How do you organize a freeski competition?

A freeski event sits somewhere on a ladder: a club jam, a national championship (NC), a FIS-level event with a FIS codex, a Continental Cup (CoC), then World Cup, World Championships and Olympics. The ICR loosens several rules at the bottom of that ladder.

• A jam heat, with as many runs as fit in a time window, is allowed only at NC, FIS level and below (ICR 3504.3).
• 2 best of x may be used only for single-hit events or a short slopestyle with one kicker and one rail at FIS level and below (3502.3).
• From CoC upwards, judges must type scores into keypads or tablets; below that, a spreadsheet is the minimum (3405).
• The minimum age for international halfpipe, slopestyle and big air is 13, and 15 for major events (2013.3.1, 2013.3.2).

Youth series often sit on top of FIS-level events. The FIS Junior Regional Cup rules for 2025/2026 group freestyle nations into a Central Europe region that includes the Czech Republic, Austria, Germany and Switzerland.

ICR 3301.1 names three jury members at every park and pipe contest: the technical delegate (TD), the head judge and the chief of competition. A contest director joins them at World Cup, World Championships, Junior Worlds, Youth Olympics and Olympics, and at a Continental Cup when one is present. Where a contest director sits on the jury, he or she chairs it; otherwise the TD does (3301).

The chief of competition is the organizer's person. ICR 3304 gives this role the judges' stand (building it, tables, chairs, partitions, heaters), food for the judges and attendance at every team captains' meeting. A club contest has no TD, yet it still needs someone to decide disputes and someone to keep the judges warm. Name both before the day.

The jury sets the format from field size, course, weather and time, then announces it at the team captains' meeting (TCM) before the draw (ICR 3603). The list of decisions:

• number of qualification heats;
• semifinal or not, and whether some skiers go straight to the final;
• a finals-only format for small categories;
• how many skiers move to the next phase;
• counting runs;
• heat procedure: single judging, double up or jam.

In bad weather the jury may drop qualification and run finals only, provided there is time for official practice. Write the format down and post it next to the start list, so a coach who skipped the TCM can read it.

Many club events mix skiers and snowboarders on one course. If two disciplines run at the same time, ICR 3504.2 asks for a completely separate judging panel for each discipline.

Qualification runs in heats per gender (ICR 3501.1.1). Recommended sizes differ by event:

A gender or category below these numbers rides as one single heat.

Seeding follows the WSPL or FIS points list (3501.1.2). With two heats, ranks 1, 4, 5, 8, 9 go to heat 1 and ranks 2, 3, 6, 7, 10 to heat 2. With three heats the pattern is 1, 6, 7, 12 / 2, 5, 8, 11 / 3, 4, 9, 10. Skiers without points are drawn at random below those with points, which at a youth contest is often most of the field.

Age categories are separate heats, and a category with fewer than four skiers may be joined with the next older or younger one (3501.3). Below World Cup level (CoC, FIS and other events) the ICR recommends that about a third of the field moves on (3501.2).

For each skier, ICR 3701.1 asks for bib, family name, first name, nation, year of birth (YB) and FIS code. Stance appears only in snowboard events, so a freeski list has one column fewer.

The header carries the FIS codex, date, venue, sponsor, the signatures of the TD and chief of results, the jury, the officials with judge positions A to X, and the weather with air and snow temperature. Course data depends on the event. A big air list gives the distance from take-off to sweet spot, the take-off angle, the landing gradient and the take-off height above the knuckle. A halfpipe list gives length, width, height and gradient. Measure these when the course is shaped, not on the morning of the contest.

Once the unofficial start list is out, team captains have 15 minutes to report an error to the jury. After that the list becomes official and goes to officials, coaches, skiers and media (2020.2).

The final start order is the same for every final run and comes from qualification or semifinal results (ICR 3604.3). Skiers who qualified directly start from the lower qualification score to the higher, so the best qualifier drops last.

Big air has its own rule (3604.3.1). In a 2 best of 3 final, runs 1 and 2 follow the qualification order, and the third run goes in reverse order of the ranking after run 2. In a two-run final, the second run may go in reverse order of the ranking after run 1. If scores are equal, the worse seeding position starts first.

The third big air run is where the contest is decided, so plan a short pause after run 2 to print the new order and hand it to the start referee and the speaker.

The Polish ski federation (PZN) runs its Puchar Polski in park and pipe for snowboard and freeski. In the 2025/26 rules, freeski has big air and slopestyle, and the freeski standings add up all big air and slopestyle starts. Age groups go by birth year: senior 2007 and older, junior (U18) 2008–2010, junior młodszy (U15) 2011–2012, młodzik (U13) 2013–2015.

Two of its rules bind the organizer directly. Results go to the federation office as PDF and Excel straight after the event. A start counts for the cup only when at least four Polish athletes started and finished it, so a category of three is a nice day out and nothing more for the standings.

Other countries do it differently. Read your federation's current document for the season before you set categories or a points table.

1. Open Create with Freeskiing selected. One event holds every category of the weekend.
2. Add one category per birth-year group and gender. Pick the type per category: Freeskiing for slopestyle, Big Air Skiing or Halfpipe Skiing. Halfpipe Skiing and Big Air Skiing have no best trick round.
3. For big air 2 best of 3, choose Sum of best rounds and count 2. For best of 2 or best of 3, keep Best round.
4. Turn on Head judge releases scores, so nothing reaches the board before the head judge publishes the run.
5. Add a field named YoB for the birth-year column and a public field FIS code. Public fields hold up to 40 characters.
6. Import the start list from a spreadsheet with first and last name in separate columns. A column named like one of your fields fills that field.
7. Use Add to categories to put one judge, head judge or speaker into many categories at once, and add a co-organizer, who gets your rights in the whole event, from the same window.
8. After qualification, Add next round creates the final from the skiers above the cut line.

Cup points can follow the FIS table (100, 80, 60 down to 1 point for 30th) or your own sheet. The start list and results export to PDF with chosen columns and up to six sponsor logos, and the whole event exports to XLSX. The freeski tutorial with Mate shows each step.

• No FIS XML. ICR 3405 requires results in the FIS XML format, so an event with a FIS codex sends them through a FIS data provider.
• No import from the FIS database. The FIS code is an ordinary field filled from your spreadsheet.
• Ties are broken. JudgeMate splits a tie by best run, then second run. ICR 3503 keeps tied skiers on the same rank.
• Drop high and low starts at five judges. FIS starts at six, so with five judges leave the switch off.
• No automatic variety check in big air. If a skier repeats a trick, the judge marks the run DNI by hand.
• No jam. Every category has a fixed number of runs.
• No carry-over. The final starts at zero; the qualification score stays in the qualification category.