Eileen Gu Lands TIME Magazine Cover Ahead of Olympics

Eileen Gu can add TIME to the list of publications she's graced the cover of, along with Vogue, Harper's Baazar, and others.

The 22-year-old landed the cover of the prestigious publication just ahead of the quickly approaching Milan-Cortina Winter Olympic Games. Time and time again (no pun intended), Gu has proved to the world that she's one of the most multifaceted athletes in our sport, and not just on skis. Her celebrity extends far beyond the slopes, making an accolade like this as unsurprising as it is well deserved.

Gu, as the article points out, is by the numbers the best freeskier to ever live, with numerous Olympic, World Championship, and X Games medals across disciplines. Although that's more than enough to land her the cover of any major sports magazine, it's presumably Gu's influence outside the sport that brought her to TIME. As noted by pretty much every piece of press about the skier, Gu balances her ski career alongside a modeling career that has her walking in shows for Louis Vuitton and Victoria's Secret, and an academic career at Stanford University.

However, the most impressive thing about Gu isn't just her athletic skill or superhero time management skills; it's her approach to the whole shebang, which her TIME cover piece touches on. “I’m a full-time student who’s really athletic,” says Gu in the article, “I can have a conversation with a physicist and stand my ground, and I can also walk a runway show the next day. I think that is pretty revolutionary, especially as a young person. Because the whole multihyphenate thing often happens in different stages in life. It’s important to show young people that you don’t have to wait until you’re older. You can do it all now.”

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