Chen, who had been the favorite going into Thursday’s event, pulled off his win with a long program packed with moves to show off the technical prowess that has earned the 22-year-old the nickname of the “quad king.”
“It means the world. I’m just so happy,” Chen said following the win, adding there were “too many emotions to process”.
“It’s a whirlwind right now. I had a blast out there.”
Chen’s long program at Beijing’s Capital Indoor Stadium opened with a quadruple flip, followed by a triple toe loop. He nailed every jump and move, with a total of five quad jumps, including a quadruple lutz.
“Of course, there are certainly many things I could have done better, but overall I was very happy I was able to do the program that I put down,” the skater and Salt Lake City native said.
Chen’s joyful and energetic routine was set to a medley of songs, including Elton John’s “Rocket Man.” Every jump he performed was met with roaring cheers and claps from athletes and other spectators in the “closed loop” side of the stadium — though the other side, holding Chinese spectators, remained largely silent, according to CNN reporters in the stadium.
The performance placed Chen well at the lead with a score of 218.63, combined with his short program score for a winning total of 332.60. Two Japanese skaters will take the podium behind him, with silver medalist Yuma Kagiyama coming in at 310.05 points and Shoma Uno taking bronze with a score of 293.
He is the seventh man to win gold for the United States in men’s singles skating, according to the Olympic website.
Thursday’s long program event had a disappointing finish for Japanese all-time great Yuzuru Hanyu, who fell attempting the fabled quadruple axel in his free skate — as he desperately tried to pull his score up.
The “Ice Prince” came into the competition in eighth place today after a sub-par show in the short program Tuesday.
The win is also a reprieve for Chen, who gave disappointing performance at the Pyeongchang Games in 2018, landing fifth in the individual competition, though leaving with a bronze medal in the team event.
In the four years since, Chen has risen, racking up three straight world championships and sealing a 6th consecutive US title to arrive in Beijing as a favorite.
It’s an accomplishment that the skater has made while pursuing a statistics and data science degree at Yale — a program he took a temporary break from in order to prepare for the Games.
“A lot of being able to perform well is resulted upon being able to spend time off the rink and recovering, giving yourself the time to be a human and friend and fill the role that’s not an athlete all the time,” Chen told CNN in January.
“Being able to spend time with my friends, my family, pick up hobbies, do things that are unrelated to skating — just sort of rest myself physically and mentally — has been really useful,” he said.
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