SNOWBOARDER Katie Ormerod likes to relax before events by listening to music and drinking a can of Red Bull.

However, the 19-year-old from Brighouse hasn't had much time to chill out recently.

Katie, who missed the last Winter Olympics at Sochi in 2014 due to a knee injury, is too busy trying to ensure that she doesn't miss out on next year's jamboree in South Korea by globetrotting in pursuit of World Cup points.

"The top 30 from the World Cup qualify for Pyeongchang and I am currently second," said the former Hipperholme Grammar School pupil, whose cousin Jamie Nicholls was sixth in the men's slopestyle final at Sochi.

Jamie, 23 and from Queensbury, became the first British male to win a World Cup, standing on top of the podium in the final event of the 2015-16 season at Spindleruv Mlyn in the Czech Republic.

But Katie, who, like Jamie, learnt skiing and snowboarding at Halifax Dry Slope and Castleford Snowdome, has been making big waves of her own this winter in the World Cup and X Games.

She finished third in a World Cup event at the Olympic venue of Alpensia in South Korea, was second in Munchengladbach and won in Moscow in bitterly cold conditions.

And, as if if to back up that she is a medal contender for the next Winter Olympics, Katie finished third in the slopestyle event at the X Games at Aspen in Colorado last weekend in only her second appearance at the iconic event.

It has certainly been a stellar season for the teenager and is a reward for her clocking up the air miles.

You might associate snowboarding with crisp weather, but Moscow was taking things to extremes, being minus 29.

"It was by far the coldest and some of the toughest conditions I've ever had to compete in, but it was an amazing place," said Katie of the Russian capital.

"It felt amazing. I'd always wanted to win a World Cup, and was really happy to win it in Moscow. I hope there's more to come."

She scored 153.75 points to beat World Cup leader Anna Gasser (Austria) by a quarter of a point, with Klaudia Medlova (Slovakia) in third.

In Aspen, Katie scored 80.33 to finish behind Americans Julia Marino (94.66) and Jamie Anderson (91.33), and admitted: "I'm super happy to get my first X Games medal.

"It's always been on my bucket list to medal there, so I couldn't be happier to medal in the most high-profile event of the season in such a tough and progressive field of riders."

Katie was competing in Innsbruck this weekend before heading back across the Atlantic for the Big Air World Cup event in Quebec City, Canada on the weekend of February 11-12.

She said of Quebec: "I would love to get another podium, and hopefully will win, I will just keep pushing and trying to get it again."

Ski-ing and snowboarding weren't the only sports that action girl Katie enjoyed when she was younger.

Another sport was gymnastics, which improves strength and flexibility, and she said: "The Great Britain squad still make us do it now."

Katie's winter sports career has been on an upward curve for a few years now.

In 2012, she won the slopestyle and Big Air titles at the national championship (the Brits), and the following year took the British halfpipe crown, also finishing second in the European Junior Open slopestyle championship.

Also in 2013, when she was 15, Katie became the youngest female, and only the fifth overall, to land a double backflip, but bettered that as a 16-year-old by becoming the first female to land a backside double cork 1080.

By this time, Katie was pretty much a full-time professional snowboarder, but it wasn't all plain sailing as a meniscus injury caused her to miss the 2014 Winter Olympics.

"I knew four or five months before that I wouldn't be going to Sochi, but the double backflip and backside double cork 1080 had helped to improve my profile, but I didn't feel under pressure in competitions after that as they had given me extra confidence."

Her rivals certainly know that, and if there is any justice after Sochi, Katie's trips to Russia, South Korea, Germany, the United States, Austria and Canada this winter will have laid down a platform for her to do the business in Pyeongchang next winter.

And what's more, she will have two bites at the cherry – snowboarding and Big Air, the latter having been added to the programme for the first time.