Eileen Gu of China was clutch after crashing on the opening run of freeski halfpipe qualifying Thursday in Italy, slipping into her third event final of the Milan Cortina Games as she continues to chase her first gold. Great Britain's Zoe Atkin led the contest with a 91.50, flying high and spinning all four directions.
San Francisco-born Gu caught a ski on the pipe deck on Run 1 while attempting to land a right 720 midway through her run. Sitting 20th — and after a 10-minute delay while course crews did maintenance, and spectators and athletes sang along to Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline" — the defending Olympic champion came inches from clipping the deck again on the same trick on Run 2, but she stayed upright and scored an 86.50 — enough for 5th and a spot in the final.
"Competitive pressure, Olympic pressure, imbues the situation with this neutral energy. You can choose to be victimized by it, or own it in an aggressive sense," Gu said. "I needed to shift that dynamic. I was waiting for it to happen, because I know when it happens, I can feel it."
Canada's Cassie Sharpe took an extremely hard fall on her second run, landing switch on a fifth-hit 1080 attempt before going backward and hitting her head. Medical staff attended to her for about 10 minutes before tobogganing her off. Sharpe waved as she exited the corral area.
The PyeongChang gold and Beijing silver medalist finished with an 88.25. It wasn't immediately clear if she would be able to compete in the final.
Atkin put down a clinical first run with gigantic amplitude, twice reaching nearly 14 feet out of the pipe. The reigning world champion and X Games champion grew up outside Boston and learned to ski in Maine before moving to Park City, Utah, at 9. She's on leave from Stanford University, where Gu also attends.
"I'm trying to not think too hard about the [qualifying] results specifically," said the 23-year-old. "Of course, I would love a good result, and I would love to podium here at the Games, but I feel like, for me to do that, I just need to focus on my skiing and not worry about what the results may be or what other people are doing. I'm trying to stay locked in.”
Americans Svea Irving and Kate Gray both made the 12-skier cut in 8th (80.75) and 12th (74.75). Fifteen-year-old Abby Winterberger — Team USA's youngest Winter Olympian since Tara Lipinski at Nagano 1998 — and Riley Jacobs did not advance, placing 15th (72.50) and 18th (56.50).
Irving finished 5th at the 2025 World Championships. Her brother, Birk Irving, is set to compete in his third Olympics, also in freeski halfpipe. Their grandfather is writer John Irving, who authored works such as "The World According to Garp" and "The Cider House Rules." Gray is the 2024 Winter Youth Olympic bronze medalist and posted a career-best World Cup finish of 5th in December.
All four of China's skiers advanced to the final. Joining Gu are 2025 world silver medalist Li Fanghui (2nd, 90.00), Zhang Kexin (6th, 82.75) and reigning Youth Olympic champion Liu Yishan (11th, 76.00).
Gu said her goal for the final is to "clean it up and go big."
“Tomorrow's my first off day since Feb. 2. So I'm really excited," Gu said. "In Chinese, there's a saying ‘lie flat’. I just have one more day [of competition], and then I can just lie flat.”
The women's freeski halfpipe final is scheduled to take place Saturday at 1:30 p.m. ET. You can watch it live on Peacock and NBCOlympics.com.
Men's freeski halfpipe qualifying, originally scheduled to take place Thursday morning, was moved to Friday due to heavy snow.
Women's Freeski Halfpipe Qualifiers
- Zoe Atkin, Great Britain (91.50)
- Li Fanghui, China (90.00)
- Cassie Sharpe, Canada (88.25)
- Indra Brown, Australia (87.50)
- Eileen Gu, China (86.50)
- Zhang Kexin, China (82.75)
- Amy Fraser, Canada (81.75)
- Svea Irving, United States (80.75)
- Rachael Karker, Canada (78.25)
- Mischa Thomas, New Zealand (77.50)
- Liu Yishan, China (76.00)
- Kate Gray, United States (74.75)