Japanese snowboarder Kazuhiro Kokubo won the men's big air at the 24th Harbin Winter Universiade here on Friday.

Kazuhiro, runner-up in 2007 world championship, outscored the Esthonia's favorite Mark Duubas in two-time best combined 54.8 points. Pekka Ruokanen of Finland finished second in 52.3 points and Russia's Dmitry Mindrul stood third in 50.2 points.

It was also Kazuhiro's second gold at Universiade after his triumph at the half-pipe contest on Wednesday.

"I just lowered my height in the final run as I knew my last two runs were good enough to seize the gold," said the Japanese after the close duel, which was challenged by the top favorite Mark who got the highest FIS points among the twelve finalists.

In the final, three runs in total for each player to ski and two best results combined decided the winner.

Kazuhiro scored a highest 27.8 points in the opening run with soaring grabs and full rotations. Mark came closely to him with 27.3 points but made a mistake in the following run, which was only awarded 22.1 points while the Japanese delivered another steady show in 27.0 points.

In the decisive third run, Mark failed to bounce back from the lackluster show and only scored 21.3 points, leaving the gold to Kazuhiro who just need to ski freely for routines.

No women skiers took part in the big air which was the last discipline of the six-day Universiade snowboarding events.

Source: Xinhua