LIVIGNO, Italy — The Livigno Aerials & Moguls Park crowd was on pins and needles Friday afternoon, awaiting the score of the final jump by Switzerland’s Noe Roth in final two.
Roth, the 2025 world champion, perfectly landed a double full-double full-full. The 25 year old in his third Games raised his arms to the sky and let out a huge fist pump. His large support group in the stands celebrated as if the gold medal was surely on its way.
As the judges took minutes deliberating over Roth’s score, the crowd, including Roth’s family and friends, fell silent.
Roth’s 131.58 score soon rang across the big screen and he put his hands on his head in confusion, shock and disappointment. China’s Wang Xindi, who landed a back double full double full-full to the leading score of 132.60 earlier in final two, rushed to the base of the jumps, pounded on the snow and pumped his fists toward the sky while on his knees.
Xindi’s Chinese teammate Li Tianma won the bronze medal with a score of 123.93.
As loud as Wang’s celebratory screams were, the U.S. team’s silence and disappointment were deafening.
Friday got off to a nightmarish start after Park City aerialist Quinn Dehlinger was ruled out of his first Games with a knee injury suffered earlier this week in training. While Parkites Chris Lillis, Connor Curran and Derek Krueger advanced to final one, they were all unable to land their two jumps cleanly and were quickly eliminated.
“I gave it all I got,” a dejected Lillis said. “But that wasn’t enough today. That’s hard to handle, especially at the Olympics, which is every four years.”
Lillis quickly moved on to talk about how it’s now time for he and the team to focus on Saturday morning’s mixed team aerials. The 27 year old won the mixed team aerials gold medal at the 2022 Beijing Games, alongside Park City aerialists Ashley Caldwell and Justin Schoenefeld, whose wedding Lillis officiated. The U.S. coaches will decide on the two-man, one-woman team shortly.
“I expect to be on that team,” Lillis said. “But that’s not really up to me. … I’m going to be focused, getting ready to go for tomorrow. We’ve got a really solid team no matter who’s out there, and hopefully we’ll go defend that title.”
Lillis lauded Curran and Krueger’s skiing Friday, both in their first Games. Krueger’s highest-scoring final one jump was 92.74 and Curran’s 88.69. China’s Sun Jaixu was the sixth and final qualifier into final two with a score of 117.26.
“They’ve got long careers ahead of them, especially Connor,” Lillis said. “I expect big things out of him in the future.”
Curran said poor body position heading into his jumps did him in Friday. He was proud nonetheless to be competing at the Milano Cortina Games for the United States.
“I feel like things could have gone a lot better,” Curran said. “I’m going to stay ready like I’m going to jump tomorrow, and if they pick me, they pick me, and if they don’t, they don’t.”
While Curran didn’t blame the swirling wind and lightly falling snow for his shoddy landings in final one, Lillis and Krueger acknowledged that the wind made things difficult. The coaches were trying Friday to help their athletes nail down the proper speeds heading into their jumps.
“We all put down some really good jumps,” Krueger said. “Especially with only having had two days of training here. That’s kind of been a setback because of some tricky weather conditions. So, very proud of myself and my teammates.”
Krueger said he hopes he is making his family, who traveled in from their hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, proud. The U.S. aerialists had strong crowd support Friday.
“It’s a dream come true,” said Krueger’s mom, Colleen Krueger. “He’s worked so hard, and is so honored to be representing the United States. We are so proud of him.”
The mixed team aerials will run from 10:45 a.m. to 12:25 p.m. CEST and 2:45 a.m. to 4:25 a.m. MST at the Livigno Aerials & Moguls Park.
