Choi Ga On of Sehwa High School won South Korea’s first Olympic gold medal in a snow sport.
Choi scored 90.25 on her third run in the women’s halfpipe final at Livigno Snow Park in Italy to take gold at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. She beat top contender Chloe Kim, who scored 88.00.
The medal was South Korea’s first gold of these Winter Games and the nation’s first Winter Olympic gold in skiing events, the report said. It also moved up the youngest gold-medalist mark set by Kim (17 years, 10 months) by seven months.
In halfpipe, riders perform aerial tricks while moving up and down a U-shaped slope, with judges awarding points. South Korea has kept pushing in the event since Kim Ho Jun became the country’s first Olympic entrant at the 2010 Vancouver Games.
Choi has been at the center of that effort. Influenced by a father who snowboarded as a hobby, she started the sport after learning figure skating while watching Kim Yuna. In January 2023, she became the youngest winner in the pipe event at the X Games at age 14 years, two months. That December, she won her first International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) Snowboard World Cup, drawing attention as a prodigy.
Her career was not always smooth. In early 2024, she suffered a spinal fracture at a World Cup event in Laax, Switzerland, and underwent surgery. She missed the Gangwon Winter Youth Olympics that year and spent more than a year focused on rehabilitation.
She returned to Laax last year and won bronze, signaling her comeback. She carried that form into the Olympic season, including back-to-back World Cup wins in December in Zhangjiakou, China, and at Copper Mountain in the United States.
In her Olympic debut, Choi placed sixth in qualifying to become the first South Korean halfpipe rider to reach an Olympic final, then rode to gold.
She struggled early in the final. On her first run, she fell hard after her second jump when her landing caught on the lip of the pipe. She fell again on the first jump of her second run. At that point, she had only 10 points and stood ninth among the 12 finalists.
Choi stayed composed and delivered a comeback on her third run, starting without hesitation and landing five aerial moves cleanly. She was the only rider to score above 90 on the day. After finishing, she cried as she rode down the slope.
“I’m so happy my first Olympic medal is a gold. I can’t believe it,” Choi said in an interview after winning. “It’s also an honor to win the first gold for the South Korean team.”
* This article has been translated by AI.
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