They start skiing down the mountain like any other downhiller. But then they’re going backward. And scooting along metal rails implanted in the snow. And then twirling and spinning impossibly off a ramp. That’s slopestyle. And the margins between the best skiers can be slim.
On Monday, it brought the first 2026 gold medal bid for Eileen Gu, the American-born Chinese double gold medalist at the 2022 Games. The one event she didn’t win in Shanghai was slopestyle, where she lost to Mathilde Gremaud of Switzerland by a whisker. It happened again on Monday, and Gu was left with a second straight silver.
In slopestyle, athletes get three runs with only the best run counting. Gu wasted no time, nailing her first run, finishing with a double cork 1260, three and a half rotations, off the last jump to score 86.58. Gremaud put up an 83.60, capped by a 1260 of her own.
With good runs in the books, both skiers could take more chances on runs 2 and 3. Those runs went well for Gremaud, not so much for Gu.
Gu made an early mistake on the second run and then chose to ski cautiously the rest of the way. But Gremaud nailed her jumps, including two 1260s, enough to take the lead with an 86.96, like four years ago, a fraction ahead of Gu. Gu had to answer on run 3. But she tumbled on the first rail, and she had lost the gold to Gremaud yet again.
Gu’s legions of fans will get two more chances to cheer her on here in Italy when she defends her big air and halfpipe titles.
Victor Mather, who has been a reporter and editor at The Times for 25 years, covers sports and breaking news.
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