(Provided photo — FISU)

NORTH CREEK — Yusei Kaku of Japan (M) and Livia Tanno of Switzerland (W) were at the top of the podium in today’s snowboard slopestyle finals at Gore Mountain during the Winter World University Games, taking home gold for their countries.

Athletes earn an “overall impression” score based on the difficulty, execution, amplitude, and landing of their tricks. Their final score is a combination of their best two of three.

“The Japanese people gave me energy,” said Kaku “It helped me do my best.”

Moritz Wolfgang Breu from Germany took home the silver in the men’s competition, with a combined score of 170.25. Atsuhiro Suzuki of Japan took home bronze with a final combined score of 165.00.

“I was very looking forward to landing it, a bit nervous, but I’ve had it in my head already, said Breu. “I landed it and I’m happy with it.”

In the women’s competition Hikari Yoshizawa of Japan took home the silver with a combined score of 152.50, while Nomie Equy of France took home the bronze with a combined score of 136.00.

“I chose to follow along others in the first two runs, and I challenged a fs 5 in the third run and failed, said Yoshizawa. “I’m a little bit frustrated that I did not do well in my last run.”