Home ›› 19 Feb 2022 ›› Sport
Californian-born Chinese sensation Eileen Gu said she felt “a deep-seated sense of gratitude” after winning her second gold of the Beijing Olympics and third medal overall in Friday’s halfpipe.
The 18-year-old set the seal on a hugely successful Games with another commanding performance, clinching the title before she had even started her third and final run.
Gu switched from representing the US to China in 2019 and she said that winning her third medal felt like a “coming-together moment”.
“The over-riding emotion is this deep-seated sense of gratitude and resolution -- this all coming together, years and years in the making,” she said, wearing a panda hat after the victory ceremony.
“It’s like letting out a deep breath.”
Gu became the first athlete to win three Olympic medals in three different freestyle skiing disciplines, after claiming gold in Big Air and silver in slopestyle in Beijing.
She was hotly tipped to add the halfpipe title after topping Thursday’s qualifying, and she wasted no time in laying down a marker in the final with a first-run score of 93.25.
That put her in first place and she raised the bar further on her second run, scoring 95.25 to put the title within her reach.
Her victory was confirmed while she waited at the top of the halfpipe for her final run, and she spent several moments hugging her coaches before making her way down with a relaxed and joyous victory lap.
“I was very emotional at the top and I chose to do a victory lap because I felt like for the first time I really deserved it and I really earned it,” she said.
“It was a great punctuation on this amazing journey up to the Olympics.”
Canada’s Cassie Sharpe took silver on 90.75 points, while another Canadian, Rachael Karker, claimed bronze on 87.75.
