Ailing (Eileen) Gu reveals: How I am dealing with the pressure at Beijing 2022

Ailing (Eileen) Gu is already an Olympic gold medallist at the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games after she won a historic first ever Olympic big air freestyle skiing competition.

And she isn't finished yet.

Already one of the brightest stars of the Beijing Games, it's all eyes on her as she aims for two more podiums in freeski slopestyle and halfpipe.

There is a lot of pressure and expectations on her. How does she handle it all?

"I’m a very introverted person naturally so I do a lot of journalling, I do a lot of self-reflection. I play piano a lot. I actually have a keyboard here with me," she tells Olympics.com.

"It’s really small but I just have it in my room so I play it and compose stuff at night. I take really long showers, I meditate.

"All of those things to kind of just keep to myself and stay in my own head as opposed to listening to all these voices who you know, 90% of the time don’t know what they’re talking about so…"

Gu also has a lot of support, millions of fans and people who understand her, like mom Yan Gu, and friend and fellow Beijing 2022 gold medallist who knows a thing or two about pressure too: Chloe Kim.

Gu may have been born in San Francisco, California, the United States, but she has deep connections with Beijing.

Her mother was born and studied there for one, she's also spent a lot of time there and has learned fluent mandarin - with a Beijing accent.

Her father is American but Gu was raised by her Chinese mother and grandmother, speaking mandarin much of the time while growing up.

Gu has won the hearts of tens of millions of Chinese people with her heroic Olympic feats on the snow, but also because she has embraced her Chinese roots and culture, they love her 北京话 (Beijing hua) - that