VIDEO: Team Canada stakes claim to gold on Canadian slopes

It was minus-15 degrees outside and it was snowing and slippery, but the 2,000 people in attendance didn't even seem to notice as they stood in the frigid weather and held their collective breath.

As one crowd, they watched world-renowned skiers fly down the slopes, glide around the moguls at impossibly fast speed, only to fly off the jumps and soar through the air as though they had wings.

Team Canada dominated the slopes at Ski Mont Gabriel in Sainte-Adèle on January 15 and 16, when it competed alongside some of the world's best alpine skiers in the FIS World Cup mogul event, as part of the Canada Post Freestyle Grand Prix.

By mid-day on Saturday, it quickly became evident the Canadian team wasn't going to let gold slip through its fingers.  A field of over 40 competitors from about a dozen different countries competing in head-to-head events was quickly reduced. Soon, eight Canadian women and seven Canadian men progressed to the 16-athlete finals.

Side-by-side, the athletes raced down the hill in difficult conditions, marked by falling snow and a hard base. As one of the smaller hills on the circuit, Mont Gabriel challenges competitors to build up speed quickly before a short descent.

The skiers raced to the bottom while jumping through the air and contorting their bodies in near-synchronized flips and defeats of gravity - only to hit the ground at fast speed, race through the moguls and make it over the finish line less than a tenth of a second before their competition.

Watching hometown hero and Olympic gold medalist Alexandre Bilodeau glide down the slopes and fly through the air was like watching magic. The Montreal native began his ski training at Ski Mont Gabriel and on Saturday afternoon he claimed the slopes as his own, beating fellow teammate Mikaël Kingsbury and taking home gold.

In an interview with the International Ski Federation following the race, Bilodeau maintained the strong Canadian showing was due to the excellent job the ski association is doing and the strong future it forecasts for Team Canada.

"It feels great to touch the podium again and I think the results are really promising for the rest of the season," said Bilodeau.

Fellow Canadian Justine-Dufour Lapointe beat out Russian skier Anastasia Gunchenko to take home gold in the women's division and to become the youngest female to win an FIS World Cup.

Dufour-Lapointe is a 16-year-old Montreal native who goes to high school like other girls her age, only to spend her weekends winning gold in international racing competitions.

This race was only Dufour-Lapointe's third race in the World Cup circuit.