Ski cross competitors find themselves on a crash course

Bright sun, snow and plenty of strong Canadian beer was flowing at the Cypress Mountain venue.

And all before noon.

There was little doubt that the newest Winter Olympic sport, ski cross, would prove to be a hit with spectators, TV viewers and competitors as it made its highly awaited debut Sunday.

Ski cross had them at “hello.” Or maybe with the first spectacular crash.

“Some people live for long walks on the beach, and I live to be standing at the top of a ski-cross course getting ready for the final,” said Errol Kerr of Truckee, Calif., who represented Jamaica.

In the first crash of the afternoon, highly decorated former Alpine star Daron Rahlves of the United States collided with Ted Piccard of France in the first round.

That was the first of several crashes -- though, thankfully, there wasn’t the carnage like at the recent X Games in Aspen, Colo., which sent Rahlves to the hospital.

The final crash of the day was painful, physically and emotionally.

Canadian Chris Del Bosco, who was raised in Vail, Colo., appeared to be headed for bronze when he aggressively attacked the next-to-last jump and went down hard.

Gold medalist Michael Schmid of Switzerland was well ahead of the pack, skiing nearly flawlessly all afternoon and easily beating Andreas Matt of Austria. Audun Groenvold of Norway took the bronze.

Rahlves had described ski cross in terms of a New York cabbie racing through traffic, trying not to crash. NASCAR was invoked too, by more than one skier.

“I still had fun today. . . . In Alpine, we’ve got a clock,” Rahlves said. “Here you can just see what’s happening. There’s a lot of stuff going on.”

Only with a minimal amount of protection.

“You’re putting four guys at a time -- that gives you eight poles, 12 edges and guys are racing down a course with huge jumps up to 100 feet through the air and guys are going 60 miles per hour and the first guy to the bottom wins,” Kerr said.

“How fun would it be watching NASCAR if it was just racing the clock? I think we all watch Daytona for the last four laps, right?”

Despite the setbacks suffered by Rahlves, 36, and Casey Puckett, 37, who also went out in the first round, the sport appears designed for an American market.

“I think Americans are into these different types of self-expression on snow,” Puckett said. “There’s been an explosion since snowboarding with all kinds of new events. It’s just different forms of expression.”

And there’s nothing like a good old battle of the sexes to give the sport another boost. The course was close to the same as it was for snowboard cross and will be for women’s ski cross, which is Tuesday. One difference: Jumps will be shortened a bit.

“What’s the hardest part here is they’re trying to build a course that fits a male skier and a woman snowboarder,” Kerr said. “So that’s like trying to fit a racetrack that’s good for a Volkswagen Beetle and a Formula One car.

“You know, there’s such a speed difference between a female snowboarder and a male skier.”

lisa.dillman@latimes.com