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Chloe Kim makes it five straight wins with Dew Tour title

By Nick ZaccardiDec 16, 2018, 1:54 PM EST
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Chloe Kim capped one of the greatest years in snowboarding history by repeating as Dew Tour champion in Breckenridge, Colo., on Sunday.

The 18-year-old PyeongChang gold medalist won a modified halfpipe contest with a 94.67-point first run on a course that combines slopestyle features with a halfpipe. She beat a field that included Olympic silver and bronze medalists Liu Jiayu and Arielle Gold.

Kim has won five straight contests — the X Games in January, the Olympics in February, the U.S. Open in March and, to open this season, victories the last two weekends. No other rider won the X Games, Olympics and U.S. Open in one year.

Kim decided to compete this season rather than enroll in college. She tweeted in March that she was accepted to Princeton.

She is expected to go for a fourth X Games Aspen title in five years next month, which would tie her for second all-time among women behind Kelly Clark, who has six halfpipe crowns.

The retired Gretchen Bleiler also won four X Games golds. Clark, a 35-year-old, five-time Olympian, said last month that she was undecided if she will compete again.

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MORE: Shaun White sets longest snowboard break of career

Johnny Weir, more Olympians among Google’s trending athletes of 2018

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By Nick ZaccardiDec 12, 2018, 9:02 AM EST
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More: Olympics

U.S. to play in snow volleyball tour, led by 4-time Olympian Ester Ledecka must decide between ski, snowboard worlds Sandro Viletta, Olympic super combined champion, retires

Lindsey Vonn and Shaun White were the third- and fourth-most Google-trending athletes in the world in 2018.

The full list:
1. Tristan Thompson, Basketball
2. Alexis Sánchez, Soccer
3. Lindsey Vonn, Alpine Skiing
4. Shaun White, Snowboarding
5. Khabib Nurmagomedov, MMA
6. Kawhi Leonard, Basketball
7. Naomi Osaka, Tennis
8. Philippe Coutinho, Soccer
9. Conor McGregor, MMA
10. Harry Kane, Soccer

The list is based on search terms that had the highest spike in 2018 compared to 2017. Which would explain why Winter Olympians would outrank the likes of LeBron James and Tom Brady.

In the U.S., “Olympic medal count” ranked ninth in trending news, just behind the royal wedding. White and Vonn were Nos. 2 and 3 on the U.S. athletes top 10, with Chloe Kim in eighth and NBC Sports figure skating analyst Johnny Weir in 10th as the only retired athlete on the list.

Google also published a Year in Search video that included Mirai Nagasu and Kim.

In 2016, the Rio Olympics was the top trending sporting event, while Michael Phelps was the No. 3 trending person behind Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, with Simone Biles in fifth and Ryan Lochte ninth.

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Chloe Kim dominates first halfpipe contest of season after clinic visit

By Nick ZaccardiDec 8, 2018, 4:00 PM EST
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More: Olympics

U.S. to play in snow volleyball tour, led by 4-time Olympian Ester Ledecka must decide between ski, snowboard worlds Sandro Viletta, Olympic super combined champion, retires

Chloe Kim for athlete of the year? She padded the argument Saturday, winning her first contest in nine months in trademark dominant fashion, days after treatment at a medical clinic.

Kim, who in PyeongChang became the youngest Olympic female snowboard champion at age 17, had the field’s highest scores in the first two runs (90 and 92.25 points) at Copper Mountain, Colo. She still led after everyone else’s third run, allowing her a victory lap as the last rider to go in her season opener.

Fellow U.S. Olympian Maddie Mastro moved up to second place with her 85-point final run. China’s Cai Xuetong took third at an event that lacked triple Olympic medalist Kelly Clark, who has not announced whether she will compete again.

Kim, who landed a 1080 in each of her runs, said afterward that she visited a medical clinic this week for dehydration.

“I woke up, and I was like blinded because I was so dehydrated. So yeah, drink water,” she joked. “I get super dehydrated up here. I need humidifiers. I’m like filling my bathtub with water and trying to get my room as nice as possible and make it easier to breathe.”

In February 2016, Kim became the first woman to land back-to-back 1080s in a contest. She then landed the first back-to-back 1080s in an Olympics in PyeongChang.

“I was going to go to school this year, but decided to just compete another year, and then go to school next year, then get back into the Olympic flow,” Kim said on NBC Sports.

Last season, Kim became the first halfpipe rider to sweep the Olympics, X Games and U.S. Open in one winter. She hasn’t finished lower than second in a contest since February 2017, when she placed fourth at an Olympic test event in South Korea after spending two days in the ER with “a pretty gnarly cold.”

Kim is capable of more. She landed the first frontside double cork 1080 by a woman in October while training in Switzerland, according to the International Ski Federation.

The double cork 1080 was the must-have trick for the men leading into the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games.

Kim is entered in one more contest before the end of the year, next week’s Dew Tour at Breckenridge, Colo.

Australian Olympic bronze medalist Scotty James won the men’s event Saturday with back-to-back 1260s in his final, 96.75-point run, overtaking American Toby Miller.

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MORE: Shaun White sets longest snowboard break of career