With great success comes hate, and Chloe Kim learned it the nasty way. Fresh off her gold medal win in the women’s snowboard halfpipe event during the PyeongChang 2018 Olympic Winter Games, the Korean-American athlete was supposed to be celebrating. Instead, thoughts of retirement crossed her mind.
Kim was only 17 years old at the time, the youngest woman to win an Olympic gold in snowboarding. With a stellar career in sports at such a young age and, no doubt, more success ahead of her, why was she thinking of quitting? Find out below.
Success At The 2018 Winter Olympics
The top snowboarder, now 21, is the daughter of South Korean immigrants and a six-time X Games gold medalist. Competing for the US at the 2018 Winter Olympics, she made history by becoming the first woman to win two golds in snowboarding.
Almost instantly after her medal-winning runs, however, Kim felt stifled by the intense pressure that comes with fame and success, reportedly even “escaping to a bathroom just to be alone, to get a look at the medal she had earned.” Things got worse when she received a nasty message by accident. Scroll for the details.
The Offensive Message
What was supposed to be a time of celebration was ruined by an Instagram message from a rival. Meant for someone else but sent to her by mistake, the text referred to Kim as a “cocky ass bitch.” She never revealed the identity of the sender, only that it was a top snowboarder.
The offensive message almost caused the star athlete to quit the sport. “My 17-, 18-year-old self was a lot more immature — like screw it all, I’m done,” she said. “I’m going to take a break and revisit this conversation later.”
Trust Issues
The incident resulted in trust issues for the snowboarder. “I just felt like everyone is out to get me or something,” Kim said. “So I was like, OK, if I’m going to be the villain in the story, then I don’t know if I want to do it. It’s just not fun.”
When the Olympic gold medalist broke her right ankle in 2019, she was forced to take a break from her sport – a break she welcomed considering how exhausted she was from all the pressure.
Back And Better
The hiatus lasted 22 months and she came back from it better than ever. In January 2021, she started competing and winning again. Even better, she returned with a healthier frame of mind, telling Shape in an interview, “I felt pressured to be perfect all the time, and it drained me. I was genuinely angry for a while because I was so concerned about what everyone else would think about me. It became toxic. That’s when I realized, I need to take better care of myself, and if I don’t want to do something, I can’t force myself to do it. It was very empowering for me, feeling like I finally had more control over my life. Right now I’m in a much better place.”
]]>The Inquisitr
