“That was my first Olympic run so I didn’t want to do anything too crazy. I wanted to ski a clean run that I knew I could do. And that was exactly that.”
Walczyk was 10th, the last man to make it through to Saturday’s final. U.S. teammate Cole McDonald was fifth.
The USA has not won a medal in men’s moguls since Vancouver in 2010 when Bryon Wilson won bronze.
– Lori Nickel
BEIJING – International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach dismissed China's treatment of its Uyghur population – which the U.S. government has called "genocide" – as purely a matter of politics.
At a news conference on the eve of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, a reporter asked Bach what message he would offer to the Uyghurs, members of a predominantly Muslim ethnic group in the Xinjiang region that have been detained in "re-education" and labor camps. He declined to comment.
"The position of the IOC must be, given the political neutrality, that we're not commenting on political issues," Bach said. "Because otherwise, if we are taking a political standpoint and we are getting in the middle of tensions and disputes and confrontations of political powers, then we are putting the Games at risk."
Bach has long clung to the idea of political neutrality, even as global politics have become one of the defining characteristics of the Beijing Games.
Several Western countries, including the United States, have declined to send an official government delegation to Beijing for Friday's opening ceremony in diplomatic boycotts intended as a rebuke of China. White House press secretary Jen Psaki cited "ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and other human rights abuses" as the primary reason for its decision.
China, meanwhile, has said president Xi Jinping will host roughly 30 foreign leaders in Beijing for the opening ceremony and "relevant bilateral activities." Topping the list is Russian president Vladimir Putin, who would have been barred from attending without a personal invitation from Xi, due to sanctions levied against Russia for doping.
-- Tom Schad
Bach said the meeting will take place inside the "closed-loop system" that has been created to limit the spread of COVID-19. He did not specify when it will occur.
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