LIVIGNO, Italy — The United States has set a brand new American record for gold medals received at a Winter Olympics.
And it got here from a self-discipline the place Team USA hadn’t had any success earlier within the Games.
Though the individuals had been considerably completely different from 2022, the Americans received a second consecutive gold medal in combined group aerials, a sport the place three individuals (one have to be a lady) every get one soar and their three scores are added collectively.
It was the 11th gold of these Games for the U.S., topping its earlier Winter Olympics record set in Salt Lake City 24 years in the past.
Though not one of the American aerials skiers hit the rostrum through the singles competitors — all of them appeared to battle with takeoff speeds within the altering wind circumstances — they made changes for the group occasion and their fortunes modified immediately.
Chris Lillis, who was on the gold medal group in Beijing, landed the ultimate, clinching soar with a again double-full-full-full and pumping his fist as he caught the touchdown. Though he needed to watch for a rating to make it official, it was a slam dunk at that time.
It was a powerful efficiency for the U.S., touchdown six straight clear runs (between qualifying and the finals) to assert the gold.
In the qualifier to get to the finals, Kaila Kuhn acquired issues began with an ordinary back-full-full-full for a 106.89 to place the U.S. on prime of the leaderboard instantly.
Connor Curran adopted with again full-double full-full, sticking an image excellent touchdown and turning his palms to the sky, like a maestro asking for a standing ovation. After Chris Lillis landed one even higher than his teammate, the ushad a mixed rating of 351.23 — signicantly greater than the opposite three groups (China, Australia and Switzerland) who superior to the ultimate spherical.
Unfortunately for the U.S. group, scores reset after the primary closing spherical, that means they needed to execute three terrific jumps once more. But it did enable them to go final and modify their technique in response to different groups.
Kuhn began it with a near-repeat of her first spherical, scoring 94.44 — second-best among the many 4 girls however solely 2.15 factors behind China.
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That left it as much as the blokes.
But after China’s Wang Xindi dialed up the diploma of problem with a again double full-double full-full — and did not land it — it appeared just like the door was open for the Americans to take management.
Curran dialed again for his soar, touchdown a again full-double full-full to place the U.S. in entrance with a mixed rating of 208.16, practically 24 factors forward of China.
It was all arrange for Lillis after China’s Li Tianma landed quick and dislodged his skis on the third soar. Lillis wanted to attain 89 factors to safe gold — and he acquired 117.19
The Swiss took silver and China received bronze.
