Winter Olympics: Gus Kenworthy not feeling pressure to win a medal for Team GB

Gus Kenworthy will compete in halfpipe qualifying on Thursday, bidding for a place in Saturday's final

Freestyle skier Gus Kenworthy says he feels no extra pressure to win Winter Olympic silverware in Beijing despite Team GB's absence from the medal table.

Kenworthy, 30, will start his halfpipe campaign on Thursday at what will be his final Olympics - but his first in Great Britain colours.

He won slopestyle silver at the Sochi 2014 Games when he competed for the United States, defecting to GB in 2019.

Not since 1992 have GB left a Winter Olympics empty-handed.

"I would love to get a medal for myself, for my family, for GB, but I want to have that medal for those reasons regardless of how anybody else does in their events," Kenworthy told BBC Sport.

"I think it's actually been pretty inspiring watching a lot of the other Team GB athletes, and while there haven't been medals, there have been incredible performances.

"It's the beauty of sport. Sometimes it's wins, and sometimes it's not.

"I think there is a lot of talent within Team GB for coming Games."

Knowing it would be his final Games, Kenworthy chose to represent GB as the country of his birth and for his British mother - and told BBC Sport he now wishes he'd "done it sooner".

In late 2021, after having Covid and a concussion, he started suffering from the 'twisties' - the term for an athlete losing their sense of space and dimension when in the air, made famous by US gymnast Simone Biles at last summer's Tokyo Olympics.

He spent two months off the snow, only returning in early January, but says he is now "feeling good and hoping for the best".

"I feel very confident which is amazing because a month or two ago I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to do it," said Kenworthy.

"So to be here and skiing well and feeling good and healthy and confident is incredible. I feel really grateful for that.

"I was training pretty hard up until the concussion and even since then recently, so I do feel pretty confident that I can do well. I just have to put my run down."

Kenworthy keeping his 'mouth shut'...for now

In a previous interview with BBC Sport before the Olympics started, Kenworthy said China was "not well suited" to host the Winter Games because of its reported human rights abuses.

The International Olympic Committee has been criticised for awarding the Games to China because of the country's treatment of its ethnic minorities.

Human rights groups say the Chinese government has gradually stripped away the religious and other freedoms of the Uighurs - a Muslim minority group living mostly in the Xinjiang province in north-west China - culminating in an oppressive system of mass surveillance, detention, indoctrination and even forced sterilisation. China has consistently denied allegations of human rights abuses.

Kenworthy, known not just for his sport but also his activism for the LGBTQ+ community, said he would "speak up" for what he believes in and will use his "voice and platform to stand up for those ideals" - but has now decided to wait until after his competition has finished.

"I think I'm planning to use my voice and platform maybe more when I return," he said.

"There are strict laws and I don't want to do anything to jeopardise my chance of doing well here at the Games.

"I just want to get through and keep my mouth shut for a second, and then continue to blab on when I get back."

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