Eileen Gu, the controversial big air skiing star who competes for China despite being American-born, was unable to defend her gold medal on Monday night at the 2026 Milan Cortina Games.
Gu came away with the silver medal in the women’s freeski big air competition, while Canada’s Megan Oldham won gold.
Gu notched a 90.00 on her first run, which was tied on the list of competitors for third place, as Oldham and Austria’s Lara Wolf had better scores.
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But Gu’s mistake was on the second run, where she wasn’t able to grab the tail of her ski cleanly and her landing was shaky, leading to a 61.25 score.
At that point, Gu was out of a medal spot with one run remaining. In this competition, the top two scores are combined for each skier.
On the final run, Gu managed to score an 89.00, which gave her a 179.00 final tally. That was enough for second place, but Oldham had a slight, 1.75-point advantage over Gu in the end.
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Italy’s Flora Tabanelli finished with bronze in the event.
Gu wasn’t upset at the result, though, pointing out that she’s won five Olympic medals in her two appearances at the Games. Her first was in Beijing in 2022, where she took home gold in big air and halfpipe, while winning silver in Slopestyle.
In this year’s Games, Gu secured a silver medal in Slopestyle, with halfpipe the remaining event for her later this week.
“‘Five-time Olympic medalist’ kind of has a nice ring to it,” Gu told reporters after the event.
Before this medal event, Gu called out the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) over how tight the Olympic schedule has been for her, saying it prevents her from getting proper training sessions she needs for a freeski event.
Gu is the sport’s only three-event athlete, and she says competing on Monday night makes it impossible for her to properly prepare for the qualifying round of the halfpipe final, which begins on Thursday.
“I’m disappointed in FIS,” she said. “I think the Olympics should epitomize aspiration, and I think being able to do something that’s beyond the ordinary should be celebrated instead of punished.
“I think it’s really unfair. I think it’s punishing excellence, to be completely honest with you. Because I dare to do three events, and this is making it completely impossible to train fairly for the third event.”
Gu became a controversial figure in action sports in 2019 when she made the decision to ski for China instead of the United States in the upcoming 2022 Olympics. She grew up in California and went to Stanford, though her mother is a first-generation Chinese immigrant in the U.S.
Gu said at the time that it was an “incredibly tough” decision, and Americans weren’t too fond of her decision given the geopolitical tension between the U.S. and China.
Meanwhile, Gu was celebrated in China for her choice, but a giant question still looms as she continues to be one of the best in the sport.
With China not allowing dual citizenship for its athletes, requiring Chinese nationality for those competing, has Gu renounced her American citizenship? She has not answered the question.
As Gu looks ahead to the halfpipe qualifiers on Thursday, the final for the event is this Saturday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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