How are FIS points calculated in park & pipe?

A freeskier on the FIS circuit collects two kinds of points, and they answer different questions.

FIS points measure the level of a rider across the whole FIS calendar. Every international park & pipe competition registered with FIS awards them (FIS Points rules 5.1). They feed the FIS points list, and that list is what the jury uses to seed start lists: under ICR 3604.1 riders are classified from the WSPL/FIS points list, and riders missing from it go into the group without points.

World Cup points only exist at World Cup events. They come from a fixed table by place and add up to the season standings.

The two systems share one rule. When riders tie, ICR 3503 gives them the same rank and therefore the same points.

Rule 5.2 of the FIS Points rules gives one formula for all slopestyle, halfpipe and big air events, in freeski and in snowboard alike. The winner receives the event factor. Every rider ranked below 1st place gets:

P = EF × ((1 − d) × (e^(−(R−1)/t) − (R−1) × e^(−(N−1)/t) / (N−1)) + d × (1 − (R−1) / (N − 0.96)))

The first part is an exponential curve that drops fast after the podium. The second part, weighted at 25 %, is a straight line from the winner down to the last place. Together they make the gap between 2nd and 3rd much larger than the gap between 15th and 16th.

The result is rounded up to the first decimal, and nobody gets less than 0.1 point. Judges' scores do not appear in the formula. A run of 92 and a run of 71 that both win their contests earn the same EF if the scales match.

Take a FIS-level freeski slopestyle with EF 220 and 20 riders ranked. Plug each rank into the formula and round up to one decimal.

The podium takes most of the value. Second place keeps 82 % of the winner's points, 5th place about half, 10th less than a quarter. The last rider gets 0.2, just above the 0.1 floor.

The field size matters as much as the rank. With the same EF 220 and only 12 riders, 2nd place drops to 177.6 and 10th to 19.1, because each place covers a bigger slice of the curve. In a small youth field, the points fall away within a few places.

Organizers do not pick the event factor. Rule 5.2.2 ties every level of competition to a band of scales, and the field decides where inside the band the event lands. The top number of each band is the best EF that competition can reach, the lower one is its floor.

The FIS Open stands out. It may be held once a season in a nation or region, and its band runs from 1000 all the way down to 50, so a strong field can lift it to World Cup values.

Only riders who actually started count. FIS looks at the 5 best women or 8 best men on the current FIS points list among the starters (rule 5.2.3).

Level 1 (World Cup and above) uses their average list rank. To get the 1000 scale, that average must be 6 or better for women and 9 or better for men. With fewer than 5 women or 8 men holding an active rank, the event gets the level 1 minimum.

Levels 2 to 4 use average points. Add the FIS points of those 5 or 8 starters, divide by 5 or 8, and round up to a whole number (the rules' own example: 380.4 becomes 381). Then take the highest scale whose entry value that average reaches. If fewer than 5 women or 8 men started, the band loses its floor and lower scales from the table open up.

A men's freeski Continental Cup where the top eight starters average 250.2 points gets 251. That clears the 237 needed for scale 320 and misses the 267 needed for 360, so the winner earns 320.

Each event (slopestyle, halfpipe, big air) has its own list value. During the season, a rider's points are the average of the two best results in that event, or the base list value if that is better (rule 5.4.1).

• One result in the season: it counts minus 40 %, unless the base list value is better (5.4.2, 5.4.3).
• No result in a whole season: the next base list cuts the old value by 80 % (5.3.2.2).
• Approved injury status: the new base list value cannot fall more than 10 % below the old one (5.3.3).

The base list (BL) is published before the end of June. List number one of the new season follows on 1 July.

Only results inside the evaluation period count. In Central Europe, North America and Asia it runs from 1 October to 30 April, with the World Cup as an exception. In the Southern Hemisphere it runs from 1 July to 15 October (rule 1.2).

100. Article 1.7.1 of the World Cup rules gives park & pipe (and aerials) a table for places 1 to 30, ending with 1 point for 30th. A rider in 31st place scores nothing.

Moguls, dual moguls, ski cross, snowboard cross and alpine snowboard use article 1.7.2. The two tables agree up to 13th place. From 14th on, the cross and moguls table pays more: one point more for 14th (19 instead of 18), two more for every place from 15th to 30th, and it runs to 32nd place. If you copy a World Cup table into a club spreadsheet, check which of the two you took.

A national cup stop that is not on the FIS calendar awards no FIS points. Rule 1.1 counts only competitions announced in the FIS calendar or registered with FIS and run under the ICR.

A national series can keep its own cup table. The Polish Cup in snowboard and freeski 2025/26 (PZN), for example, ranks riders by the table in the PZN sports guidelines, which the cup regulation itself does not print. We publish no national values here. Ask your federation for the current table before the season.

JudgeMate does not calculate FIS points and does not send results to FIS. For an event on the FIS calendar, the competition's data system sends the results to FIS in the FIS XML format (ICR 3405 recommends a FIS-certified system). To check the formula for your own field, use the FIS park & pipe points calculator.

What a Freeskiing category does have is a Cup points column. The organizer opens it from the category menu, even before the first run, and picks a table:

• FIS 100-1: the World Cup park & pipe table for 30 places, built in.
• Upload points tables: an .xlsx or .csv sheet with places in the first column and one table per column. You pick the table by its points for 1st place, which suits a national series where the event rank sets the table.

Tied riders share the place and the points, and riders without a run get none. The points appear in the results, on the public event page and in the results PDF. The ranking itself does not change.

JudgeMate breaks ties differently from ICR 3503. Before two riders share a place, JudgeMate compares their runs: best run, then second run, then best trick if it is on, then third run. Riders FIS would rank equal can end up one place apart, with different cup points. Look at close scores before you send the table to the series coordinator.

Start from the freeski page or open a new Freeskiing category. The freeski setup film shows the category steps.