U.S.-born Chinese ski star Eileen Gu wins her second medal of the Beijing Olympics

BEIJING — Eileen Gu took her next step toward domination of the 2022 Winter Olympics, but fell just short of a second straight gold medal.

The American-born freestyle skier, who now competes for China, won silver in the women’s freeski slopestyle by the barest of margins, needing a dig-deep third-round run to vault herself onto the podium.

Slopestyle requires a skier to navigate a series of pipes and jumps with artistry, grace and daring. Treachery awaits at every trick, and numerous competitors in the minus-seven-degree temperatures struggled with the pipes and the landings.

Judges credited her with a 69.90, good enough for third behind Estonia’s Kelly Sildaru and France’s Tess LeDeux after the first round. But her second round ended early with a fall off a pipe, and she found herself in eighth place after the round.

Above her, the leaderboard turned upside down. Mathilde Gremaud, whose broken binding in the first round annihilated her run and left her with a score of 1.1, rebounded strong, throwing down an 86.56 to claim the top slot. Sildaru held onto the second slot, and Team USA’s Maggie Voisin snared the third slot with a 78.28 heading into the final round.

Gu knew she had to perform the slopestyle run of her life, and she very nearly did. Her final run totaled 86.23, just over three-tenths of a point behind Gremaud for the gold. Sildaru’s opening-round run held up for the bronze.

Gu is a nationwide celebrity in China. Her face adorns everything from commercials and billboards to the shopping bags filled with Olympic souvenirs at official Beijing Games stores. A silver medal may not carry the same cachet as gold, but the fact that Gu was able to throw down an all-or-nothing final round will only help burnish her legend.

Voisin ended up in fifth after Gu and Russia’s Anastasia Tatalina passed her in the final round. Team USA’s Marin Hamill, who qualified sixth, injured her right leg in her final qualifying run and did not compete.