Eileen Gu: US-China tension is trickiest slope for Olympic free skier

On Monday, world champion skier Eileen Gu made her Olympic debut in the women’s big air qualification round. But even before that, Ms Gu – also known as China’s “Snow Princess” – had already been known to millions.

A teenage US-born athlete, Ms Gu is indisputably a gifted skier. At 18, she has already won eight international skiing events, claiming gold for the big air event in the 2020 Winter Youth Olympics in Lausanne and medalling three times at the Winter X Games in Aspen, Colorado, last year.

She’s also predicted to walk away with three medals this year, according to data analysts Nielsen Gracenote.

But it is not her podium odds in Beijing that are sparking the most provocative discussions about her.

A San Francisco native who learned to ski on the pristine slopes of California’s Lake Tahoe, she is representing China, not the USA, in the Olympics – a move that has come at a sensitive time for Sino-American relations, and has inevitably placed Ms Gu at the centre of a global debate on geopolitics and representation.

And for all that she has attempted to deflect questions about her identity, citizenship status and thoughts on political issues, they are unlikely to go away.

Is she an American or a Chinese woman? And is it possible to be both in a world where the two nations have strained relations?

When Ms Gu began her competitive skiing career in 2018, she did so as an American, but switched her affiliation with the International Ski Federation the following year.

In making the announcement, Ms Gu – the daughter of an American father and first-generation Chinese immigrant mother – said she wanted “the opportunity to help inspire millions of young people during the Winter Olympics in Beijing – my mother’s birthplace”.

Little is known about her father, and Ms Gu uses her mother’s surname.

Though her switch to China came in 2019, her Olympic debut has thrown her into the spotlight again.

Speculation about her citizenship status has been rife since Red Bull, a corporate sponsor, claimed she gave up her US passport in order to compete for China, but later removed the line when pressed by a US newspaper.

China does not recognise dual citizenship, and Ms Gu has always declined to disclose the status of her nationality.

When asked by the South China Morning Post last year, she said: “I’m fully American and look and speak the way I do. Nobody can deny I’m American. When I go to China, nobody can deny I’m Chinese because I’m fluent in the language and culture and completely identify as such.”

She did not respond to the BBC’s requests for an interview.

The Chinese Consulate General in New York told the BBC that Ms Gu would have to have been naturalised or gained permanent residency status in China to compete for its team.

In 2020, the Chinese Ministry of Justice broadened rules for foreigners to obtain permanent residency such that those who has achieved international recognition in sport, science, culture and other fields would be eligible. The expansion would seem to apply to Ms Gu.

Ms Gu and four other athletes went through the process to gain eligibility to play for China in the 2022 Games, the Consulate said.

But regardless of what is stated on her official papers, she faces difficult questions as an athlete born in America, living the life of a Western teenager – yet representing a country whose government has been widely criticised for human rights violations and anti-democratic crackdowns.

Ms Gu has expressed support for movements Black Lives Matter and spoken out against anti-Asian violence in the US, but remained silent on issues like the mass internment of ethnic Uyghurs in Xinjiang and the arrests of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong.

“There’s no need to be divisive,” she told news site The New York Times. A difficult, if not impossible posture to take when several countries, including the US, are engaged in a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing games in protest of Beijing’s rights record.

In China however, she has been embraced by state media. Dubbed “genius girl skier” and “snow princess” – she has been featured in several government TV documentaries and has also shown her commercial potential by modelling for high-profile brands and her intelligence with a place at Stanford University.

Deals with the Bank of China, China Mobile and JD.com, a Chinese retailer, are among her commercial contracts.

Ms Gu and her team clearly understand that they must tread lightly.

In declining to speak to The Economist, her American agent, Tom Yaps, told magazine: “If [Eileen] participates in an article that has two paragraphs critical of China and human rights, that would put her in jeopardy over there. One thing and a career is ruined.”

Or, as Ms Gu observed in her New York Times essay: “You do have to be careful of who you’re telling your secrets to”.