SKIING-CHINESE MAKE PROMISING FREESTYLE SKIING DEBUT .
TIGNES , France 1996-12-07
China made a promising debut on the freestyle skiing world cup circuit in an aerials event in the French resort of Tignes on Saturday .
While the Chinese failed to gain a place in the men 's final , they had two in the top 10 of the women 's competition , Cuo Dan finishing a respectable seventh and Xu Nannan ninth .
But overall , it was France and Canada who dominated the day .
Alexis Blanc and Sebastien Foucras gave France a one-two finish in the first aerials competition of the season .
Blanc collected his seventh career World Cup win with a two jump combined score of 238.36 points , easily beating Foucras , the overall World Cup aerials champion , who was a distant second with 223.60 .
Canada 's Jeff Bean , who had never finished higher than ninth in a World Cup event , made his first trip to the podium taking third place with a mark of 209.96 .
Veronica Brenner of Canada , who picked up her first career victory at Tignes last year , made it two wins in a row at the French resort taking first in the women 's competition with a score of 170.42 .
Swiss skiers occupied the other two places on the podium , Karin Kuster taking second with 160.55 narrowly ahead of Evelyne Leu with 160.36 .