The first overall and first gold medal for China at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics were both earned by snowboarder Su Yiming. On February 7, he took bronze in the men's big air final. Eleven days later, on his 22nd birthday, Su topped the podium in the men's slopestyle event. In an interview with CGTN Sports Scene's Greg Laffradi, he shared his take on what it takes to become an Olympic and world champion.

After participating in two editions of the Games, Su now has two golds, one silver and one bronze. He said his success feels "unreal," even though he had been dreaming of achieving such honors for a long time.

The men's slopestyle gold at Milano Cortina 2026 put Su on the top of the Olympic podium for the second time, after his debut appearance resulted in a big air title at Beijing 2022. He noted that it was more difficult to compete at this edition in Italy, because he was shouldering a bigger responsibility to show the rest of the world that Chinese snowboarding is stronger than ever.

Although Su headed to this year's Winter Games with a different mindset, coming away with the big air bronze medal lifted a lot of pressure.

In the slopestyle final, Su soared into the lead with 82.41 points, which stood as the winning score in the end, something he admitted he hadn't expected to happen.

Injuries are an unpleasant but nearly unavoidable part of any athlete's career, and Su is no exception. He took a nearly two-year break after the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. The snowboarder struggled to maintain his confidence during that period, but managed to win the battle in the end, both physically and mentally, returning as an even stronger champion.