At just 17, Olympic snowboarder Chloe Kim is favored to win *GOLD* in Pyeongchang this year. But not only is she an incredible athlete, she's also total BFF material!
OMG SHAUN WHITE YOU'RE SO LUCKY YOU'RE HANGING OUT WITH HER!!
1. Chloe got into snowboarding when her dad brought her to the mountain at just four years old in an attempt to coax her mom to come along!
Her first snowboard was bought on eBay for $25, and she won multiple medals riding it.
2. And her dad has been her #1 supporter ever since! He quit his job in engineering in order to support her snowboarding pursuits and would drive her six hours every weekend to train.
He made a makeshift bed in the back so she could sleep on the way, and even sewed a patch of a yoga mat to the seat of her pants to lessen the impact of falls. #GOALS
3. She has an adorable miniature Australian Shepherd named Reese, who sometimes goes on the road with her!
4. Chloe told Cosmo she's a "goody-two-shoes" who wants to attend Harvard to study business, law, or to eventually become a sports agent.
5. Chloe is a first-generation Korean-American. She is the daughter of two South Korean immigrants who came to the U.S. in 1998. Her mother's side of the family still lives in Seoul.
6. But at the end of the day she's proud to be an American through and through!
In an interview with the Washington Post, she said, “I always get the question, like, ‘Where are you from?’ L.A. ‘No, where are you really from?’ I was born in Long Beach. ‘No, no, like, where are you really, really from?’” she said. “. . . I always get that question. It’s never, like, my first answer would be, ‘I’m from Korea,’ or, like, ‘I’m Korean.’ It’s always, like, ‘I’m American.’"
7. Chloe LOVES to travel. She told Cosmo, "That's the thing I love most about snowboarding, honestly — getting to travel and explore different places and meet people. The plane rides suck but the destinations are sick."
8. Chloe loves dying her hair fun colors. She's done silvery-purple, teal, and bright pink in the past.
Her mom didn't want her to start dying it crazy colors so she initially had to bribe her by winning a snowboarding competition.
9. When she's not crushing half-pipes, Chloe enjoys shopping, hiking, skateboarding, and playing guitar.
10. She's afraid of ghosts.
Like, same.
11. She loves sweets, and Skittles are one of her favorites — the company sent her a large supply after hearing of her obsession!
12. But she also loves her some In-N-Out and Chipotle!
She told the Washington Post, “Since I travel with my parents, my mom is always cooking Korean food. So it’s, like, I always want American food. It’s like, I need In-N-Out. We need to go to Chipotle. KFC, where are you at?”
13. Her go-to karaoke song is Carly Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe."
14. Chloe is the only woman to hit back-to-back 1080s (three full revolutions) in competition.
15. She's fluent in Korean and French. When she was in third grade, she went to live with her aunt in Switzerland and learn French. She speaks Korean with her parents at home.
16. She's the youngest of three sisters.
17. Chloe described her perfect day as sleeping in, a big delicious breakfast, hiking with her dog, shopping, getting her nails/hair done and then kicking back and watching Netflix!
SAME GIRL!
18. Her personal motto is: "Go have fun and don’t worry about anyone else’s opinion."
19. When she gets ready to go out, she gives herself a full hour and a half, because she has to take a few dance breaks between putting mascara!
YAASSS!!
20. She also loves to binge shows on Netflix — including Grey's Anatomy, Orange Is The New Black, and Gilmore Girls.
21. She's not ~too~ superstitious, but she always knocks on the top of her board before a run. The habit came from the expression “knock on wood."
22. Her celebrity crush is Zayn Malik.
Zayn, call her maybe??
23. When she trains, she loves to listen to Lorde and Rihanna.
24. Even though she's likely to win a gold medal in this year's Winter Olympics, she's still an ordinary teenager at heart! “I don’t know what I’m doing with my life," she said.
She told the Washington Post, "I don’t know how you can learn anything from me because I’m still, like, a teenager." GIRL ARE YOU FOR REAL??! WE CAN LEARN SO MUCH FROM YOU!!!!! YOU'RE THE BEST!
CHLOE, WILL YOU PLEASE BE MY BFF??? <3
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