Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated
ZHANGJIAKOU, China – She had crushed it and she knew it, and when the judges confirmed it, she slammed her hand down and said, “What a run! What a —ing run!” And that is how Queralt Castellet celebrated winning the non-Chloe Kim division of the snowboard halfpipe.
Kim won her second straight gold medal, and in a purely competitive sense, it came just as easily as the first. The first of Kim’s three runs in the final, her “safety run,” earned a 94 score. Nobody else would reach 91. Kim’s gold was perhaps the most predictable of the entire Olympics. But it did not feel that way to her.
