Eileen Gu last competed in a big air contest four years ago. She learned the trick that helped her reach the medals stand Monday night four days ago. Then, in a frenzied training session before the snowy Olympic final, she tried an even bigger trick, but hit her head on the landing and cracked her helmet.<\/p>\n
Given all that, finishing second, a mere 1.75 points behind Canada\u2019s Megan Oldham, felt like a victory, not a loss for the sport\u2019s best-known star. Given all that, picking up a fifth medal in the five events she has entered over two Winter Olympics felt like a time to celebrate, not think about what might have been.<\/p>\n
\u201c\u2018Five-time Olympic medalist\u2019 kind of has a nice ring to it,\u201d Gu said.<\/p>\n
While Gu has two silvers at these Olympics \u2014 one in slopestyle and the latest in big air \u2014 Oldham, the 24-year-old from Parry Sound, Ontario, has a bronze and a gold.<\/p>\n
Egged on by her older brother, Bruce, who is also a pro freeskier, Oldham traded in gymnastics and figure skating a handful of years ago to start catapulting herself off mountains. The other sports taught her a lot about \u201cair awareness, and spinning in general,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
It also took her from a pair of dangerous sports to one that borders on death-defying. In this Olympic big air contest, the adrenaline junkies have to ride an actual elevator to the top of a scaffolding on which sits a man-made hill 165 feet in the air.<\/p>\n
\u201cA brutal sport,\u201d Oldham called it. \u201cA lot of times when you\u2019re learning these new tricks, you can fall pretty hard.\u201d<\/p>\n
She suffered a concussion in December and said she felt pressure, not knowing if she could make it back in time for the Olympics.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust coming back from that alone, I\u2019m pretty proud of myself,\u201d Oldham said.<\/p>\n
So was bronze medalist Flora Tabanelli, who took bronze for Italy\u2019s 23rd medal of the Games. She\u2019s four months removed from a torn ACL. She decided to compete in a brace instead of opting for season-ending surgery.<\/p>\n
\u201cThree months ago, after the injury, I thought I wouldn\u2019t make it here,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen I arrived here and said to myself, \u2018I feel pretty good,\u2019 it was already a win.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gu brought friends with her, and suddenly found herself in medal contention<\/p>\n
Gu, naturally, came to Italy with better name recognition and higher expectations than anyone else in the snowpark.<\/p>\n
After her first jump, a 1440-degree whirl that put her in medal contention, she ran to the stands to celebrate. She had friends from college and from junior high who took advantage of the three-day weekend in the United States to come watch.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s the sport\u2019s only three-event athlete. So, over the past few years, something had to give between all the skiing, Stanford University, modeling and globe-trotting between her native U.S. and her mom\u2019s home country of China, the country she competes for. That one thing was big air.<\/p>\n
She had not been on an entry sheet for the sport\u2019s highest-flying discipline since the day she left Beijing four years ago with the first of two gold medals in tow.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019d asked me four days ago and said, \u2018What tricks are you going to do in the final?\u2019 I\u2019d be, like, \u2018I\u2019m in the final?\u2019\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
During warmups for the final, she crashed while trying a 1620-degree spin, the likes of which won her that gold.<\/p>\n
She was fortunate that a near blizzard rushed through the snowpark shortly after, delaying the start by 75 minutes and giving her a chance to rest in a dark room. The contest itself was held under a moderate snow (which can slow down the run) and no wind.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really needed those … minutes,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t think the outcome would\u2019ve been the same, to be honest with you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oldham celebrates, but for Gu, it\u2019s time for halfpipe practice<\/p>\n
Oldham\u2019s victory came on her other brother, Cody\u2019s, 18th birthday. \u201cHe can celebrate with us,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
For Gu, there was no time for rest.<\/p>\n
She hasn\u2019t skied halfpipe since December. She was frustrated to have missed one of the three halfpipe training sessions the rest of the skiers are getting for a qualifying round that starts Thursday. She now has two days to make up for lost time. Halfpipe is maybe her best event \u2014 it\u2019s where she\u2019s captured 15 of her record-setting 20 World Cup wins.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it was Kobe (Bryant) who said the greatest athletes have the shortest memories, and I try to follow that,\u201d Gu said. \u201cI am in goldfish mode, I finish this and go straight into the next.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for the notion that she has anything left to prove \u2014 or anything to be disappointed about after picking up another silver medal, which gives her more Olympic medals than any woman in the history of freestyle skiing \u2014 she let loose a chortle.<\/p>\n
\u201cWinning a medal in the Olympics is a life-changing experience, and doing it five times is exponentially hard,\u201d she said. \u201cThe \u2018two medals lost\u2019 perspective is ridiculous to take. I am showcasing my best skiing and doing things that have never been done before, so that is more than enough.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eileen Gu last competed in a big air contest four years ago. She learned the trick that helped…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":472837,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,215489,215490,3727,215491,934,4281,3,79600,13646,215492,129364,215488,215486,21,19,22,20,25,24,215487,58926],"class_list":["post-472836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-competitor","tag-consecutive-gold-medal","tag-event","tag-halfpipe","tag-live-update","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-news","tag-status","tag-switzerland","tag-torn-labrum","tag-total-number","tag-training-run","tag-u-s-athlete","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa","tag-winter-games","tag-winter-olympics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=472836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/472837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=472836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=472836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=472836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}