Will Jackways and ‘Team Wells’ Win The 2020 Obsidian
Our Aloe Up Ambassador and Kiwi Snowboard legend Will Jackways has spent the best part of the last couple of weeks taking part in the New Zealand Winter Game’s new team format tournament, the Obsidian. The Obsidian event is in place of the usual Winter Games events which were unable to go ahead due to COVID-19 induced travel restrictions. Each of the four teams is made up of nine people, seven are a combo of New Zealand’s top skiers and snowboarders, both Men and Women plus two videographers. These teams then competed in four main events; big air, park jam, freeride and a ‘mountain shred’ video part. The videographers then take all the footage from all four events to create a seven minute long team highlights video, which is also judged.
Will was part of ‘Team Wells’ captained by one of New Zealand’s most successful skiers and former X Games gold medallist Jossi Wells. Team Wells was full of heavy hitters including Freeride World Tour event winner Craig Murry, 2018 Winter Olympic bronze medallist Nico Porteous, Big Air and Slopestyle World Cup athlete Margaux Hackett, Freeride World Tour competitor Claire McGregor and Winter Olympian Carlos Garcia Knight.
Will helped remind some of the younger crew of his freestyle roots by placing 5th in the Big Air and backed up that performance with a 6th place finish in the Park Jam, both held at Cardrona Parks. Then Will flexed his backcountry credentials by making the podium in the freeride event held way out in the Minaret Range!
Will’s Team was assigned with Coronet Peak as their venue for the ‘Mountain Shred’ video part. The team spent the day tearing up the resort and with the help of their videographers (Two Bearded Men Productions) and some air guitar from Will J, managed to stitch together a winning video section!
After compiling four events worth of footage and condensing it down to a final seven minute highlights video, a premiere evening was held to showcase all the teams edits and celebrate an exciting couple of weeks of competition. The Team Wells highlights vid was deemed good enough for second place, giving Will J and the rest of his Team Wells team mates the overall 2020 Obsidian title!
