Sam Smoothy, Janina Kuzma, Benny Bright and Abby Lockhart were the winning riders on the night but there were other awards for winning photographers and cinematographers.

PHOTOGRAPHY
This year saw the competition’s first ever photography awards of which five people took part. Between the five of them they took over 25,000 images and managed to successfully capture the action and the lifestyle of the event.

Each photographer selected one image from each category to be judged.

The winning photos in each category were as follows:

Best Extreme Day Shot - Pablo Azocar
Best Freestyle Day Shot - Miles Holden
Best Corona Branded Heli Shot - Miles Holden
Best Exide Batteries Branded Heli Shot - Pablo Azocar
Lake Wanaka Tourism Best Wanaka's Backyard Photo - Mitch Stubbs

CINEMATOGRAPHY
The cinematography stage of the competition was astounding as there were some wonderful pieces of film created during the event.

This year's awards went to:

Air New Zealand Best Documentary - Mic Simpson
Gobandit Best Footage Captured on the Point of View Helmet Cam - Sean Balmer
Best Corona Product Placement - Jason Larraman
Most Creative Angles - Chris Kirkham

THE RIDERS
The finale of the announcements was the awards for the best riders of the competition. The competitiors were chosen for their performances over ht etwo days od the competition (Extreme Day and Freestyle Day).

An esteemed panel of judges from around the world was chosen and for the first time in World Heli Challenge history, judging was done online, with each day of competition captured by two long lenses and uploaded for viewing.

And this year's winners are:

Men's Ski Champion - Sam Smoothy (NZL)
Women's Ski Champion - Janina Kuzma (NZL)
Men's Snowboard Champion - Benny Bright (AUS)
Women's Snowboard Champion - Abby Lockhart (NZL)

Here is the official video from this year’s World Heli Challenge…