Britt Cox puts world moguls title down to patience and hard work

No Australian winter athlete has had a more dominant season than new world moguls champion Britt Cox.

Britt Cox soars during the women’s moguls competition in Sierra Nevada, Spain.

No Australian winter athlete has had a more dominant season than new moguls world champion Britt Cox.

The 22-year-old from Mount Beauty in Victoria has compiled a beautiful set of numbers over the past four months.

Yesterday’s world title in Sierra Nevada, Spain, seemed almost a formality after Cox racked up seven World Cup victories to clinch the series title, freestyle skiing overall title and world No 1 ranking.

She led at every stage of yesterday’s competition and held her nerve as the balmy weather threatened to deconstruct the world championships course.

Cox was the last to ski in the six-woman final and needed to outdo the precocious French teenager Perrine Laffont, who had already scored 82.51 points on her run. But Cox glided down the course with the metronomic consistency she has developed this season, putting together flawless turns and two solid jumps to clinch her first world title with 83.63 points, a full point clear of the field.

Canada’s reigning Olympic champion, Justine Dufour-­Lapointe, claimed the bronze medal with 80.74 points.

Despite all of her success this year, including a victory on next year’s Olympic course in South Korea, Cox said she never lost sight of the fact the world title was the key event of the year.

 “All season this was the event in the back of my mind, this was the event that I really wanted to be successful at,” she said. “To be successful here and ski the way I did, I couldn’t be happier.” 

The unassuming Cox, who at 15 was the youngest athlete at the Vancouver Olympics, where she made her Games debut in 2010, has steadily worked her way up the mountain to a position of pre-eminence as she approaches her third Winter Olympics.

Despite the flashy nature of her sport, hers is a victory for the less flamboyant virtues of patience and hard work.

 “A lot of people have been asking me what clicked this season and I don’t think anything necessary clicked, it was more a matter of all the training I have done over a number of years finally paying off for me,” Cox said.

“My coaches are huge advocates for basics and fundamentals and I’ve learnt from them that to be successful consistently you have to master those basics and fundamentals and we’ve worked hard on that for a long time and I think it’s finally starting to pay off for me.’’

She will go into the Olympic season both confident and hungry for more success.

“There’s still so much more I want to do with my skiing ... to hopefully put myself in the best position to do the run of my life next year,” she said.

Australia’s next generation was also well represented in Sierra Nevada, with 18-year-old Jakara Anthony finishing 12th (75.45 points) in her first senior season.

It was a more difficult day for the Australian men, who fell short of the six-man final in which Japan’s Ikuma Horishima upset Canada’s longstanding world No 1 ­Mikael Kingsbury. Brodie Summers was the highest-placed Australian in 11th, with Matt Graham in 14th and Rohan Chapman-­Davies in 15th.

Australia’s world-class aerials team, led by 2010 Olympic champion Lydia Lassila, will compete for medals tonight in Spain, and reigning world halfpipe champion Scotty James will defend his title tomorrow.