By Alvise Armellini
LIVIGNO, Italy, Feb 21 (Reuters) – The United States won gold in the Olympics freestyle skiing mixed team final on Saturday, retaining their 2022 title, while Switzerland bagged the silver and favourites China were left with the bronze.
The Americans stormed to victory after failing to reach the podium in this week’s women’s and men’s finals, where China took the golds through husband-and-wife couple Wang Xindi and Xu Mengtao.
The winning U.S. team included Kaila Kuhn, gold medallist at the 2025 world championships in women’s and mixed team aerials, who finished fifth in Wednesday’s Olympic women’s final.
Her teammates were Christopher Lillis and Connor Curran, who were eighth and 12th respectively in the men’s final on Friday.
“All of us came in so motivated after that individual event because it didn’t really go any of our ways. And so we came in today motivated, strong as ever,” Kuhn said.
The winning trio spoke to reporters with American flags draped around their shoulders, and gold medals hanging from their necks.
“It’s hard to put into words how much it means to represent the USA and get a gold medal with your friends and family. And yeah, it means the world, and I’m honoured,” Curran said.
CHINA GOES AWAY WITH TWO GOLDS AND THREE BRONZES
The Americans scored 325.35 out of a possible total of 450. The Swiss team, including men’s silver medallist Noe Roth, got 296.91 points, while China posted 279.68.
The contest in the alpine resort of Livigno took place in overcast and snowy conditions affecting visibility in an added challenge for athletes.
The Chinese medal bid was spoiled by final round mistakes from Wang and Li Tianma, the bronze medallist in the men’s, who both crashed on landing after high-difficulty jumps.
“This is a good lesson for me, it proves that there is something to improve (…) in the future training I must keep improving myself,” Li said.
Xu stressed that Milano Cortina was still China’s biggest-ever aerials medal haul, with two golds and three bronzes including Shao Qui’s in the women’s event.
Aerials is a gravity-defying discipline that has been part of the Winter Games since 1994 for men’s and women’s events and from 2022 for mixed teams.
Athletes jump off a near vertical ramp, launching themselves in the air and performing complex aerobatics, reaching speeds of up to more than 65 km per hour.
They are judged on height, distance, style, degree of difficulty and landing, with a maximum score of 150 for each jump.
In mixed teams, male and female athletes compete together, with each country fielding three contestants. Their individual scores are added up for an overall total.
(Reporting by Alvise Armellini, editing by Andrew Cawthorne and Hugh Lawson)
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