2025/26 Snowboard Big Air World Cup season preview

Nov 07, 2025·Snowboard Park & Pipe

Photo: @fisparkandpipe

Winter is coming and so is the start of the 2025/26 FIS Snowboard Park & Pipe World Cup season, with Big Air the first discipline to get the party started on 27 November in China.

As Big Air's best pursue precious qualification points for the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games in February, every drop-in between now and Games time will be of serious significance, with last season’s parade of world-first tricks and mind-blowing progression set to march on.

2025/26 BIG AIR CALENDAR

For the first time, China’s iconic Secret Garden has the honor of launching this year’s FIS Big Air World Cup season starting on 27 November. The Chinese snow resort has become a world-renowned stop on the international snowboard circuit since hosting the snowboard and freestyle skiing events during the Beijing 2022 Games, but it was back in 2017 when Secret Garden first hosted FIS World Cup competitions in both freeski and snowboard halfpipe. November’s season opener marks Secret Garden’s first time hosting a FIS Big Air World Cup.

After Secret Garden, riders will head to Beijing and its Olympic Big Air jump at Shougang Park. With qualification for Milano Cortina 2026 on the line, it seems fitting we return to the venue where Su Yiming won China’s first snowboard Big Air Olympic title in front of a home crowd. This will be the third time the FIS Big Air World Cup returns to the Shougang jump since Beijing 2022.

From China we head to North America to Steamboat in Colorado for our third and final stop on what is a rapid-fire 2025/26 FIS Big Air World Cup calendar. The Visa Big Air event returns to Steamboat for the second time since 2021 when that edition was also an Olympic qualifying event for the Beijing 2022 Games.

Once the finals in Steamboat wrap up on 13 December, it won’t be long until the Olympic Qualification Quota is published on 19 January 2026, after Slopestyle competitions in Aspen and Laax give the riders on the ‘park’ side of the FIS Park & Pipe equation a couple of last-chance opportunities to earn their spot at the Games.

Then it is just a short countdown until Big Air’s best take to the world stage at the Milano Cortina 2026 Games, with the Olympic Big Air competitions at Livigno Snow Park going down with the men’s finals on 7 February, followed by the women's finals on 9 February.

RIDERS TO WATCH: WOMEN

With back-to-back Big Air Crystal Globe trophies as well as the 2024/25 overall Park & Pipe Globe, British teenager Mia Brookes defended her FIS title in spectacular fashion last season. The 18-year-old also confirmed she is a Big Air and Slopestyle double threat after claiming seven podiums across eight starts, including two Big Air wins, one of which featured her signature switch frontside 1440 melon grab.

While the 2025 FIS Snowboard World Championships in Engadin (SUI) did not go to plan for Brookes, there's no stopping the teen’s progression this season as she closes in on her first Olympic Winter Games.

Japan’s Mari Fukada finished with the same amount of Big Air FIS points as Brookes last season but counted only one win among her three Big Air World Cup podium finishes, meaning she lost out to Brookes on the tiebreaker. However, the 18-year-old went on to claim bronze at the 2025 World Championships behind compatriots Kokomo Murase and Reira Iwabuchi, who took gold and silver respectively.

The strength of the Japanese team was on display throughout the Engadin 2025 World Championships, as days earlier Murase and Iwabuchi finished with respective silver and bronze medals in the Slopestyle competition. Throw in the fact that 18-year-old Momo Suzuki took fourth in the Engadin 2025 Big Air competition, along with third place finishes at the Klagenfurt (AUT) and Aspen World Cup events, and it’s impossible to argue against the fact that Japan is the most talented women’s Big Air nation on earth.

On top of World Championships silver, Iwabuchi also claimed silver at the X Games Aspen 2025 behind gold medallist and two-time Olympic Big Air champion Anna Gasser (AUT). The Austrian won a record-breaking 10th Big Air World Cup in front of a home crowd in Kreischberg (AUT) last season – but this upcoming competition season will likely be her last, as the 33-year-old is planning to retire after Milano Cortina 2026. Not one to shy away from new challenges or new tricks, her final World Cup events are the perfect canvas for Gasser to add to her history-making records as the first woman to land a cab double cork 900 in 2013, followed by a women’s first cab triple underflip in 2018.

After missing most of the 2023/24 season due to an ankle injury, Zoi Sadowski-Synnott (NZL) capped off a spectacular comeback campaign in 2024/25 with four World Cup podiums out of six starts, including one Big Air victory in Aspen (USA). The New Zealander also won her third Slopestyle World Championships title in Engadin, as well as Slopestyle gold and Big Air bronze at the X Games Aspen 2025. Sadowski-Synnott also has a full set of Olympic medals: gold in Slopestyle at Beijing 2022, silver in Big Air at the same Games, and bronze at PyeongChang 2018 when she was just 16.

Last but not least to mention in the women’s Big Air field is US snowboarding icon Jamie Anderson. In September the 35-year-old announced she would return to World Cup competition in 2025/26 to set her sights on qualifying for her fourth Olympic Winter Games at Milano Cortina 2026.

Anderson’s Olympic record already features two gold medals in Slopestyle from the Sochi 2014 and PyeongChang 2018 Games, as well as silver in Big Air from PyeongChang. Anderson last stood on a Big Air World Cup podium in 2016, but in 2021 she won two X Games gold medals after topping that year’s Big Air and Slopestyle contests to become the the most decorated woman in X Games history with 21 medals from 23 appearances.

RIDERS TO WATCH: MEN

Japan’s Taiga Hasegawa ended last season with two Crystal Globes – in Big Air and the men’s overall Park & Pipe – and the 2023 Big Air World Champion almost made it back-to-back World Champs titles in 2025 before countryman Ryoma Kimata surpassed him for the gold in Engadin.

Other riders from the outrageously stacked Japanese team to look out for this season are 2025 X Games Big Air gold medalist Hiroto Ogiwara – who landed the first-ever 2340 rotation in that competition – Yuto Miyamura, who finished third in a stacked field at the Aspen World Cup in February, and Kira Kimura, who claimed third at the Big Air Klagenfurt in January.

In first place at Aspen was Canadian teenager Eli Bouchard, who claimed what was his first World Cup victory ahead of then reigning World Champion Hasegawa. Bouchard’s winning score included points for originality from a never-before-seen triple moose flip, and the endlessly creative 17-year-old should be counted on for more fireworks in 2025/26.

Another teen going from strength to strength is the USA’s Oliver Martin. The 17-year-old claimed Big Air bronze at the 2025 World Championships, just a month after he outperformed a stacked Slopestyle field to win his first World Cup in Calgary (CAN).

Italy’s Ian Matteoli finished second in the Big Air standings last season, and the 2025/26 will be a new opportunity for the 19-year-old to keep progressing. Matteoli was runner-up at the Klagenfurt and Beijing World Cup events and has racked up five top-five finishes since 2022. Matteoli made history in Beijing by becoming the first rider to land a 2160 in FIS competition on his way to that second place finish in Beijing.

China’s Yang Wenlong enjoyed a bit of a breakout World Cup season in 2024/25 after taking third place in front of a home crowd in Beijing, then going on to win Big Air Kreischberg.

While Yang’s compatriot and Beijing 2022 Big Air Olympic champion Su Yiming fought through some nagging injuries and struggled to find form during the World Cup season, he was able pull it all together to claim silver in Slopestyle at the World Championships. Early season clips from Su’s social media channels suggest the 21-year-old is back in top form ahead of the upcoming season.

Other contenders to watch this Big Air season are France’s Romain Allemand – who finished third at Big Air Chur 2024 and fourth at the World Championships – and Rocco Jamieson (NZL), who topped the European Cup Premium in Corvatsch (SUI) in April.

Canadian snowboarding icon Mark McMorris finished third at that same event, which was the 31-year-old’s only Big Air podium last season. The rider widely considered to be the best competition snowboarder of all time on the men’s side of things is in a tough battle to earn a spot on the Canadian team for his fourth Olympic Winter Games go-around.