Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics

Hong Kong (AFP) – Olympic moguls champions Dale Begg-Smith and Jennifer Heil will be looking to dazzle in Vancouver as they bid to defend their freestyle skiing titles with confidence sky-high.

The top draw in snowboarding is Shaun White, the reigning halfpipe gold medallist, highly fancied to add to his huge haul of trophies as he takes to the air in a routine of acrobatic jumps, twists and tricks.

Australia’s Begg-Smith, 25, who took gold in the men’s moguls in Torino in 2006, was on a hot streak earlier this month, winning three World Cup competitions in a row until his run was snapped but he still tops the overall moguls standings.

Steve Desovich, coach of the Canadian-born Begg-Smith, said his charge was “quite pleased” with his form in the run-up to Vancouver.

“He’s feeling really good and he’s really peaking right in time for the Games, not that he will allow himself to think that way, because moguls is such a precarious event,” he told The Australian newspaper.

Canada’s Heil is also in top form heading into the Games, going one better than Begg-Smith and making it four World Cup wins on the trot to also top the overall standings in the moguls, in which competitors are required to perform two different jumps.

The 26-year-old is confident despite the inevitable pressure of defending her crown.

“I dealt with a lot of pressure in 2006. But I’ve grown up a lot since then,” she said after her recent win in Calgary.

China are targeting two golds in freestyle. Han Xiaopeng took gold last time around in the men’s aerials — in which competitors soar into the air, performing different jumps that combine back flips and twists — and three-time reigning world champion Li Nina took silver in the ladies’ event.

The freestyle programme is bolstered this year by the addition of ski cross which involves a timed qualification run before four skiers race down the course incorporating turns, flat sections and traverses as well as rolls, banks and ridges.

In snowboarding, there is no question that Shaun White will be the star attraction. White performs in the halfpipe, in which competitors perform their routine on the inside of a half-cylinder shaped snow tube or ramp.

The 23-year-old took gold in Torino in 2006, one of three snowboarding wins for the United States, matched by Switzerland, whose haul included the men’s and ladies’ parallel giant slalom.

But his task will be made a little easier by the absence of Kevin Pearce, one of the few riders to have beaten White in head-to-head competition. Pearce suffered a serious head injury in training this month.

In the ladies’ halfpipe American gold medallist Hannah Teter is expected to face competition from compatriot Gretchen Bleiler, who earned silver behind Teter in 2006.

Two-time world champion and two-time World Cup winner Lindsey Jacobellis is looking to add the elusive Olympic title to her medal collection in the snowboard cross, in which four racers bomb downhill over a series of jumps and ramps.

The snowboarding and freestyle skiing events will be held at Cypress Mountain, near Vancouver. The skiing runs were closed to the public earlier than planned to protect the course after a spell of warm and wet weather.