Chloe Kim of La Palma won the Winter Youth Olympic Games gold medal in women’s halfpipe snowbarding in Oslo, Norway.
Kim’s score of 94.25 on the first of her three runs was higher than any of the 16 other riders had on any of their three runs. She had a 96.50 on her second run, which included a McTwist indy and a frontside 720 Lien, and 96.25 on her third.
“I just kept doing the same run, but I felt like I was slowly going bigger and bigger as it was going on,” said the 15-year-old Kim, a sophomore at La Palma Christian School on Sunday. ” My first run was super swirly and stuff, but after landing it I was a little more confident going into the second and third.”
Kim thanked her parents after receiving her medal.
“I couldn’t be here without my parents,” Kim said. “I feel like my mom was scared when she first sent me off to the mountain. She was like, ‘What am I getting my baby into?’
“But my dad was always the one who was steering me in the right direction.”
Emily Arthur of Australia won the silver medal with a score of 90 on her second run. Yu-rim Jeong of South Korea won the bronze with a score of 84.50 on her second run.
The winner is determined by the highest scoring on a run.
Kim is the youngest person to win a gold medal at the X Games, would have qualified for the 2014 Winter Olympics but was too young and was selected by Time in 2015 as one of the 30 most influential teenagers.
Kim began snowboarding when she was 4 years old and competing for Team Mountain High at age 6. She spent third and fourth grades studying in Geneva and trained in Valais, Switzerland from when she was 8 to 10 years old.
“She’s competing on the highest levels and she’s winning at the highest levels with older competitors who are much more experienced,” head judge Ales Silec said. “I’m a judge so I can’t say she’s (the best in the world), but she’s really good.”
Kim carried the U.S. flag during Friday’s opening ceremony at Lysgardsbakkene Ski Jumping Arena in Lillehammer, Norway, the same venue used for the opening ceremony of the 1994 Winter Olympics.
Kim is scheduled to compete in Saturday’s slopestyle event.
The Winter Youth Olympic Games are conducted by the International Olympic Committee. They began in 2012 and are held every four years. Competitors in this year’s Games must be between 15 to 18 years old as of Dec. 31, 2016.
—City News Service