On March 23, 2013, I took part in the X Over 1* Freeride World Qualifier Contest on the Kitzsteinhorn in Salzburgerland. This contest in late winter was also the last part of the Open Faces series.
Registration at the valley station started at seven o'clock in the morning. The queue of freeriders was quite long, but eventually everyone was provided with their start number and goodie bag. Then it was off to the Langwiedboden for the face check. The riders' meeting started at a quarter past eight, where we were given all the important information about the course of the contest, the judging criteria and safety. Then the ascent to the start began. The women started a little further down, the men climbed up to the summit to get to their starting gate. Once we arrived at the start, we had to wait a short while until the women were cleared to start. The snow conditions looked pretty good and the slope was still untracked, plus the sun was shining perfectly. I was therefore looking forward to my run. I watched the runs of the riders in front of me. There was always one snowboarder and one skier starting alternately. The skier in front of me was Sabine Schipflinger, who unfortunately had bad luck and crashed, even breaking one of her bindings. Fortunately, she escaped without injury. The slope was not completely visible from the top, so we had to wait and puzzle over what had happened. Relieved, we finally saw Sabine cross the finish line.
As the sixth starter, it was my turn: I decided to ski the first part of the slope in the fall line and only made the first turn in the snow a little further down, followed by two more jumps over snow cornices and I was already through the finish line, where I was able to relax and watch the rest of the contest. The award ceremony took place at the Langwiedboden in the early afternoon. To my great delight, I was able to achieve third place in the women's snowboarding category with my run.
