WITHIN the past two weeks, snowboarding prodigy Su Yiming has joined freeskier Gu Ailing in the ranks of China’s new wave of Olympians who are shaking up the podiums at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. Su’s name became social media’s top trending topic with 150 million views on Twitter-like social media platform Weibo after his gold medal victory. The hashtag “Su Yiming must be able to fly” trended on Weibo with nearly 50 million views. Su etched his name in the history books by winning China’s first Olympic gold in the sport Tuesday, days shy of his 18th birthday that falls on Friday, to cap his stunning Games debut. By cleanly stomping back-to-back 1800 tricks, the teenager landed the biggest prize so far in his young career — gold in the men’s Big Air. The feat realized a childhood dream to reach the pinnacle of the sport, which he began to learn at the age of 4. Now with two shinning medals, including a slopestyle silver, hung around his neck, Su described his superb Olympic debut as an insane experience that has made all his sacrifices worthwhile. “This feels so surreal that I’ve finally accomplished what I’ve dreamed of since I was little,” an emotional Su said after finishing his third run as a victory lap. Su secured the gold with a winning total of 182.5 points from his first two jumps. Over the past four years, Su has combined his innate talent with hard work — under the guidance of renowned Japanese coach Yasuhiro Sato — to produce one of the swiftest rises to prominence the sport has ever seen. When the Shougang Big Air venue hosted its first international event — a World Cup meet in 2019 — Su was an obscure qualifier, who didn’t even make the final runs. Just over two years later, Su is the name on everyone’s lips at the venue’s Olympic debut, drawing the whole nation’s attention to the sport he loves. “The biggest motivation for me is my love for snowboarding,” Su said, when asked about the secret to his success. “In snowboarding, I feel like I can demonstrate my own style and creativity. Every time I ride my board, it’s always a blissful moment. I hope through my experience, I can inspire more young people to get interested in the sport.” Su’s golden day matched fellow teenage skier Gu Ailing, who also claimed gold in Big Air’s freeski equivalent Feb. 8 at the towering slope built on the former site of a relocated steel mill. Boasting multi-medal performances at the Games, both young athletes have shot to celebrity status in the country while attracting hordes of new fans on social media. Su, a former child actor who featured in action movies, said the Olympic gold will encourage him to seek for more breakthroughs, even beyond his athletic career. “I enjoy snowboarding just as much as I enjoy acting,” said Su. “I think I still have a lot of possibilities to explore in my future career either in snowboarding or in acting. But now I just want to enjoy the moment and celebrate it as the best possible birthday gift.” Slopestyle, also known as snowboard freestyle competition, is an extreme sport. Among the various types of snowboarding competitions, the slopestyle competition has become one of the most enjoyable events due to the long trails and execution of breathtaking tricks. Snowboarding is a young event in the family of the Winter Olympics. It only entered the Nagano Winter Olympics in 1998, when there were only four individual events. At Genting Snow Park in Zhangjiakou, Hebei Province, the course is designed in the shape of the Great Wall, which helps to block the high winds from athletes during the events. The top of the course consists of three jib sections where riders show their stylish rail tricks before giving way to three jump sections. Su, an athlete from North China’s Shanxi Province, won a silver for snowboard slopestyle Feb. 7, marking the first time that someone from Shanxi has secured a Winter Olympics medal. It was also the first snowboarding medal won by a Chinese athlete during the Games. Su’s performance was hailed by many as “flawless,” as he scored 88.70 points in his second of three runs, becoming the only competitor to perform a triple cork 1800 in Winter Olympics history. The medal won by Su, the youngest athlete taking part in the slopestyle competition, is a breakthrough for the host country, since it was the first time a Chinese athlete has competed in the event at the Olympics. Su only made his snowboarding World Cup slopestyle debut Jan. 1. Su’s success didn’t happen overnight. Influenced by his parents, who are skiing enthusiasts, Su began to snowboard when he was just 4 years old. Su became a professional snowboarder when he was 14 and joined the national team in the same year. He participated in the second National Youth Games in 2019 on behalf of Shanxi, taking home two gold medals. He won a gold medal during the U.S. leg of the International Ski Federation (FIS) Freeski and Snowboard World Cup in January. Su is known for his performance with difficult tricks and agility. In December 2021, he soared to big air gold at Steamboat Springs, Colorado, in the United States, landing a backside 1800 Indy grab and a frontside 1800 tail grab in his first two runs, which had never been done at a FIS competition. Still, compared to the rest of the field, Su is a newcomer who doesn’t have a long competition history. He’s only competed at six World Cup events, with the first dating back to December 2019. With top-10 finishes at the past three World Cup events and now two Olympic medals, Su is only just starting to break boundaries and is quickly becoming a podium mainstay. A former child film star and a keen music fan, Su decided to focus fully on snowboarding seven years ago when China was awarded the 2022 Games. That decision has started to bear fruit in recent months with his first World Cup win coming in Big Air at Steamboat over a star-studded field in December. Su was born in Jilin Province, which boasts a handful of mountain ranges, including the Changbai Mountains, and has produced a number of Chinese winter athletes. With his parents already fans of snowboarding, Su had his first try when he was 3 years old and quickly became hooked. At 7, he obtained his first sponsorship deal and his extraordinary skill attracted the attention of film directors to open up further opportunities. In 2014, the film “The Taking of Tiger Mountain” needed a young boy who could ski for several scenes. Su fitted the bill and he quickly became a child star appearing in several movies. In the coming years, he successfully managed to combine snowboarding, filming and school studies. When Beijing was awarded the right to host the 2022 Olympic Winter Games in 2015, Su decided to temporarily put his acting career on hold. At the time he published a post on his Weibo account saying: “What determines our life is not our ability, but our choice.” In 2018, he was selected for the Chinese Snowboard slopestyle and Big Air team and improved further under the instruction of famous Japanese coach Sato. Su won his first senior competition, the 2019 Chinese National Championships, topping the podium of the Big Air event to cement his spot in the team. As the pioneer of the new generation of Chinese snowboarding, Su holds multiple national records and even achieved a world first in 2021. In March 2020, he became the first Chinese to land a Backside Triple Cork 1620 Mute. The following January, he became the first Chinese to complete a Cab 1800. And in October in Stubai, Austria, he became the first snowboarder in the world to land a Backside 1980 Indy Crail in training, which saw him recognized by the Guinness World Records. Two months later, he became the Chinese to win a men’s World Cup Big Air snowboard competition at Steamboat. He has also achieved consistent results on the World Cup circuit with regular top-10 finishes. (SD-Agencies) | 