One of the most prominent athletes of the Beijing Games is now an Olympic champion.
Gu, who is one of only two women who competed in all three freeski events in Beijing, took her third medal and second gold in the halfpipe. She is the first freeski athlete to medal in three events.
Gu said she had more in store for the finals after the qualification. She scored 93.25 in her first run. She went even higher in her second run, including back-to-back alley-oop flat spin 540s in her final two hits. She was given a score of 95.25, which held for the rest of the contest.
When her win became official, Gu hugged her coaches at the top of the halfpipe and cried. She wiped her tears and dropped in for a victory lap.
Gu said that he felt like he finally deserved it after taking a victory lap.
Defending Olympic gold medal winner, Cassie Sharpe of Canada, took the silver and her teammate, Rachel Karker, took the bronze. Three Americans finished in the top 10.
It has been two weeks of the most intense highs and lows of my life. I knew my life was never going to be the same after landing the last 16 in the air. I would have never imagined that I would walk away with more than one silver and gold.
Gu has juggled an exhausting schedule and faced enormous expectations while also attempting to straddle two cultures. Gu was raised by her mother and grandmother in San Francisco and decided to leave the U.S. ski team in order to compete for China in the 2022 Games.
This was an incredibly tough decision for me to make, she wrote.
Gu spent summers in Beijing. She has said repeatedly that she is American and Chinese when she is in the U.S.
She is a young woman shaped by the city in which she was born, in local news stories about her Olympic success. She is an incoming freshman who might major in journalism or biology. In some U.S. news coverage, she is known as American-born Eileen Gu, with the emphasis placed on the American half of her identity, while in others she is known as China's Gu Ailing.
Gu has been a marquee name of the Beijing Olympics. She is interviewed in English on NBC and broadcasts in Chinese. Between events, Gu posts to her Weibo account, which is similar to a US account. She is the most popular athlete at the Games and her image is ubiquitous around Beijing. Her Weibo account has grown to 5 million followers, while her following has increased sevenfold to more than 1.2 million.
Gu has received a lot of attention, but she did not let it get to her. She was the most consistent woman freeskier of the Olympics, landing almost every run throughout the three events. Even when she was leading the competition, she was never out of it. She was 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217 800-273-3217
Gu left Beijing as a multiple gold medal winner under the heat of the Olympic spotlight.
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