The week leading up to Mt. Sima’s first Freestyle Canada slopestyle Canada Cup event, Tyler Nichol was in the shop welding rails.

With more than 15 years experience building parks and features for snowsports – including the Vancouver Olympic halfpipe – Nichol knew the judges wanted to see a more technical rail section, so he set to work making it.

And the night before official training began, he installed them, using the light from a snowmachine on the mountain’s terrain park. The hand-made custom rails complemented a course already thought out and created by Nichol, including the three “scoopy” jumps at the bottom of the course where, in just a few short hours, skiers would be taking off and performing dizzying tricks for hillside spectators.

And as the training day ended, Nichol received the ultimate compliment for his work.

Neither the athletes – who had come from across the country to compete in the first Canada Cup event of the season – nor their coaches wanted any changes made.

“They’re like, ‘It’s awesome, we love it, don’t touch it. Don’t change anything,’” said Nichol.

What followed was more than 80 athletes, including NextGen national team athletes, who are targeting the 2022 Olympics, styling the course.

They hit the rails, then the jumps, trying out their bags of tricks in the first competition of the 2016/17 season.

Julie Steggall, the sport’s high performance athlete director said that Freestyle Canada chose to host the event here after hearing about the solid conditions and the terrain from athletes who had attended Mt. Sima’s pre-season training in previous seasons.

“This year we decided to put on an event and the club was behind it and Mt. Sima was 100 per cent behind it,” she said. “It was an amazing, amazing event for us to kick off the Canada Cup Series.”

She said they are likely to return again next year.

By Saturday evening, the finals were set: six women and 24 men would hit the hill in pursuit of the early season win.

Two local athletes had made the list: Etienne Geoffroy-Gagnon and Miguel Rodden, who had qualified in first after a high-scoring rail section from qualifiers.

“It was arguably one of the best rail sections of the competition,” said Yukon coach Graham Pollock, who was coaching his first national-level competition.

“The best skiers in Canada were at this event,” said Pollock. And though Yukon’s top finish in the final was an 8th placing by Geoffroy-Gagnon (Rodden was 22nd), Pollock was pleased with the team’s performance.

“It was really cool that we had some kids that skied really well,” he said. “They were really stoked on their runs.”

Also competing from the Yukon were Dylan Reed (26th), Niko Rodden (41st), Argus Huggard (59th) and Evyn Dinn.

“The Yukon kids skied really well. They were very impressive,” said Steggall. “I’m looking for some pretty great things coming from that Yukon club.”

Earning the first win of the season was Quebec’s Philippe Langevin, who earned an 87.41 best run in the final.

“I am so excited to finish first in the first competition of the year,” he said after receiving his medal at the bottom of the hill.

Second was Ontario’s Matthew Wilcox (84.16) and rounding out the podium was Alberta’s Max Moffat (83.41).

On the women’s side, Ontario’s Nikki Blackall won with an 84.41.

“It’s been good,” she said of the competition. “A super comfortable course. It’s nice to start off on something that was built well and a good size for people to get some tricks on to start the season.

“Qualifications were good. I got the tun I wanted to. I kept it pretty mellow and luckily landed pretty clean, so I think that helped me out and today I just upped my rails a little bit and tried to get my grabs better and go a little bigger.”

In second was Alberta’s Bryana Cressey (76.41), while B.C.’s Sofia Tchernetsky (74.33) was third.

Blackall complimented the build of the park, calling the jumps “really comfortable.”

Skiers didn’t really need to check their speed going into any section of the jump, something that Nichol calls “flow.”

“For me as a builder, it’s controlling the momentum throughout the course,” he said.

“So it’s like understanding momentum and being able to to build to it so the speed is just perfect.”

Race organizers were also appreciative of the local volunteers.

“Everything ran like clockwork all weekend,” said technical delegate Brian Spence, who came up from Penticton. “The mountain was really supportive... they worked really hard to get everything in place. Anything we needed, they got for us. You don’t get that support at a lot of mountains.”

This weekend also marked the official opening of Mt. Sima to the public.

After a little TLC, riders will be able to enjoy the park as well. It’ll remain in its competition configuration at least for a while.

“That’ll stay there until we get bored of it,” said Nichol.

The next Canada Cup will take place in Silverstar, B.C. Jan. 10-15.