Vincent Zhou, the U.S. figure skating hopeful who missed the end of the team competition at the Beijing Olympics after testing positive for the coronavirus, said on Monday night that he would not compete in the men’s singles competition that begins Tuesday.
In an emotional video posted to his Instagram account, he said he had withdrawn from the event. Because of the Olympics’ strict virus protocols, Zhou, 21, also will not be allowed to join his teammates when they accept their silver medals on Tuesday.
His positive test, and his sudden absence from the rink on Monday night hours after he had entered isolation, surprised even his teammates.
“Where’s Vincent? Where’s Vincent?” the women’s skater Karen Chen said she had asked herself. She assumed he was off to the side, lacing up his skates, and would join the United States’ silver medal-winning team on the ice when the final results were confirmed.
“We just feel bad for him not being able to share this moment with us,” said Brandon Frazier, who, with his partner, Alexa Knierim, was also part of the silver medal winning team. “When you get held back from doing what you’ve been training to do your whole life, it’s a really tough pill to swallow.”
In Zhou’s video, filmed in his hotel room, he fought back tears as he addressed comments “to the future Vincent watching this,” professing pride in his accomplishments and in his long path to Beijing and declaring his continued love for skating and the people and teammates who had supported him.
“It seems pretty unreal that of all the people it would happen to myself,” he said. “And that’s not just because I’m still processing this turn of events, but also because I have been doing everything in my power to stay free of Covid since the start of the pandemic. I’ve taken all the precautions I can. I’ve isolated myself so much that the loneliness that I felt in the last month or two has been crushing at times.”
Several of Zhou’s teammates said they were just as surprised as he was that he had tested positive. Zhou often ate alone, they said, wore N95 masks and sanitized his hands frequently. He did not socialize with others in the common room in the Olympic Village.
Many of the American skaters wore two masks after the team finals on Monday, but most eat in the cafeteria in the Olympic Village, with hundreds of other athletes. Nathan Chen, the three-time world champion who is the gold medal favorite in men’s singles skating, said that the Americans eat in a walled-off area and that he pulls his mask down each time he takes a bite and quickly pulls it back up when he chews because “better safe than sorry.”
“Obviously, everything now is just speculation: When did he get it? Who did he get it from? Who has he been around?” Chen said. “I personally have not really been around him, and anytime I’ve been around, I’ve been wearing a mask.”
Zhou’s disappointment was palpable; at one point in his video he said, “I really have lost count of the number of times I’ve cried today.” Still, one of those moments, he said, included “happy tears,” when he learned he had become a silver medalist.
“I am more than just another positive Covid test,” he added.
An alternate will not be able to take Zhou’s place in the men’s singles event because he had already competed on Olympic ice, the U.S. skating federation said.
