Nathan Chen “never thought he’d be able to make it this far,” he said yesterday after winning the Olympic figure skating gold in Beijing, easily beating defending champion Yuzuru Hanyu, who fell twice and finished fourth.
The American three-time world champion finally claimed the only major prize that had eluded him with his overall score of 332.60, more than 20 points ahead of his nearest challenger.
Chen held his nerve to score 218.63 in his free program, building on his record-breaking short program score from Tuesday to win gold from 18-year-old Yuma Kagiyama. Another Japanese skater, Shoma Uno, took bronze.
Photo: AP
“I never really thought that I’d be able to make it this far in my career,” the 22-year-old Chen said.
“I’d always of course dreamed about making the Olympics and winning the Olympics, but I was like ... I don’t know if I can make that happen. I haven’t really had time to process fully, but it’s amazing so far,” he said.
Skating to Elton John’s Rocket Man, Chen lived up to his nickname “Quad King” in a routine in which he landed five quadruple jumps, to rapturous cheers from the crowd.
After his last jump — which later he said he had “almost tripped on” — he broke into a hip-hop-like dance choreography.
Japanese icon Hanyu, chasing a third gold in a row and looking to cement his status as one of the best skaters of all time, had a shaky start in the short program and saw any chance of gold vanish as he fell twice in his second routine.
His free program score of 188.06 was far short of his all-time best of 212.99.
“I think I did everything I could,” said Hanyu, who arrived in Beijing on Sunday, two days before competing.
“Honestly, it feels like everything has gone wrong this time around, but I did my best,” he said.
After finishing eighth in the short program, the champion from the 2014 and 2018 Games needed to make up a gap of 18.82 points to beat Chen.
Dressed in a long sky-colored shirt embroidered with sequined flowers, Hanyu entered the rink to screams from the crowd.
The 27-year-old attempted a quadruple axel — a jump no skater has ever landed in competition, but which he had insisted he would perform in Beijing.
He failed to land it and fell to the ice. He quickly rose, but fell once more, before carrying on his “Heaven and Earth” program with his usual polished precision.
Looking crushed as the music died down, Hanyu recovered and skated off the rink with his head held high, the crowd still cheering.
Chen said that it had been “an honor to be able to share the ice with Hanyu.”
“Again, watching him when I was a kid, I never even dreamed that I would be able to have the opportunity to even skate with him,” Chen said. “It’s just been a really great honor and he’s in my opinion the greatest skater ever.”
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