Chloe Kim Wins Winter X Games Halfpipe At Age 14
Chloe Kim is now the youngest person ever to win X Games gold after she conquered the women’s halfpipe finals on Saturday night at the age of fourteen.
Mere minutes after a brutal practice crash, the 14-year-old toppled Kelly Clark’s dynastic halfpipe dominance. Spinning technical combos with a pair of 900s, a switch method and a switch 720 with floating amplitude, Kim’s final run in the best-of-three contest earned 92 points to beat Clark’s first-run 90.
Last year, Kim was the youngest athlete to win an X Games medal with her halfpipe silver. Saturday night, she became the youngest Winter X Games gold medalist. She was too young to go to Sochi, and she is too young to compete in the World Cup circuit.
On the final run of practice Saturday, Kim slammed the deck of the pipe on her final hit, smashing her face as she slid down the wall of the pipe.
So, Chloe Kim, how does it feel?
“My face kind of hurts right now,” Kim said on ESPN.
Kim, who won silver behind Clark last year, chipped a tooth in her earlier practice fall and wore a Nelly-like bandage on her left cheek.
Clark, 31, a three-time Olympic medalist, soared more than 16 feet above the halfpipe, reportedly a new women’s X Games record. She won her 10th X Games halfpipe medal, tying Shaun White for the record in the event.
Kim was not alive when Clark and White made their Winter X Games debuts 15 years ago.
“In years to come, I’ll be able to look at women’s snowboarding and know that not only is it in good hands, but it’s in the hands of someone I’m proud of,” Clark said of Kim and others before the competition, according to the Associated Press and USA Today.
Kim has said she considers Clark an idol, standing in long lines to get Clark’s autograph and being mesmerized and speechless to ride a chairlift with Clark, according to the Associated Press.
“All I could think was, ‘I’m going to get Kelly Clark powers now,'” Kim joked to the AP when retelling the chairlift story.
[Image via AOL]
