While Nathan Chen revels in his gold medal win, the athlete is taking the time to give a personal shout-out to his number one supporter: his mother, Hetty Wang.
On Thursday, Chen took home the top honor for the male division of the figure skating competition at the 2022 Winter Olympics. After winning the gold medal, the 22-year-old athlete took to Instagram to pay tribute to his parents, Wang and Zhidong Chen.
Chen shared a throwback photo of himself wearing a navy blue suit with a red bowtie and a medal wrapped around his neck (attached to a red, white, and blue ribbon). He wrote in the caption, “Thanks mom [red heart emoji] couldn’t have done this without my family.”
In an exclusive interview with USA Today, Chen detailed how his mother sacrificed a lot for him to pursue his dreams. At the age of 11, he and his mother moved to California so he could train with Armenian figure skating coach, Rafael Arutunian.
“We didn’t always have the funds to be able to support coaching,” Chen told the outlet. “So she was basically my coach throughout that whole period of time I was growing up, and along when I decided to move to California to work with my current coach, [Arutunian]. She drove me back and forth in our trusty little Prius, so a lot of miles put together and a lot of time put together, but this is a result of her.”
And Wang’s hard work and dedication have certainly paid off. Chen won his first Olympic gold medal with a world record of 218.63 points. He is the first American to win the competition since Evan Lysacek took home gold in 2010.
Congrats on your big win, Chen!
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