X-Games champion Jenny Jones may yet get chance to realise her Olympic dream

GREAT Britain's Jenny Jones has seen her hopes of competing at Sochi 2014 boosted after slopestyle snowboarding took a step closer to Olympic inclusion.

EDGING CLOSER: Double X-Games champion Jenny Jones' hopes of competing at the Winter Olympics in Sochi have taken a step forward following an FIS Congress in Turkey

Jones, 29, is the reigning double X-Games slopestyle champion but despite conquering all before her in the past two years, was forced to watch the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics from her living room.

Despite its popularity in snowsport circles, slopestyle has been overlooked for Olympic inclusion in the past but at the recent International Ski Federation Congress in Turkey, the discipline took a giant step towards being added the programme for Sochi 2014.

The FIS voted unanimously to add slopestyle to the World Snowboarding Championships, while a proposal to submit slopestyle to the International Olympic Committee was also discussed in positive tones.

Jones is arguably the most successful ever snowsport athlete from the UK and would be considered a genuine contender to claim Great Britain's first ever snowsport Olympic medal in Sochi.

Another champion of slopestyle's cause is American superstar Shaun White, who wowed packed audiences in Vancouver on his way to defending his Olympic halfpipe crown.

White, 23, is the marque name of snowboarding. He made an estimated $8m in sponsorship last year, while according to Forbes magazine he tops the Winter Olympian rich list.

And he has publicly called on the IOC and the FIS to add slopestyle to the Olympic schedule and give him the chance to compete in more than one discipline in Sochi.