BEIJING (AP) – Chinese Eileen Gu, born in the United States, was the first to jump for his career in his last, toppled Frenchwoman Tess Ledeux and won the first of what she hopes will be three gold medals at the Beijing Olympics in the big-air free female Tuesday.
Under the eyes of tennis player Peng Shuai from the stands, the skier, nicknamed the “snow Princess”, delivered the huge hype to perform in her adopted country. She is a favorite for medals in big air, slopestyle and halfpipe — no action sports athlete has ever reached the podium in all three.
His first attempt at gold ended in the last round.
Ledeux is the only other woman to have managed — 4 1/2 rounds in the competition, and she trampled one with a slight wobble when landing in the first round.
Gu hinted after qualifying on Monday that she might be able to match that. With everything at stake, she did.
The 18-year-old from San Francisco screamed as she made the jump to the 3rd round, and then dropped to her knees when her score of 94.50 was announced. His total of 188.25 exceeded that of Ledeux (187.5).
Ledeux tried to improve his second lap in the 3rd lap,jumping back in for a switch 1440. She landed with a ski still in the air, however, paving the way for gu gold.
Gu received warmth from his country of birth after he refused to compete the US team for China. GU’s mother is from China, and although she learned to ski in California, Gu says her goal is to be a role model for young girls in China, who didn’t have many female athletes to admire.
This was also a lucrative step for her. Her face is on commercials all over Beijing, and her modeling career is almost as hot as her skiing talents, with appearances for Vogue, Victoria’s Secret, Louis Vuitton, Tiffany and more.
Peng, already an idol for the female athletes, Chinese, sat in the stands with the president of the international Olympic Committee Thomas Bach a day after she said in an interview that the accusations of venereal harassment that she objected to a former member of the high-ranking party-the community power in China were “a huge misunderstanding.”His answers-delivered in front of a Chinese Olympic officer-left unanswered questions about his well-being and what exactly happened.