Winter Olympics 2026: Elizabeth Lemley flies to gold in moguls

LIVIGNO, Italy — When she was a young girl, Elizabeth Lemley’s father Wayne would take her and her brother down to Eagle Airport near Vail, Colorado, and put them in the back seat of a single-engine plane while he trained to be a pilot.

Up in the air she’d go, little Liz, feeling the rush of the takeoff, gliding through the clouds, building up to top speed. Eventually, she’d fly planes herself, a hobby that perhaps isn’t too far removed from the career that just won her a gold medal.

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“My favorite type of flying is acrobatics,” Lemley said. “I’ve only done it a few times, but I love the adrenaline. It’s similar to skiing. I love the risk.”

Understand that this qualifies as a pretty bold statement for Lemley, a soft-spoken 20-year old who keeps her cards close to the vest and her emotions in check. On Wednesday, moments after stunning the world with a gold-medal winning run in women’s moguls, it was hard to tell whether Lemley had just fulfilled a lifelong dream or was getting ready for an early dinner.

“She knew she was gonna win,” said Ava Keenan, who’s been skiing with Lemley since they were little and has remained one of her best friends. “She said she had a second gear yesterday. We knew it. We knew this was gonna happen. She just had to ski the way she just skied.”

And how did she ski?

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Almost perfectly.

Second in qualifying and fourth in the first portion of the moguls final, when it all came down to one final run, Lemley put down perhaps the best 25.81 seconds of her skiing life. After the second and final jump, a trick she calls “Slime” that she cribbed from Great Britain’s Matéo Jeannesson — a corked takeoff, a safety grab then a pullback for the final flourish — Lemley crossed the finish line, drove her fist through the air and waited for a score that turned this event on its head. It was 82.30, undoubtedly good enough to medal and perhaps high enough to claim gold.

“I didn’t expect anything from my score,” she said. “I was just thinking about my run. I was super stoked that I put one down.”

Suddenly vaulted into first place, Lemley waited at the bottom along with American teammate Jaelin Kauf, who had skied her way into second. All that remained was the run of Australia’s Jakara Anthony, one of the most accomplished moguls skiers of all time and the favorite to win gold for the second straight Olympics.

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Everyone expected Anthony to do something special. But a failure to control her speed coming through the middle of the course caused her to spin out as she turned her skis. Just like that, Anthony’s run was over and Lemley was the third American to win this event, joining Hannah Kearney in 2010 and Donna Weinbrecht in 1992. The large American contingent holding signs for Lemley and Kauf were delirious, breaking out into hugs before the winners eventually made their way from the podium, both of them hoisted onto shoulders as they showed off their medals.

“I’m so proud of Liz,” said Kauf, who also won silver four years ago and was thrilled to do it this time after a pretty shaky qualifying run Tuesday that almost caused her to miss the finals. “It speaks volumes to our team and what our team is capable of to have us go 1-2 on the Olympic stage.”

To those in the freeski world, it’s not a surprise that Lemley became a gold medalist. She’s always been a bit of a prodigy, winning her first World Cup event at age 16 and the Youth Olympic Games gold in 2024. The stunning part is that she did it this soon, against this field, in her first crack at the Winter Games.

“She’s a silent assassin,” said Jim Keenan, Ava’s father and a close family friend. “She doesn’t say much, but in her head, she knows what she’s doing.”

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Lemley’s own father, the one who put her on skis and in airplanes practically before she could walk, is supposed to arrive in Italy this weekend to watch the dual moguls event. According to one Team USA official, he was too nervous to watch Wednesday’s competition in person.

He missed a heck of a show, but Lemley’s large crew of coaches and friends engulfed her in hugs. As usual, for someone who’s been flying high their whole life, she was the calm in the center of the storm.

“I guess my coach would definitely describe me as pretty stoic,” she said. “I like to stay calm and just feel the moment around me. I think everybody’s different. Some people have a lot of success being super emotional but for me it just works to be super calm.”