Nathan Chen skates his way to Olympic gold: Check out these photos of his dazzling win
The USA's Nathan Chen dazzled the judges and became the first American male to win an Olympic gold medal in men's figure skating since 2010.
Chen, 22, landed all five of the quad jumps in his long program as he skated to a compilation of music from the 2019 film "Rocketman." His score after the performance was 218.63, making his total 332.60 and leaving his competitors in the dust. They were 22 points behind him.
After a devastating performance at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, Chen left no room for error in the men's individual competition and last week helped the U.S. to win silver by winning the men's short program.
The weight of trying to become an Olympic champion had lifted from his shoulders as he exited the rink and won the men's individual competition.
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"I never thought I’d actually be able to make this happen," Chen said.
Wait ... why not?
"It’s hard!" the 22-year-old said with a laugh. "I don’t know. It’d always been a dream of mine, of course, but it’s a pretty daunting mountain."
Check out these photos of Nathen Chen's Olympic gold performance:
Contributing: Tom Schad
Follow reporter Asha Gilbert @Coastalasha. Email: agilbert@usatoday.com.