KEY POINTS:
Top-ranked Japanese rider Ryoh Aono produced the highest scoring run on the first day of the Snowboard World Cup near Queenstown today.
In near-perfect conditions at Cardrona, Aono booked himself a berth in tomorrow's finals with a blistering second run.
He was flat in the morning before pulling out all stops in the afternoon, impressing judges with his trademark massive air and consistently-landed tricks to score a total of 44.2 points.
He was joined automatically in the finals by five others, including three compatriots - Kohdai Watanabe, Daisuki Murakami and Kohhei Kudoh.
The others through are American Broc Waring and Christophe Schmidt of Germany, who is competing for the first time after a year off with injury.
The six top riders qualified directly for the finals while the next 12 will battle it out in the semifinals tomorrow morning to fill the remaining berths.
Through to the semifinals are New Zealanders Ben Stewart and James Hamilton, who are the highest ranked of those who missed automatic qualifying with 40.9 and 39.3 points respectively.
The 2008 World Cup halfpipe champion, Iouri Podladtichikov of Switzerland was below his best, just sneaking through to the semis with 36.3 points.
Jiayu Liu of China continued her domination of the women's competition with a convincing top qualifying score of 41.6, ahead of Japan's Shiho Nakashima and Sina Candrian of Switzerland.
The six-woman semifinals qualifiers will include New Zealander Juliane Bray, who scored 32.9 today.
- NZPA
