Cai Xuetong competes in the women's snowboard superpipe qualifier of the Dew Tour at Copper Mountain on December 16, 2021 in Copper Mountain, Colorado, the US. Photo: VCG

Although she did not rank high in the final competition, it was enough for Chinese snowboarder Cai Xuetong to top the standings with 216 points after three rounds of competition of at the Snowboard World Cup.

From Tuesday to Saturday, Europe's renowned snowboard competition, the Laax Open in Switzerland, served as the final qualifying event leading to the Beijing Winter Olympic Games in February, as part of this season's International Ski Federation (FIS) World Cup event.

On the final round of competition at Laax on Saturday, PyeongChang Olympic champion, Chloe Kim from the US, won the women's halfpipe, while China's Cai Xuetong claimed the seventh place in the competition.

Cai also won the title at Copper Mountain in December 2021 and went on to finish second at Mammoth Mountain last week.  

She has participated in the Winter Olympic Games three times in a row, in Vancouver 2010, Sochi 2014, and PyeongChang 2018. However, the three-time Olympian has never managed to reach the podium and wishes to win a medal at the Beijing Winter Olympic Games in February 2022.

"I think my goal has not changed, I still yearn for that gold medal," Cai said.

Born in Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, the 28-year-old was spotted by amateur sports school coaches and began to get in touch with snowboarding as early as 2003, the year when Chinese snowboarding started to develop.