Aussie James pipped for gold in halfpipe

Australia's Winter Olympics medal hopeful Scotty James has won silver at the World Cup halfpipe finals in Snowmass, Colorado.

The two-time Olympian and reigning world champion scored 96.25 and appeared to be headed for victory only for Shaun White to produced what many believe was one of the most impressive runs in snowboarding history to be awarded a perfect 100.

Japan's Yuto Totsuka finished the day in third place.

"It was a long day, a lot of nerves," 23-year-old Melbourne native James said.

"The switchback twelve is something I've been working on and something that's never been done before so it definitely got me mentally the past couple of competitions, but I was very stoked and over the moon to put it down.

"I was just happy to come away and land a run pretty much."

In typical James style, he wore his red boxing gloves for the final run.

"My red gloves are just a bit of a tradition of mine, just my boxing gloves - boxing kangaroo," he said.

"I wear them all the time, every finals I have them on - that's it, it's my mojo."

It was a great weekend in Snowmass for Australia, with 17-year-old Tess Coady claiming the country's first medal in a snowboard slopestyle World Cup.