World Cup aerials win for St. Onge

AMERICA'S Ryan St. Onge has claimed freestyle World Cup gold for the first time in two years with victory in front of a home crowd in Utah.

St. Onge, along with China's Li Nina, who won the women's event, topped the podium in the aerials competition.

It was St. Onge's sixth career title - three of which have come at Deer Valley - with China's Liu Zhongging second and Canada's Steve Omischi, who leads the overall rankings, third.

"During that second jump, I knew I was either going to be way too big and land on my head," he said.

"But if I could somehow get my feet underneath me, I knew it was going to be the biggest-scoring jump I could possibly do.

"I just stretched for my life and somehow, my feet got down."

China's Guo Xinxin was second in the women's, ahead of American Emily Cook.

China was poised for a sweep of the podium, but Cheng Shuang took a fall right before Li's clinching jump.

Li still had to go with the final women's jump and did well enough to pass Guo, whose 108.11 on her second jump was the highest score of the night by almost ten points.

Li led after qualifying with a new jump, a double back flip with two twists on each.

"I'm very, very happy today," she said. "It's the first time in World Cup I did that jump."

---

RELATED: Defending champion Omischl bags first World Cup win

---