Eileen Gu takes Secret Garden halfpipe event to return to top of all-time FIS Freeski World Cup wins leaderboard
Gu celebrates 16th World Cup career victory, which puts her back into a tie for the lead with France's Tess Ledeux for most FIS Freeski World Cup wins of all time. USA's Nick Goepper takes men's competition.
Freestyle Skiing
Two-time Olympic champion Eileen Gu (People's Republic of China) just keeps winning and winning.
Three months after clinching the halfpipe season opener in New Zealand, the freestyle skier was on top again in Saturday's (7 December) three-run final at the halfpipe World Cup in Secret Garden, China.
It was her 16th World Cup career victory, putting her back into a tie for the lead with France's Tess Ledeux for most FIS Freeski World Cup wins of all time.
Gu's second-run score of 90.00 was enough to hold off her compatriot Li Fanghui (82.75) and USA's Svea Irving (80.0).
“I’m really happy that when it counted I was able to gather all my resources and channel it to where it counts,” said the 21-year-old to FIS.
“I actually had a pretty heavy slam a few days ago in training and was just recovering alone in my room for three days. I came out today and had another tough slam (in) the first round of finals, so I was really going through it mentally, fighting a lot of demons all day."
Qualifications and finals had to be scheduled on the same day as unfavourable weather did not allow competition on Thursday.
Gu's 13th halfpipe World Cup victory since 2020 also makes her the all-time leader for halfpipe wins across men’s and women’s competition.
On the men's side, Nick Goepper led a USA sweep.
The Beijing 2022 slopestyle silver medalist managed 95.00 points in his second run to finish ahead of defending World Cup champion Alex Ferreira (92.25). Two-time Olympic halfpipe champion David Wise, who had topped qualification, came in third (89.0).
Goepper's impressive showing included a switch right bone air 900 tail which had never been done before in competition.
The 30-year-old is hoping to bag some halfpipe silverware at the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics as he has put in a lot of hours to make the transition from slopestyle to halfpipe work.
“I’ve been working really hard,” said Goepper. “There’s been tons and tons of hard work that’s gone into this, but overall I love this. The most important thing is I love doing this, and that’s what has made the transition so fun and successful.”