White, Vito Go One-Two

TIGNES, France (Mar. 15) – With a first run score of 98.00, Shaun White (Carlsbad, CA) took European X Games halfpipe gold Wednesday night in Tignes. His nearly perfect score and huge run included a massive cab double cork 1080 that landed White with his fourth win of the season. Sprint U.S. Snowboarding Grand Prix champion Louie Vito (Sandy, UT) was second showing off his smooth style and big amplitude that put him on his fifth podium of the season.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Shaun White (Carlsbad, CA) put down a near perfect score to edge Sprint U.S. Snowboarding Grand Prix champ Louie Vito (Sandy, UT) in the European X Games.
• White’s winning run consisted of: a front side double cork 1080, to cab double cork 1080, to front side 540, back double cork 1260 to back ally-oop rodeo. It was a near flawless run for White.
• Vito’s smooth third run scored a 94.33, went like this: double crippler, double backside rodeo, front side dub cork 1080, cab double cork 1080, front side 1260. His run featured a grab on every hit. Unique to his run were four back-to-back double corks in a row.
• This is White’s fourth first place podium position for this season and debut at European X Games.
• U.S. Snowboarding’s Matt Ladley (Chicago) had a huge double 1080 in his third run that put him in fourth position with a score of 85.00. 
• U.S. Snowboarding's Benji Farrow (Ludlow, VT) had bobbles in his first two runs and pulled it together in his final to land in sixth.
• The top two spots by Americans came a day after a U.S. Snowboarding sweep of the women’s podium led by Kelly Clark (West Dover, VT).
• European X Games wraps up for the snowboarders with slopestyle Friday.

QUOTES
Shaun White
I pretty much was standing at the top of the third run and was thinking of the icy slopestyle course I have to go to and rarely take advantage of a victory lap, so I just had fun and cruised it. It finally hit me at the bottom of the pipe, man this is the first time ever getting a medal at the European X Games. It's huge for me, I came out here to do well and tonight was an amazing night. I am going to hold my celebration to a minimum until after tomorrow's slope finals. I was pretty nervous and I don't really get nervous, I did so many interviews talking about the event and what I wanted to do and I was like 'Hopefully I can do this?!' it dawned on me that this was my debut at the Euro X Games and I wanted to give a good show. I definitely felt the pressure from myself and these two guys for sure

Louie Vito
I think everyone was kind of pushing themselves. The pipe was really good and SPT always does a good job when they build a halfpipe- last year was amazing and this year's was as well. I think you just see people pushing themselves with amplitude and tricks, sometimes it clicks and sometimes it doesn't. When you are at the X Games and there is a good turnout like there was tonight and you might get a little nervous, but I think the riding was really good. It's nice you don't always look at who landed runs, but who was really pushing themselves and pushing the people around them.

OFFICIAL RESULTS

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