Olympian Eileen Gu ruffles US skiers with decision to compete for China

[Leroy N. Soetoro]

https://nypost.com/2022/02/01/olympian-eileen-gu-competing-for-china-is-
ruffling-us-skiers/

She could be America’s next Olympic darling — a stunning 18-year-old skier
who signed with Victoria’s Secret and plans to attend Stanford after she
vies for gold in Beijing.

But Eileen Gu won’t be competing for the US.

Instead, in a move that’s baffled members of the American skiing
community, San Francisco-born and -bred Gu has joined Team China.

“I have decided to compete for China in the 2022 Winter Olympics,” Gu
announced in a 2019 tweet, months after she earned her first World Cup win
in Italy at 15.

“The opportunity to help inspire millions of young people where my mom was
born, during the 2022 Beijing Olympic Winter Games is a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity to help promote the sport I love.”

Others in the sport are questioning why Gu, an ultra-athletic freeskier
and favorite to claim as many as three gold medals when the games begin
Friday, would side with the host nation, which is accused of abusing human
rights and engaging in unfair trade policies.

“It is not my place to judge, but Eileen is from California, not from
China, and her decision [to ski for China] seems opportunistic,” said Jen
Hudak, a former Winter X Games gold medalist for the USA women’s team. “I
can’t speak to what Eileen’s Chinese heritage means to her and she has
every right to do what she believes is best for her career.

But “she became the athlete she is because she grew up in the United
States, where she had access to premier training grounds and coaching
that, as a female, she might not have had in China,” Hudak told The Post.
“I think she would be a different skier if she grew up in China.

“This makes me sad,” added Hudak, who retired in 2014 after knee injuries
derailed her career. “It would be nice to see the medals going to
America.”

Gu, a US citizen, made her decision with input from her Chinese mother,
Yan, an outspoken “Tiger Mom,” and an American father who keeps a low
profile, said one of her former coaches.

“All roads to Eileen go through Yan,” said Mike Hanley, head of school at
Wy’East Mountain Academy in Oregon, a training facility for Olympic skiers
such as Nick Goepper and Alex Beaulieu.

“Yan is very pleasant but one of the most intense human beings I have ever
met in my life. She smiles and tells you how great you are. But then you
find out, after the fact, what the requests are. She loves her daughter
and wants her daughter to get priority.”

There could be an economic incentive, too.

“She is the golden star for the country with the fastest-growing economy,”
Hanley said. “She can be the Tony Hawk of winter sports in China.”

Gu is not the first American to cross from West to East.

Beverly Zhu and Ashley Lin, both figure skaters, were both born in the US
and now compete for China. But neither is at Gu’s level in their sport.

“Most people compete for other countries because they can’t make the
American team,” Hudak said.

Gu’s talent is undeniable.

In November, at the Steamboat Freeski Big Air competition, she became the
first woman to pull off a tricky stunt that once seemed impossible for
females to execute: a “1440 double cork.” She shot up a ramp and into the
sky, then completed four 360-degree rotations, before landing flat on her
skis. A blown-away NBC announcer gushed that Gu “absolutely stomped the
field.”

Freeskiing blends the gravity-defying acrobatics of snowboarding with the
challenges of alpine racing. The event features the kinds of tricks, jumps
and obstacles often seen in skateboarding competitions.

“She is the gold medal favorite,” said Hudak, noting that Gu will compete
in three events in Beijing: big air, half-pipe and slopestyle.

“I don’t think anyone is at her level. I can see her getting medals in all
three events this year.”

In America, Gu’s sponsors include Red Bull, Cadillac, the Apple-owned
Beats by Dre headphones and Victoria’s Secret. In the pages of Harpers
Bazaar, Gu modeled the lingerie brand’s activewear in an image that showed
her flying through the air.

But those big names are dwarfed by the deals being made in China, where
the national broadcaster, CCTV, has described Gu as “the perfect child
next door.” Others in China have dubbed her the “Snow Princess.”

So far she’s inked more than 20 endorsement deals in her adopted homeland,
signing with companies such as the Bank of China, China Mobile and milk
company Mengniu. She is also the spokesperson for Luckin’ Coffee, the
Starbucks of China. According to campaignasia.com, a single endorsement
deal with the skier costs about $2.5 million.

When the Olympics start, Gu’s biggest challenger could be France’s big air
specialist, Tess Ledeux, who last week executed four-and-a-half rotations
for a 1620 double cork during an X Games competition.

That new record planted a seed of doubt among some Gu watchers. In a video
that went viral on China’s equivalent of TikTok, a poster suggested,
“Chinese fans, let’s not put too much pressure on Gu.” Unaccustomed to
doubters, Gu replied to her fans, “Why don’t you have more faith in me?”

Gu’s success stems from her dedication, said Peter Olenick, who coached Gu
at a Red Bull training camp.

“She has a ton of talent and passion for the sport, but, in the end it is
her work ethic,” he told The Post. “She is the first one at training and
the last to leave. She competes in multiple events; then she goes home to
run and train. That is unusual.”

Being fearless also helps.

“She came up with the mentality of following guys around and doing tricks
that they do,” Elijah Teter, the athletic director at Wy’East Mountain
Academy, told The Post.

“She’s used to crashing and that is tricky for women. A couple summers
ago, on Mount Hood, Eileen clipped the deck and got a very bad concussion.
That took her out for a week. It’s an injury that can make people fearful.
Not Eileen. She gets past the fear.”

Her intelligence is also obvious, Olenick said. Gu notched a nearly
perfect 1580 SAT score, speaks fluent Mandarin and has already been
accepted to Stanford.

“Eileen is incredibly smart and likes to make the skier boys feel dumb,”
he said. “She uses bigger words than they do. She talks about things that
go beyond skiing and hanging out. She throws chemistry stuff at them.”

Skiing isn’t her only sport. While attending a private school in the Bay
Area, Gu became an elite runner. “She was one of the top long distance
runners in California,” said Hanley.

But Gu ultimately focused on freeskiing because of her mother. Yan saw her
daughter take up downhill skiing at the age of 3 and was concerned about
how fast she was whooshing down the slopes. Hoping to temper her speed,
Yan enrolled her daughter in freestyle lessons, not realizing the sport
involves even more risks and greater danger than standard alpine ski
racing.

But Gu took to it all. She focused on winning events and Yan served as her
biggest booster, according to Hanley.

“Yan is not going to back down,” he said. “These sports are very
expensive. So many of the Americans ask for favors. Yan was willing to
pay, which is very rare in the action sports industry. She paid for
coaching and travel.”

But Gu ultimately focused on freeskiing because of her mother. Yan saw her
daughter take up downhill skiing at the age of 3 and was concerned about
how fast she was whooshing down the slopes. Hoping to temper her speed,
Yan enrolled her daughter in freestyle lessons, not realizing the sport
involves even more risks and greater danger than standard alpine ski
racing.

But Gu took to it all. She focused on winning events and Yan served as her
biggest booster, according to Hanley.

“Yan is not going to back down,” he said. “These sports are very
expensive. So many of the Americans ask for favors. Yan was willing to
pay, which is very rare in the action sports industry. She paid for
coaching and travel.”

Meanwhile, in China, Gu will be supported by the government, said a former
X Games athlete who asked not to be identified. “The amount of money and
the amount of support she gets from China will be so much higher than what
she would get in America,” he said.

Two years after that World Cup victory in Italy, Gu became the first
Chinese athlete to win gold in the X Games and the first rookie to snag
the top medal for the superpipe event in January 2021.

And now it’s on to Beijing — to compete for China.

It’s a decision that to Hanley “seems practical and pragmatic, just like
every decision she makes.”


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