SNOW BOARDING

After a relatively rapid rise to popularity snowboarding, now more popular than Alpine skiing in most of the world, will be making its debut at this year's Olympics.

Many believe that snowboarding originated when Sherman Poppen invented the 'snurfer' - the first mass produced snowboard - in 1966

The next major development in board technology came in 1977 when Tom Sims modified his skateboard into the 'Flying Yellow Banana'.

The sports popularity grew throughout the 1980s, being popularised through surf and skating magazines, and in 1981 the first snowboard event took place.

By the following decade the sport had become more mainstream in-turn strengthening its place as a recognised sport.

The snowboarding competition, to be held at Shiga Kogen, will be divided into sections - the giant slalom (alpine) event and the halfpipe (freestyle) event.

The giant slalom event will see each rider race twice in the course of a day. The rider with the lowest aggregate time will win gold.

In the halfpipe event there are 20 female riders and 35 male. In each run the riders will be scored on their standard technique, rotation, height, landing and technical merit.

After the first run the four highest scoring women and the eight highest scoring men progress to the final.

The remaining riders go into the second round and again the four highest scoring women and the eight highest scoring men go through to the final with the rest dropping out.

There are two runs in the final and the best combined scores count.

© PA Sporting Life