Caldwell, Lillis and Schoenfield Become the First Trio to Win a Mixed Team Aerials Olympic Gold
© US Ski & Snowboard Team via NBC Olympics. From left to right: Ashley Caldwell, Christopher Lillis and Justin Schoenefeld
On Thursday February 10, Ashley Caldwell, Justin Schoenfeld and Chris Lillis became the first trio to win the Mixed Team Aerials event, securing Olympic Gold, upsetting China for first place and setting a new precedent in the process. The new competition made its debut as an Olympics event in 2022 after being on the World Cup circuit.
Winning this competitive event requires individual mastery as each athlete competes to the maximum level of difficulty. The mixed team aerials event consists of three athletes — either two men and a woman or two women and a man (limitation of no more than two competitors per gender) that each take a jump to produce a cumulative score. The competition consists of two rounds called ‘Finals’ where the format is repeated to figure out a winner and starts out with a woman and ends with a man. Aerialist performance is measured on three components for a final score, which includes:
• 20 percent air (takeoff, distance and height)
• 50 percent form (body position, separation)
• 30 percent landing
With an almost perfect quintuple twisting triple, Lillis brought in 135 points, landing him silver after Caldwell’s ski jump had scored 88.89 points. Lillis’s score was the highest at the event. A strong jump from Schoenfeld — something he did every day in training — would take them to the podium first place. Aiming to keep calm and just get it done, Schoenfeld did his part, securing Olympic Gold — the first for the US aerials team since 2010.
© U.S. Ski & Snowboard Team, Photo of Chris Lillis
This medal is a first for Ashley Caldwell at her fourth Olympics event and the first time an American aerialist has won an Olympic medal since 1998 when Nikki Stone took one home. It is also the first time both Lillis and Schoenfeld have competed at the Olympics. Caldwell first appeared at the Olympics in 2010 as a 16-year-old in Vancouver, B.C. The medal is the first time the US team has taken home a prize in freestyle skiing since 2010.
“I’ve been in the hunt for a gold medal my entire career.”
All Park City, Utah natives, the trio were coached by prior Gold medalist Eric Bergoust. A University of Utah student hailing from Virginia, Caldwell trained for 11 years a a gymnast before starting aerials. Aerials involve flips and twists very similar to gymnastics after launching up three stories into the air. Hailing from Indiana, Schoenfield attends Utah Valley University. Following in the footsteps of his brother Jon who competed at the aerials in PyeongChang, Lillis hails from Pittsford, New York. Throwing down quintuple twisting triples has been a three-year process for the trio.
“I was just happy to get the opportunity to throw one and to put it down.”
The win follows Chloe Kim’s haul of two Olympic Gold medals in snowboarding. See the results at the 2022 Olympics.
View more at the US Ski and Snowboard Team’s website.