Many of us remember distinctly the day that Seb ‘Toots’ won his first mid-major contest, the notorious Empire Shakedown at St. Saveur by his hometown of Montreal, QC. He was 13 at the time, and the breakout performance had several snowboarding industry experts and all-stars going wild in the judging booth (among them MFM, Mikey Leblanc, JF Pelchat, Dionne Delasalle, Daryl Trinidad, Derek Heidt, Eero Niemela, Mikey Rencz, and David Aubry). As Seb stood atop the podium, hall-of-fame TM Ricky Melenik could be seen yelling over 6,000 cheering fans into his cell phone, “Dude, he’s only 13!” It appeared that a star had been born, quite locally.

Fast forward 5 years later and its surprising that the good old USA barely knows the rising international star. Generally choosing to chase international (read: Europe, Canada, southern hemisphere) podiums such as Burton Opens, Seb has rarely participated in a major contest in the States – beyond the US Open. And when his 09-10 season was supposed to break out full-stop worldwide, including a major US debut, Seb suffered a devastating ankle injury while “guineaing” the Air and Style jump just as the season got underway.

It took Seb about six months to resurface in Whistler and win the 5-star Billabong “Ante Up” contest. Then one full year later, completely healed and slightly the wiser, Seb headed back to the contest where he shattered his ankle (this time dubbed the ‘Shaun White’ Air and Style in Beijing), and won the whole thing.

The bottom line is that while a professional and fun-loving guy like Seb may not sit on the tip of many American snowboard fans’ tongues, among the slopestyle and big air competitive set of 2011, he’s clearly among the brightest of its future starts. In fact, its probably not a biased reach to offer that Seb is a likely podium pick for Big Air and potentially Slopestyle in his very first Winter X Games this year. If you don’t want to take our word for it, that’s ok, but check out the laundry list of what Seb has accomplished during the past 24 months despite being removed from his snowboard from December 2009 to April 2010, and it just may change your mind.

1st O’Neill Evolution – Davos 2011
1st Shaun White Air and Style (big air) 2010
1st FIS Big Air Sweden 2010
2nd Freestyle.CH Big Air 2010
1st Billabong Ante Up 2010
2nd Ride Shakedown 2010
3rd US Open 2010 Slopestyle
1st Canadian Championship Slopestyle 2010
1st  Freestyle Berlin Big Air 2009
2nd  Freestyle.CH Big Air 2009
1st  Stylewars Rail Jam 2009
1st  Stylewars Slopestyle 2009
1st  Burton New Zealand Open 2009 (slope)
1st  Ride Shakedown 2009
2nd  US Open 2009 Slopestyle
3rd  US Open 2009 Quarter Pipe
1st  Showdown Over the City 2009