2025/26 Freeski Halfpipe World Cup season preview
Dec 01, 2025·Freeski Park & Pipe)
The countdown is on for the start of 2025/26 FIS Freeski Halfpipe World Cup season, with the first action of an all-important Olympic campaign beginning on 11 December in China’s Secret Garden — the first of five Halfpipe World Cup events to take place over the next four months.
December also marks less than 60 days until the qualification window for the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games closes on 19 January. With the chance to compete on the world’s largest winter sports stage undoubtedly on everybody's minds, every run and every trick will be carrying a little added significance for the next month and a half.
2025/26 FREESKI HALFPIPE CALENDAR
China’s Secret Garden resort is no stranger to Halfpipe World Cup events, with China’s finest pipe having hosted events since its very first FIS World Cup for Freeski and Snowboard Halfpipe in 2017. Secret Garden is also where the Halfpipe, Slopestyle, Ski and Snowboard Cross, Aerials and Moguls events were held during the Beijing 2022 Games. This year‘s season opener beginning on 11 December marks the first time skiers will start their season in a former Olympic pipe.
From China we head to the United States of America for the first of two World Cup events held in Colorado this season. Copper Mountain has been an annual stop on the World Cup tour nearly every season since 2011, and this year you can expect the skiers of the heavyweight U.S. team to be out in full force when competition begins on 18 December as they vie for one of the four national Olympic spots available for the Milano Cortina 2026 Games.
After Copper the tour heads into a quick Christmas break before reconvening in Calgary (CAN) for a halfpipe-themed New Year’s Eve gathering ahead of qualifications on 1 January. One of the longest-running and most historic venues in Freestyle Skiing, Calgary previously hosted the the Halfpipe World Cup season finale events in 2025 and 2024. This time around, however, the Albertan city serves to celebrate the new year and mark the midway point of the World Cup season with night-time finals on 3 January.
From Canada skiers head back down to U.S. snow, where Aspen will not just be the fourth stop of the season beginning on 7 January 2026, it also represents the last chance for Halfpipe skiers to qualify for Milano Cortina before the Olympic Qualification quota is published on 19 January 2026. From that moment, it will be exactly one month until Freeski Halfpipe competition starts at at Milano Cortina 2026 on 19 February.
Following the Games, skiers will have a few weeks break until the season finale in Silvaplana (SUI) beginning on 25 March to decide who will walk away with the women’s and men’s Crystal Globe. This fifth and final stop of the 2025/26 FIS Freeski Halfpipe World Cup season in the Corvatsch ski area’s new halfpipe comes a year after it also hosted the Engadin 2025 FIS Freeski World Championships competition.
SKIERS TO WATCH: WOMEN
British skier Zoe Atkin wrapped up last World Cup season by sharing the discipline’s Crystal Globe with China’s Li Fanghui. Atkin then went one better by winning World Championships gold ahead of Li by 0.50 points at the Engadin 2025 FIS Freeski World Championships. With Bakuriani 2023 silver and Aspen 2021 bronze already to her credit, Atkin was able to complete the full set with her Engadin 2025 gold performance.
The shared Crystal Globe between Atkin and Li was the first time in FIS Freeski World Cup history that two skiers ended up with identical World Cup results of one victory, two second place finishes, and a fifth place finish. The pair have also swapped medal positions in other contests: Li was the 2025 X Games superpipe silver medallist, while Atkin missed out on the podium with fourth place. A year earlier, Atkin was the X Games superpipe silver medallist. With Milano Cortina 2026 on everyone’s minds, it will be interesting to see how the Li vs. Atkin rivalry plays out in the coming months.
No discussion about Freeski Halfpipe is complete without mentioning China’s Eileen Gu. The 22-year-old double Olympic champion in Halfpipe and Big Air did not compete at the 2025 World Championships due to injury, but she still ended her World Cup season with four wins from four starts, including a Slopestyle victory at the prestigious Laax Open. Her three Halfpipe World Cup victories also extended her win record to a historic 18 World Cup victories of which 14 were in Halfpipe. In short, Gu is the standard by which all others are measured, and any World Cup in which her name is on the start list is one in which she is expected to win.
Canada’s Cassie Sharpe was runner-up to Gu in Halfpipe at Beijing 2022, and before that she was the outright Olympic Halfpipe champion at the PyeongChang 2018 Games. After stepping away from the sport in 2022, 33-year-old Sharpe came back in a big way last season with top-five finishes in four of her five World Cup starts, including third in Copper. Sharpe followed that up with a bronze at the 2025 World Championships in Engadin, her third World Championships medal after silver at both the 2019 and 2015 editions. Sharpe also won X Games ski superpipe gold in 2025.
Joining Sharpe in the quest to represent Canada at Milano Cortina 2026 are Rachael Karker and Amy Fraser. Karker finished fourth behind Sharpe at the Engadin 2025 World Championships after a World Cup season in which she claimed two third-place finishes in Cardrona (NZL) and Calgary. Engadin marked Karker’s fourth World Championships start, and only the second in which she didn’t claim a medal after securing silver and bronze in 2021 and 2023 respectively. Karker also claimed bronze behind Sharpe at Beijing 2022. Fraser, on the other hand, counted just one podium finish among her results last season, with third at the Copper World Cup.
Another North American name to look out for this season is Svea Irving (USA). The 23-year-old was third behind Gu and Li at the Secret Garden World Cup in 2024 and missed out on a podium finish three times last season with fourth place at Cardrona, Copper and Aspen. Irving finished fifth at the 2025 World Championships, her best result in three World Champs starts.
SKIERS TO WATCH: MEN
Following the announcement during the off-season that Beijing 2022 Halfpipe gold medalist Nico Porteous was retiring from World Cup competition at the age of 23, New Zealand’s figurative Freeski Halfpipe baton has now been passed on to 19-year-old Finley Melville Ives. The teenager was still 18 when he became World Champion in March after outclassing long-time idols Alex Ferreira (USA) and Nick Goepper (USA). Melville Ives’ gold medal-winning performance capped off a 2024/25 season in which he progressively worked his way to the World Cup podium by qualifying for every final before winning the Halfpipe season finale in Calgary ahead of runner-up Goepper and third-placed Ferreira.
Thirty-one-year-old Ferreira’s bronze at the 2025 World Championships was his second consecutive bronze medal after also finishing third at the 2023 edition. Ferreira will be hoping to complete his Olympic medal set at Milano Cortina to add to the bronze and silver medals from the Beijing 2022 and PyeongChang 2018 Games respectively. Ferreira currently leads the all-time men’s Freeski Halfpipe World Cup standings with 11 wins from a total of 20 podium finishes. Five of those podiums came from the 2024/25 season alone when Ferreira won two competitons, was runner-up in two, and ended the season with third place in Calgary.
Already a three-time Olympic Slopestyle medalist, Goepper’s switch to Halfpipe in recent years has also netted him a 2025 World Championships silver medal and four top-three World Cup finishes last season. The 31-year-old is targeting his fourth Games at Milano Cortina 2026 to hopefully add Olympic gold to his silver medals from PyeongChang 2018 and Beijing 2022, as well as bronze from Sochi 2014.
Another U.S. veteran also chasing a fourth Olympic Winter Games this World Cup season is 35-year-old David Wise. The two-time Olympic champion from Sochi 2014 and PyeongChang 2018 went on to claim silver at Beijing 2022 behind Porteous. Last season Wise counted two top-five finishes among his four World Cup starts, including third place in Secret Garden for a U.S. medal sweep with Ferreira and Goepper in second and first place respectively.
Leading the Canadian charge in men’s Freeski Halfpipe is former World Champion Brendan Mackay. The 28-year-old finished seventh at the Engadin 2025 World Championships after winning gold at the 2023 edition. Mackay was one of four Canadians who finished outside of the top five in Engadin, with Dylan Marineau, Andrew Longino and Noah Bowman in eighth, ninth and 10th place respectively. Mackay also won the Cardrona World Cup last season while Logino was third. Mackay was also runner-up at Copper in a 10-man final featuring seven U.S. skiers.
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