Gu Ailing's Winter Olympic debut successfully advanced to the final is expected to be "difficult"

(Beijing Winter Olympics) Gu Ailing's Winter Olympic debut successfully advanced to the final is expected to be "difficult"

Beijing, February 7 (China News Service) -- Chinese skier Gu Ailing ushered in her debut at the Winter Olympics on February 7. In the freestyle ski jumping qualifier, despite a mistake in the second round, she still relied on the steady performance of the other two rounds to advance to the final with a total score of fifth place. She said that she hopes to make difficult moves in the final and give a wonderful performance.

Although the freestyle ski jump is a new event in the Beijing Winter Olympics, this cool sport has always been widely concerned by ski enthusiasts around the world in top competitions such as the World Championships and Extreme Games.

18-year-old Gu Ailing is already a world-class skier, and she has won many world championships in freestyle U-shaped skiing and slope obstacle courses. The big jump was originally her side item, but in last year's World Cup, Gu Ailing returned from injury and staged a difficult 1440-degree maneuver of forward-skid forward flip two-turn body, winning the first world cup of her career.

On February 7, in the Beijing Winter Olympics Freestyle Ski Women's Big Jump Qualifying Tournament, China's Gu Ailing made her debut and successfully advanced to the final. Photo by Mao Jianjun, reporter of China News Service

At the Beijing Winter Olympic Games, Gu Ailing faced fierce competition from many opponents. The 21-year-old Swiss star Mathilde Grimau has the title of "king of the big jump", and she has a high winning percentage in the World Cup and the World Extreme Games during the Beijing Winter Olympics cycle. France's Tess Ludder was once at the top of the world rankings, and Estonia's "genius girl" Hildaru is also very competitive.

The qualifying round is divided into three rounds, with a total of 25 players participating, and the highest two rounds of results are added together, and the top 12 players advance to the final round. Standing on the departure area of the Shougang Big Jump platform, Gu Ailing was in a relaxed state, and in the first round she chose a 1080-degree turn, the aerial jump parabola and landing position were flawless, and she scored a high score of 89.00 points, ranking third among all the players.

Tess Ludd has a higher difficulty factor, with her 90.50 points in the first round. In the second round, Gu Ailing chose the difficult action of grabbing the board with both hands, which is relatively rare among female players, but she failed to complete it successfully, and there was a big mistake when landing, resulting in a snow board falling off, and this round only scored 24.50 points. After two rounds, Gu Ailing slipped to 16th.

However, in the crucial third jump, Gu Ailing played quite steadily, still choosing the 1080 action difficulty, and got a good score of 72.25 points. After three rounds, Gu Ailing ranked fifth among all the players with 161.25 points and successfully advanced to the final.

With the exception of Hildaru, gu Ailing's other competitors have advanced to the final. Talking about her performance, Gu Ailing said that her goal in the qualifiers is not to win the first place, but to successfully advance to the final.

"Actually, the performance is quite satisfactory, of course, after the second jump mistake I will also have some pressure, because if I did not enter the final I will be dissatisfied with myself, but I did not deliberately think about it, I told myself, the last jump is very simple, I can complete it at the age of 14, so the end is very smooth." Gu Ailing said.

In the qualifiers, Gu Ailing did not use her killer skill 1440 difficult action. Will it be difficult in the final? "Tomorrow I hope I can do difficult moves and bring you a wonderful performance!" (End)