Women's Snowboard Slopestyle Finals - My first time shooting this type of event

Today was an amazing day of photography, as I spent the entire day shooting sports that I have never photographed before. I just love the challenge of capturing something different, not only for my portfolio, but also to share with all of you.

The first event that I photographed was Slopestyle. If you have never heard of this sport before, then we have something in common. This is the first year that the Winter Olympics has included this sport and it was fun to watch. The girls had to do big jumps on their snowboards, but also perform other tricks as well.

In order to find a good shooting position, I hiked up a pretty steep mountain in my hiking boots. I really could have used some cramp-ons, since getting up and sliding down, afterwards, was a challenge. But being in that position, made for some cool shots.

Catching big air!

Not only is she grabbing the board, but she is wearing perfect colors against the white background.

At first I was trying to zoom in really tight to isolate the athletes, but then after a while I thought it would be better to zoom out a bit and show a little more of the scene.

And then I turned the camera in portrait mode and took some this way.

My goal was to show the snowboarder over the flags, and this worked out a couple of times.

Here is the American who ended up winning the Gold.

She nailed her run!

Here is the British girl who won Bronze. As you can see, she was very happy to win an Olympic medal, no matter the color.

And then it was time for Jamie Anderson to stand on the podium as the gold medal winner. Initially I was upset that I was on the side of the podium (since it took me a while to slide down the mountain without falling), but as I was shooting, I knew that I was getting reactions that I would not have gotten from the front-on position.

All choked up.

Luckily, after myself and other photographers yelled for them to turn our way, they did and we got this shot.

And then Jamie stepped down off of the podium, but the smile sure stayed with her!

These are moments that us photographers love to capture...

...as you can see in the photo above.

I shot this photo as I was leaving the venue. All the Americans were cheering and dancing in the stands. I saw this guy and yelled for him to turn round. Too funny.

Next blogs will be luge and ski jumping. I would post them tonight, but since it is already 1:30am, I need to get some sleep and be ready for the woman's big hockey game tomorrow. Good night (or good morning) everyone from Sochi.