LIVIGNO, Italy — Eileen Gu is a scientist at work, experimenting on her own mind and body. She spends a lot of time in her own head, analysing every thought, forming her “working hypothesis,” just like she does with her skiing, constantly tinkering, striving for “higher optimization.” Such words are just part of her vernacular.
“It’s not a bad place to be,” said the self-proclaimed “statistics nerd,” who loves the Olympics because of the records she can break. After winning halfpipe gold on Saturday at Livigno Snow Park, she explicitly pointed out that it made her the most decorated freestyle skier, male or female.
Gu’s eight-year-old self would be “obsessed” with the young woman she has become. “I would love me, and that’s the biggest flex of all time,” she said.
The American-born athlete has won the most gold medals of any free skier, is the highest earner at the 2026 Winter Olympics, according to Forbes, is an IMG model, a Stanford University student, and a controversial figure, having decided to represent her mother’s native China aged 15 in 2019.
When Gu drops into the halfpipe, listening to American rap, her brain is still working at 100mph, sometimes visualizing a takeoff one second before performing her trick. “Sorry, I’m going to get a little nerdy,” she said last week, explaining the minutiae of the trajectory, angle and degrees of each of her jumps. But for 30 seconds on the pipe, she is in her “truest form,” a flow state in which the noise is temporarily dialled down.
It is the only time she does not have to answer questions about U.S. President Donald Trump, Vice-President JD Vance, the feeling of having “the weight of two countries on (her) back,” or whether a silver medal is good enough. For half a minute, she can fly without someone trying to clip her wings. “Skiing gives me that lightness,” she said.
Yet there is no real escapism, because for all her critics, Gu is the harshest. She describes that space by herself in the halfpipe as “intimate” and “deeply revealing,” like “burying your soul.” All her work is laid bare for the world to see. “Years of work, effort, dedication, fear, despair, ecstasy and hope all in 30 seconds,” she said.
Eileen Gu warms up before the successful defense of her Olympic halfpipe title. (Cameron Spencer / Getty Images)
Gu, who often answers so quickly and comprehensively, for once struggled to find the words. “I guess it’s more like, I don’t know, it’s very honest,” she said. “It makes you look in the mirror and see who you are. You can’t lie to yourself. The work you’ve done or haven’t.”
It shows how you react when under extreme pressure and when you are Eileen Gu, every camera watches every move. “Skiing is not who I am, but it represents all the values by which I judge myself,” she said. Some may question her “honesty” and “values” after the Wall Street Journal reported that Gu and fellow American-born figure skater Zhu Yi, who competed for China at the 2022 Winter Games, were paid a combined $6.6million (£5.8m) by the Beijing Municipal Sports Bureau in 2025, and all told, have been paid $14m over the past three years.
Neither Gu’s representatives nor the Chinese national organizing committee responded to a request for comment when contacted by The Athletic.
The United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee offers medal bonuses (up to $37,500 for golds) through its “Operation Gold” program, but does not pay salaries to athletes.
You would be forgiven if you thought Gu was a quasi-human robot expertly created by artificial intelligence, so eloquent are her responses to the media, but she is not immune to pressure, and after losing her balance on her first run in the halfpipe, she felt it.
Yet Gu bet on herself, not only in this event, but even daring to compete in three Winter Olympic events — slopestyle, halfpipe, and big air — the only female freestyle skier to do so. “I took a big risk in trusting myself and I’m glad I did,” she said.
In the second run, Gu leapfrogged Great Britain’s Zoe Atkin into first place. She blew kisses and saluted to the camera before going even bigger again in her third run, beating her score by 0.75 of a point. But she had to wait for four more competitors to run before her fate was sealed.
When Gu found out she won gold, she collapsed to the floor before hugging her mother, Yan Gu. On top of the podium, gold medal around her neck, gold ribbon in her hair, she sang China’s national anthem, describing it as a “special moment.”
Eileen Gu poses with her medals from the 2026 Winter Olympics. (Cameron Spencer / Getty Images)
With three silvers and three golds to her name across two Olympics, Gu is a freak of nature, extraordinary in every sense of the word. So what is next for a young woman who seems to have it all?
“I want to be better, kinder, more patient, always be curious, a student of the world,” she said. One thing is certain: she is not retiring, but she does have her “other job” — Milan Fashion Week — to attend in a couple of days.
However, her broader purpose is her “global beneficial impact.” The 22-year-old feels fashion and sport are the best ways to achieve this, although that may change over time.
But does representing China allow her to have the biggest global beneficial impact? “Yes,” Gu replied resolutely, explaining that at the Winter Olympics press conference four years ago, inspiring more girls to ski was “theoretical.” Now, the numbers prove it, she says. Since the 2022 Games in Beijing, the Chinese government announced that around 313 million people had taken up ice and snow sports, or related leisure activities.
She claimed 350 million people have tried snowsports for the first time.
As for her critics, Gu encourages them to try skiing or another sport. “As an athlete, a young biracial woman, this is the way I can inspire the most good on a global scale. If other people think that’s not the right call, then don’t do what I’m doing. Do what they think will make the world better. Direct their energy there. I’ve seen a lot of creative insults. The world could use some creative good,” she said, a response she has used before.
The scientist, politician, skier, model, and student is like a magician, the audience dazzled by her mastery but somewhat irked by how she does it.
Gu is calculated in her media approach. She always provides a response but spins answers in a masterful way, honing in on what she wants to talk about, whether that be criticising the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) for the clash in her programme or jumping at the opportunity to detail every stitch of her ski outfit put together by one of her long-term sponsors. “I feel so strong wearing an outfit I designed with Anta,” she said at the start of the Games.
But just when you question if this is a mechanical staged performance, she shows vulnerability. “I’m exhausted,” she said last week. In her final press conference of these Games, Gu apologised for being slightly late. It was not because of the throng of adoring fans, but she had just found out her maternal grandmother, Feng Guozhen, had died.
She was a “fighter” and a “steamship” who “commanded life” and “grabbed it by the reins” and “made it what she wanted it to be,” said Gu, tears filling her eyes. She did not promise her late grandma Olympic gold, but she did promise bravery.
Love her or hate her, these Winter Olympics have been “a marathon” run at “the pace of a hundred-meter dash” for Gu. Yet again, she has left everyone in her wake.
Veni, vidi, vici was written on one Chinese flag. She came, she saw, she conquered.