Canter Wins in Aspen, Clinches Olympic Spot; Henkes Fourth

In dramatic fashion and in front of his hometown crowd, Jake Canter took home his first career World Cup victory at the Toyota U.S. Grand Prix’s men’s snowboard slopestyle final. The win mathematically locked his spot on the 2026 Olympic team that heads to Italy in less than a month.

It was an interesting final for both the men and women on Saturday morning, with sub-degree temperatures affecting the rails and impacting even the most veteran of athletes. First to drop was 15-year-old Jess Perlmutter, who made an uncharacteristic mistake falling on the first rail. Two-time Olympic champion Jamie Anderson followed her teammate and took a heavy slam on the same rail forcing her to DNS the second run. Perlmutter was able to lace together her second attempt to finish the day in seventh place and secure the 2026 women’s slopestyle national championship title - particularly impressive given that it was her first slopestyle World Cup.

The six American men looked to turn the day around for the red, white and blue. The squad was sitting pretty with three riders in the top five as USA’s Brock Crouch and Hydro Flask U.S. Snowboard Team’s Red Gerard and Jake Canter all put down their first run. But run two was where the leaderboard started to shake up, as Judd Henkes entered the chat with his signature style to step into podium position. Second to last to drop, Canter locked in and delivered the run of his career - a 50-50 to front lipslide 270, then a back 270 on 270, a switch back 1260 nosegrab, back 1800 melon, and finally a switch noseslide 630 mute on the final section. The Aspen Valley Ski & Snowboard alum was emotional watching his score come in from the judges - an 85.16 to land him in the top spot. With one rider to go, Canter anxiously watched as Olympic big air champion Su Yiming dropped in for his final attempt. The Aspen crowd knew it would be close after China’s top rider stomped his run but his 84.18 was not enough to best Canter’s full pull.

Judd Henkes finished fourth on the day, Olympic champion Red Gerard was sixth and Brock Crouch rounded out the top-eight in eighth place. Hydro Flask U.S. Snowboard Team’s Dusty Henricksen took 14th and Sean FitzSimons 15th.

Canter's win clinched him to spot to joins Gerard on the men’s slopestyle/big air roster for the 2026 Milano Cortina Olympic Winter Games.

The team heads to Laax for the final World Cup of the season that will decide the remaining two spots on the Olympic roster.

Results
Women
Men