Two years ago, Team USA athletes combined to win nine gold medals at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018.
With exactly two years to go before the 2022 Olympic Winter Games begin in Beijing, several of those 2018 stars are not only still competing but are also among the best in their sports.
Here’s a look at Team USA’s 2018 Olympic gold medalists, and where they stand halfway to 2022.
Jamie Anderson, Slopestyle Snowboarding
Jamie Anderson celebrates at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 12, 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
If snowboarding is a young person’s sport, nobody told Jamie Anderson. The two-time defending Olympic champion in women’s slopestyle, now 29 years old, hasn’t slowed down, and last month she won her sixth career X Games title, bringing her to 17 on her career. The South Lake Tahoe, California, native, who also won 2018 Olympic silver in big air, finished third in slopestyle at the 2019 world championships.
Jessie Diggins and Kikkan Randall, Cross-Country Skiing Team Sprint
Kikkan Randall and Jessie Diggins pose for a photo on the podium at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 22, 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
Five-time Olympian Kikkan Randall, who led U.S. cross-country skiing to prominence over her long career, retired after winning her historic gold medal in PyeongChang – Team USA’s first in the sport. Post-Olympic plans were put on hold just months after the Games, however, when she was diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer. Following treatment, the Alaska native announced she was cancer free in March 2019, and in October ran the New York City Marathon. Diggins, meanwhile, has established herself as the leader of the U.S. team. The 28-year-old Minnesotan is ranked fourth in the world this season, and in March she’ll be the main attraction when the world cup circuit makes a stop in Minneapolis – the tour’s first U.S. stop since 2001.
Red Gerard, Slopestyle Snowboarding
Red Gerard competes in snowboarding at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 11, 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
With his slopestyle win in PyeongChang, 17-year-old Red Gerard claimed Team USA’s first gold medal of the Winter Games. Now halfway to the 2022 Winter Games, Gerard is old enough to vote – and he’s still going strong on his snowboard. The Colorado native, now 19, is coming off an especially big January, when he went from finishing second at a world cup event in Switzerland to claiming his first X Games medal with a bronze in slopestyle. He also competes in big air, and in August he reached the world cup podium in that event.
Chloe Kim, Halfpipe Snowboarding
Chloe Kim celebrates on the podium at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 12, 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
Fans couldn’t keep their eyes of Chloe Kim in 2018 – nor could they ignore her tweets. The 17-year-old Californian killed time between her historically good halfpipe runs with instantly viral tweets about her appetite. Since PyeongChang, Kim has continued to dominate the sport, and in 2019 she won her fifth X Games gold medal, followed immediately by her first world title one week later. However, the 19-year-old superstar is taking a hiatus from the sport to start classes at Princeton. She’s planning to return to snowboarding in time for 2022, though.
Mikaela Shiffrin, Giant Slalom
Mikaela Shiffrin celebrates at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 15, 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
Mikaela Shiffrin has been nothing if not dominant since PyeongChang, where she surprisingly missed the podium on her signature event – slalom – but won gold in giant slalom and silver in combined. Since then, Shiffrin put together what might have been the best world cup season in the sport’s history in 2018-19, and she’s now a bona fide contender across all disciplines. Her 66 world cup wins rank third all time, though Shiffrin, who turns 25 in March, remains particularly dominant in slalom. She ended 2019 with her 43rd world cup slalom win, tying the women’s record for most wins in a single discipline.
Team Shuster, Curling
Team Shuster celebrates at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 24, 2018 in Gangneung, South Korea.
John Shuster’s comeback story started well before the PyeongChang Games, when the then-three-time Olympian was cut from the national team program. Upon battling his way back to make his fourth Olympic team in 2018, the Minnesota native then led his team of Tyler George, Matt Hamilton, John Landsteiner and Joe Polo from a 2-4 start to a historic gold medal – Team USA’s first in the sport. Since the 2018 Games, George stepped back from the sport, replaced on the team by Chris Plys, and the group kept rolling. In 2019, the team finished fifth at the world championships, while Shuster and Cory Christensen won a bronze medal at the mixed doubles world championships.
Shaun White, Halfpipe Snowboarding
Shaun White celebrates at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 14, 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
The iconic Shaun White hasn’t competed since winning his third Olympic gold medal in PyeongChang – at least, he hasn’t competed on a snowboard. Over the past two years the 33-year-old White embarked on a longshot bid to make the 2020 Olympic Games in skateboarding, a sport making its Olympic debut in Tokyo. White won five X Games medals in skateboarding from 2005 to 2011, though all in the non-Olympic vert event. Competing in the park discipline, though, White made a run to the semifinal round and ultimately finished 13th at last year’s world championships. He hasn’t decided if he’ll continue his quest for Tokyo, though he has said he plans to go for another halfpipe snowboarding gold medal in Beijing, when he’d be 35 years old.
David Wise, Halfpipe Skiing
David Wise celebrates after winning a gold medal in freestyle skiing at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 22, 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
Now 29 years old, David Wise continues to hold the standard in men’s halfpipe skiing. After winning the sport’s first Olympic gold medal in 2014 and then defending the title in 2018, Wise has remained a contender on the world cup circuit, notching two podium finishes in three world cups last season, and scoring another one already this season. In January, the Reno, Nevada, native and father of two competed in his 12th X Games, finishing seventh.
Women’s Ice Hockey Team
Members of the U.S. women's hockey team celebrate at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on Feb. 15, 2018 in Gangneung, South Korea.
The 2018 Olympic Winter Games might have been a turning point for women’s ice hockey. Going into PyeongChang, Canada had won the previous four Olympic gold medals. Since Hilary Knight and Co. led Team USA to a dramatic gold-medal win in 2018, though, recent history is starting to look pretty red, white and blue. The U.S. won its fifth consecutive world title in 2019, which also marked its eighth win in the past nine tournaments. In other words, since 2008 the U.S. has won every major title except two: the 2010 and 2014 Winter Games. The U.S. and Canada are currently in the midst of a five-game rivalry series, with the Americans having an early 2-1 lead. They’ll likely meet again in April when the world championships are held in Halifax and Truro, Nova Scotia. While some new faces are working their way into the roster, several 2018 Olympic stars are still going strong, including Knight, Kendall Coyne Schofield, Amanda Kessel and others.
Chrös McDougall has covered the Olympic and Paralympic movements for TeamUSA.org since 2009 on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc. He is based in Minneapolis-St. Paul.
