Tag: Alysa Liu

Alysa Liu’s Trump Comments Resurface After She Called Out ‘Faults’ in the ‘Government’—’Immigrants Deserve Rights’

[ad_1]

Alysa Liu is Gen Z’s current favorite role model. From her unique hair, daring piercings, and large repertoire of trending alternative songs on her skating playlist, she’s been a beacon of light for subverting the uptight image of figure skating as a whole.

The 20-year-old scored gold in the women’s free skating event and at the team event with Team USA at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan Cortina. Some athletes have spoken about their feelings about representing Team USA amid ICE Immigration Raids in Minnesota and Trump’s aggressive immigration policies, and Alysa is no exception.

Related: Alysa Liu Finally Breaks Silence About Her Dating Life Amid Her Olympic Gold Win: ‘This Is the 1st Time I’ve Talked About This… ‘

What has Alysa Liu said about Trump?

While Alysa Liu hasn’t directly said anything about Donald Trump himself, she has criticized his policies. “I definitely do care what our country is doing,” she said in an interview with KARE 11. “I think it is really important also to notice the faults in our own government. Things are a little rough. There’s so many protests that are going on and I’ve attended. Coming from a family of immigrants, I think immigrants deserve rights.”

“I mean, coming from a family of immigrants, like, I think immigrants deserve rights. I think it’s a little silly, especially in America.”

Alysa’s teammate, Amber Glenn, who’s a fierce critic of the Trump administration and an advocate for LGBTQ+ rights, also posted a TikTok carousel featuring the two rocking out their gold medals. She captioned the post, “If ‘Woke’ means people who use their platforms to advocate for marginalized communities in the country that they are actively representing……. Then yeah sure?”

Alysa Liu’s father, Arthur, who was a political refugee from China during the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests in China, told The Daily Beast that Alysa’s performances helped unite Americans no matter what their political affiliation is. “What I heard is that the left and the right and the independent they all embraced her, which is great,” Arthur told the publication. “She’s a very charming young lady who won two medals from the Olympic games, so she has some magic.”

He added, “MAGA loves her…What’s not to love about her? She is a pride of America.”

[ad_2]

Lea Veloso

Source link

February 24, 2026
Alysa Liu brings fresh look: The two-time Olympic gold medalist with rings bleached in her hair

[ad_1]

Go do it again because you’re gonna do this so again anyway. See, I think it’s. Whoever said quitters never win, never met Alissa Liu. I was done *** year before I quit. I knew I wanted to be done way before I actually announced my retirement. Olympic bronze medalist on the outside, miserable teenager on the inside. I didn’t care for my choreography, the dresses, um, that was all kind of picked for me, um, so I started to think like why am I doing this? And I just wanted to see my friends, my family. I was 16, homesick. She retired to become *** teenager, trading the icy cold for the warmth of family and friends, hiking the Himalayas and college at UCLA. Like I wouldn’t even step in the rank, honestly, I was low key, *** little bit traumatized. With the entrance and the exit, but two years later, the athlete who had been the youngest US figure skating champ at 13 and the first US female figure skater to land *** quadruple jump in international competition. Unretired. Not everyone thought Alyssa coming out of retirement was *** good idea, starting with her coach. I said, Please don’t. I really did. I said, Please don’t respect your legacy. Philip De Gallielmo has coached Alyssa since she was 5. We had *** Zoom call for about 2 hours, and the story is I had *** lot of glasses of wine over that 2 hours, and she talked me into. Her comeback. Just 7 months of training and *** lot of selfies later, Alyssa Liu won *** world title in the sport she left as *** child but returned to as an adult. Nobody’s ever taken this time off, come back and won the world championships. I have *** perspective that not many of the athletes. Right now in the sport have so many people. Their goal is Olympics, and when they get there and it’s over, it’s like they don’t know what to do. You’ve known her since she was 5 years old. What’s the biggest difference now in the coaching relationship because now you got *** 20 year old adult. My 5 year old Alyssa, or 6 year old Alyssa didn’t talk back. She didn’t even talk. Now she likes to talk back. No, now she’s in charge. It’s about Alissa showing what it’s like to love what you’re doing so much that you become the best in the world at it. The best in the world while also being the happiest girl on the ice, proving two things can be true and sometimes quitting is the quickest way to winning again. On the road to Milan Cortina, I’m Deirdre Fitzpatrick.

Alysa Liu brings fresh look: The two-time Olympic gold medalist with rings bleached in her hair

Updated: 9:25 AM EST Feb 20, 2026

Editorial Standards ⓘ

The 2026 Winter Olympics are full of eye-catching moments of athletic excellence – ski jumpers in the air like flying squirrels, Breezy Johnson’s gold-medal downhill finish, and Ilia Malinin at the apex of a backflip on ice.But they’re also an opportunity to admire athletes’ individual expression, and there’s no better event for it than figure skating.Two-time Olympic gold medalist Alysa Liu’s fashion and accessories are shaking up typical skater looks – and they’re integral to her presence at the Games.The 20-year-old made history as the youngest women’s national champion in history at age 13, but three years later, she announced her retirement. Now, at age 20, not long after coming out of retirement, Liu is skating on her own terms, having rediscovered her love of skating. Accompanying her new era is a wardrobe that feels more like herself.”Someone called my style alternative, and I’d agree with that,” she told NBC.Liu stands out with her smiley piercing, which goes through the frenulum behind the upper lip and is only revealed when she smiles. Her hair is also breaking the mold among skaters, with thick stripes bleached blond. She’s been adding one halo, as she calls them, per year since 2023, saying the stripes are like rings on a tree.On the ice, Liu now chooses her training outfits and has more of a say in the designs she sports. She’s been photographed training in spiral-adorned tights, and her skating dress at a recent championship featured a jagged hemline and elements drawn from Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” music video.Part of what motivated her decision to retire at 16, she has said, was how little control she had over her own life.”All my memories from back then are gone. I have no idea how I felt in the moment. I have watched it, and I was crying, and I seemed super happy, so I guess I was very happy,” she told Elle, reflecting on her wins at ages 12 and 13. “I didn’t enjoy skating back then because I didn’t make my own programs, I didn’t design my own dresses — I was just following orders.”As a teenager, she said she “grew to hate figure skating” and the demands of her training schedule. “All I wanted was to be with my family and friends at home, and live like a normal teenage girl.” Now, she told the AP, “I have ideas and concepts that I want to share with the world, so I’m happy to be here, versus last time I was kind of like, ‘Let’s get this over with.’ Now I want be here, and I don’t want this to end.”As for nerves at this year’s Games, she’s calm, cool and collected.”I don’t know what’s up with me,” she said. “They’re going to actually have to dissect my brain when I’m dead and figure me out.”PHNjcmlwdCB0eXBlPSJ0ZXh0L2phdmFzY3JpcHQiPiFmdW5jdGlvbigpeyJ1c2Ugc3RyaWN0Ijt3aW5kb3cuYWRkRXZlbnRMaXN0ZW5lcigibWVzc2FnZSIsKGZ1bmN0aW9uKGUpe2lmKHZvaWQgMCE9PWUuZGF0YVsiZGF0YXdyYXBwZXItaGVpZ2h0Il0pe3ZhciB0PWRvY3VtZW50LnF1ZXJ5U2VsZWN0b3JBbGwoImlmcmFtZSIpO2Zvcih2YXIgYSBpbiBlLmRhdGFbImRhdGF3cmFwcGVyLWhlaWdodCJdKWZvcih2YXIgcj0wO3I8dC5sZW5ndGg7cisrKXtpZih0W3JdLmNvbnRlbnRXaW5kb3c9PT1lLnNvdXJjZSl0W3JdLnN0eWxlLmhlaWdodD1lLmRhdGFbImRhdGF3cmFwcGVyLWhlaWdodCJdW2FdKyJweCJ9fX0pKX0oKTs8L3NjcmlwdD4=

The 2026 Winter Olympics are full of eye-catching moments of athletic excellence – ski jumpers in the air like flying squirrels, Breezy Johnson’s gold-medal downhill finish, and Ilia Malinin at the apex of a backflip on ice.

But they’re also an opportunity to admire athletes’ individual expression, and there’s no better event for it than figure skating.

Two-time Olympic gold medalist Alysa Liu’s fashion and accessories are shaking up typical skater looks – and they’re integral to her presence at the Games.

The 20-year-old made history as the youngest women’s national champion in history at age 13, but three years later, she announced her retirement.

Now, at age 20, not long after coming out of retirement, Liu is skating on her own terms, having rediscovered her love of skating. Accompanying her new era is a wardrobe that feels more like herself.

“Someone called my style alternative, and I’d agree with that,” she told NBC.

Jamie Squire
Gold medalist Alyssa Liu of Team United States poses with the medal after the medal ceremony for the Team Event on day two of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games at Milano Ice Skating Arena on Feb. 8, 2026, in Milan, Italy.

Liu stands out with her smiley piercing, which goes through the frenulum behind the upper lip and is only revealed when she smiles.

Her hair is also breaking the mold among skaters, with thick stripes bleached blond. She’s been adding one halo, as she calls them, per year since 2023, saying the stripes are like rings on a tree.

On the ice, Liu now chooses her training outfits and has more of a say in the designs she sports. She’s been photographed training in spiral-adorned tights, and her skating dress at a recent championship featured a jagged hemline and elements drawn from Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” music video.

Jamie Squire
Alysa Liu competes in the Women’s Free Skating during the 2026 United States Figure Skating Championships at Enterprise Center on Jan. 9, 2026, in St Louis, Missouri.

Part of what motivated her decision to retire at 16, she has said, was how little control she had over her own life.

“All my memories from back then are gone. I have no idea how I felt in the moment. I have watched it, and I was crying, and I seemed super happy, so I guess I was very happy,” she told Elle, reflecting on her wins at ages 12 and 13. “I didn’t enjoy skating back then because I didn’t make my own programs, I didn’t design my own dresses — I was just following orders.”

As a teenager, she said she “grew to hate figure skating” and the demands of her training schedule. “All I wanted was to be with my family and friends at home, and live like a normal teenage girl.”

Now, she told the AP, “I have ideas and concepts that I want to share with the world, so I’m happy to be here, versus last time I was kind of like, ‘Let’s get this over with.’ Now I want be here, and I don’t want this to end.”

As for nerves at this year’s Games, she’s calm, cool and collected.

“I don’t know what’s up with me,” she said. “They’re going to actually have to dissect my brain when I’m dead and figure me out.”

[ad_2]

Source link

February 20, 2026
Figure skater Alysa Liu retired for two years: How the time away helped her skating

[ad_1]

Whoever said “quitters never win,” never met Olympic figure skater Alysa Liu. Liu’s figure skating comeback has been remarkable: The 20-year-old is a two-time Olympic gold medalist in the Milan Cortina Games and a 2025 world figure skating champ.Her free skate on Olympic ice on Thursday clinched the 20-year-old the gold, marking the first time a U.S. woman won an individual figure skating gold since 2002.”My family is out there. My friends are out there. I had to put on a show for them,” Liu told the Associated Press afterward. “When I see other people out there smiling, because I see them in the audience, then I have to smile, too. I have no poker face.”She sat in third place after the short program and is the top American in those standings. The approach she took was one with no pressure on herself.”I’m OK if I do a fail program. I’m totally OK if I do a great program,” she said after the short program, according to the Associated Press. “No matter what the outcome is, it’s still my story.”Looking at her career and why she leftLiu became the youngest U.S. figure skating champ at 13. She’s the first female figure skater to land a quadruple jump in international competition.But at age 16, she announced her retirement from figure skating. Liu said she hated skating by that point and had been planning her exit for a year before she did it. Liu had skated since the age of 5. Skating can be a solitary and controlled sport. She craved teen normalcy, time with friends and freedom. She put her skates in the closet and said she didn’t miss the ice at all. “I left the sport completely,” Liu said. “Like I wouldn’t step in the rink. Honestly, I was low-key traumatized.”Liu spent the next two years making up for lost time. She spent time with her siblings in Oakland, California. She’s the oldest of five kids. She hung out with high school friends, graduated and traveled the world, including hiking in the Himalayas. She enrolled at UCLA and picked up a new sport: skiing. Skiing reminded her of skating because of the sensation of the cold air on her skin. One day, she ventured into a rink with a friend. And, she didn’t hate it. In fact, she enjoyed it. Making a comeback She started skating again for fun and then floated the idea of coming out of retirement to her longtime coach, Phillip DiGuglielmo. “I said, ‘Please don’t.’ I really did. I said, ‘Please don’t. Respect your legacy as an Olympic bronze medalist,’” DiGuglielmo said.DiGuglielmo had coached Liu since she was 5. “We had a Zoom call for two hours,” DiGuglielmo said. “The story is, I had a lot of glasses of wine over those two hours. And she talked me into a comeback.”Liu and DiGuglielmo resumed training for just seven months, and she won the 2025 World Figure Skating Championships. DiGuglielmo said no one has taken a two-year break from skating and pulled off such a feat. “It makes me think if I was one of those athletes, I’d be like, ‘Why did I just skate for the last year? I could have taken a vacation for two years. But that’s Alysa. She’s different,” DiGuglielmo said. Liu pointed out that she left her sport while still in puberty. At 20, she’s physically and mentally stronger. And, she’s competing on her own terms, taking an active role in choreography, competition and training. “I have a perspective not many of the athletes in the sport have,” Liu said. “So many people, their goal is the Olympics, and when they get there, and it’s over, they don’t know what to do. I’m really just doing this for fun.”PHNjcmlwdCB0eXBlPSJ0ZXh0L2phdmFzY3JpcHQiPiFmdW5jdGlvbigpeyJ1c2Ugc3RyaWN0Ijt3aW5kb3cuYWRkRXZlbnRMaXN0ZW5lcigibWVzc2FnZSIsKGZ1bmN0aW9uKGUpe2lmKHZvaWQgMCE9PWUuZGF0YVsiZGF0YXdyYXBwZXItaGVpZ2h0Il0pe3ZhciB0PWRvY3VtZW50LnF1ZXJ5U2VsZWN0b3JBbGwoImlmcmFtZSIpO2Zvcih2YXIgYSBpbiBlLmRhdGFbImRhdGF3cmFwcGVyLWhlaWdodCJdKWZvcih2YXIgcj0wO3I8dC5sZW5ndGg7cisrKXtpZih0W3JdLmNvbnRlbnRXaW5kb3c9PT1lLnNvdXJjZSl0W3JdLnN0eWxlLmhlaWdodD1lLmRhdGFbImRhdGF3cmFwcGVyLWhlaWdodCJdW2FdKyJweCJ9fX0pKX0oKTs8L3NjcmlwdD4=

Whoever said “quitters never win,” never met Olympic figure skater Alysa Liu.

Liu’s figure skating comeback has been remarkable: The 20-year-old is a 2025 world figure skating champ and an two-time Olympic gold medalist in the Milan Cortina Games.

Matthew Stockman/Getty Images
Alysa Liu of Team United States competes in the Women’s Single Skating – Short Program on Feb. 6, 2026.

Her free skate on Olympic ice on Thursday clinched the 20-year-old the gold, marking the first time a U.S. woman won an individual figure skating gold since 2002.

“My family is out there. My friends are out there. I had to put on a show for them,” Liu told the Associated Press afterward. “When I see other people out there smiling, because I see them in the audience, then I have to smile, too. I have no poker face.”

She sat in third place after the short program and is the top American in those standings. The approach she took was one with no pressure on herself.

“I’m OK if I do a fail program. I’m totally OK if I do a great program,” she said after the short program, according to the Associated Press. “No matter what the outcome is, it’s still my story.”

Looking at her career and why she left

Liu became the youngest U.S. figure skating champ at 13. She’s the first female figure skater to land a quadruple jump in international competition.

But at age 16, she announced her retirement from figure skating. Liu said she hated skating by that point and had been planning her exit for a year before she did it.

Liu had skated since the age of 5. Skating can be a solitary and controlled sport. She craved teen normalcy, time with friends and freedom. She put her skates in the closet and said she didn’t miss the ice at all.

“I left the sport completely,” Liu said. “Like I wouldn’t step in the rink. Honestly, I was low-key traumatized.”

Liu spent the next two years making up for lost time. She spent time with her siblings in Oakland, California. She’s the oldest of five kids. She hung out with high school friends, graduated and traveled the world, including hiking in the Himalayas. She enrolled at UCLA and picked up a new sport: skiing.

Skiing reminded her of skating because of the sensation of the cold air on her skin. One day, she ventured into a rink with a friend. And, she didn’t hate it. In fact, she enjoyed it.

Making a comeback

She started skating again for fun and then floated the idea of coming out of retirement to her longtime coach, Phillip DiGuglielmo.

“I said, ‘Please don’t.’ I really did. I said, ‘Please don’t. Respect your legacy as an Olympic bronze medalist,’” DiGuglielmo said.

DiGuglielmo had coached Liu since she was 5.

“We had a Zoom call for two hours,” DiGuglielmo said. “The story is, I had a lot of glasses of wine over those two hours. And she talked me into a comeback.”

WANG Zhao / AFP via Getty Images
Alysa Liu reacts after competing in the figure skating women’s single free skating final during the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games at Milano Ice Skating Arena in Milan on Feb. 19, 2026.

Liu and DiGuglielmo resumed training for just seven months, and she won the 2025 World Figure Skating Championships. DiGuglielmo said no one has taken a two-year break from skating and pulled off such a feat.

“It makes me think if I was one of those athletes, I’d be like, ‘Why did I just skate for the last year? I could have taken a vacation for two years. But that’s Alysa. She’s different,” DiGuglielmo said.

Andy Cheung/Getty Images
Gold medalist Alyssa Liu of Team United States celebrates after the medal ceremony for the Team Event on day two of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games at Milano Ice Skating Arena on Feb. 8, 2026, in Milan, Italy.

Liu pointed out that she left her sport while still in puberty. At 20, she’s physically and mentally stronger. And, she’s competing on her own terms, taking an active role in choreography, competition and training.

“I have a perspective not many of the athletes in the sport have,” Liu said. “So many people, their goal is the Olympics, and when they get there, and it’s over, they don’t know what to do. I’m really just doing this for fun.”

[ad_2]

Source link

February 20, 2026
Alysa Liu’s Dad Spent Nearly $1M on Her Figure Skating Career: ‘I Spared No Money’

[ad_1]

As one of the faces of US Olympic figure skating, Alysa Liu wouldn’t have gotten to where she is now without the incredible support of her parents.

Alysa Liu was hailed as an ice skating prodigy from the young age of 5 and held out a promising future. She competed at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics at 16-years-old and shocked the skating community by announcing her retirement shortly after. Fast forward to 2026, Alysa’s back on the ice and chasing after the gold medal in the women’s short program at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics.

Related: Ilia Malinin’s Parents Are Also Olympic Figure Skaters—His Mom’s Grandma Sold Her Wedding Ring So She Could Buy Her 1st Skates

Who is Alysa Liu’s dad, Arthur Liu?

Alysa Liu’s dad is Arthur Liu. Her father was involved in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and emigrated to the US, where he started his own law firm. He has five children, including Alysa, with different anonymous egg donors. When Alysa was 5-years-old, he brought her to the Oakland Ice Center, and she trained under Laura Lipetsky.

In an interview with 60 Minutes, Arthur Liu revealed that he has spent between $500,000 to $1 million for his daughter’s skating career. “I spared no money, no time. I just saw talent.”

At the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, Arthur and Alysa were targeted in a spying operation that the US Justice Department alleges was ordered by the Chinese government.

“They are probably just trying to intimidate us, to … in a way threaten us not to say anything, to cause trouble to them and say anything political or related to human rights violations in China,” Arthur Liu said. “I had concerns about her safety. The U.S. government did a good job protecting her.”

“I’ve kind of accepted my life to be like this because of what I chose to do in 1989, to speak up against the government. And I know the Chinese government will extend their long hands into any corner in the world,” Arthur Liu said. “I’m going to continue to enjoy life and live life as I want to live. I’m not going to let this push me down, and I’m not going to let them succeed.”

Throughout her retirement, Arthur supported her through the tough times. “She became really unhappy,” he told USA TODAY Sports. “She avoided the ice rink at all costs. She’s traumatized. She was just traumatized. She was suffering from PTSD and she wouldn’t go near the ice rink.”

Arthur has had a hand in Alysa’s coaching directly, by firing and rehiring Phillip DiGuglielmo and Massimo Scali. “Once in person, and two by text,” Phillip DiGuglielmo told 60 Minutes. When asked if he was a “tiger dad,” Arthur said that he was a “laissez-faire dad” by constantly monitoring his daughter’s coaches during practice.

When she was coming out of retirement, she reached out to both of her former coaches and made it clear that she wanted to have more say in her training and her programs and that she would compete because she wanted to.

Who is Alysa Liu’s mom, Yan “Mary” Quinxin?

Alysa Liu was born with an anonymous egg donor and surrogate mother. According to a report by Sports Illustrated (via Romper), Liu’s donors were white women in hopes that his children would “benefit from a diverse gene pool.”

Arthur currently considers himself a single father. However, Alysa and her siblings were also raised by Arthur’s ex-wife, Yan “Mary” Quinxin. When Alysa was 8, she noticed that she and her mother had different physical qualities. “That’s how I figured out she wasn’t my real mom,” the Olympian told the magazine, “because she was Asian and I did not look Asian.”

[ad_2]

Lea Veloso

Source link

February 17, 2026
Ilia Malinin’s stunning free skate secures US figure skating team gold at Milan Cortina Olympics

[ad_1]

Ilia Malinin beat Japanese rival Shun Sato in a head-to-head showdown at the Milan Cortina Olympics on Sunday night, helping the U.S. defend its team figure skating gold medal by breaking a deadlock with Japan in the final session of the competition.The 21-year-old nicknamed the “Quad God” landed five quadruple jumps and scored 200.03 points for his free skate, atoning for his mediocre short program — at least by his lofty standards — one night earlier. Sato followed him with three quads in his program, but he could only manage 194.86 points, leaving the Japanese with a second straight silver medal in the team event.The U.S. ended up on 69 points while Japan finished with 68. Matteo Rizzo delivered one of the best free skates of his career as Italy was trying to hold onto the bronze medal, allowing the host nation to finish third with 60 points.Georgia wound up fourth with 56. It still has never medaled in any sport at the Winter Games.The U.S. had a five-point lead over Japan after two days of competition. But the advantage dwindled to nothing when world champions Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara won the pairs free skate and Kaori Sakamoto won the women’s free skate earlier Sunday night.Leave it to the best closer in the business to deliver for the Americans.Malinin opened with a big quad flip, opted for a safer triple axel over his quad, and overcome a couple of mistakes along the way to finish with aplomb. The son of Olympic skaters Tatiana Malinina and Roman Skorniakov ended with back-to-back combos, a quad toe-triple flip and a quad salchow-triple axel, leaving a crowd full of American and Japanese fans roaring in approval.Sato did everything he could to give Japan a chance.From his opening quad lutz to his finishing triple lutz, the Japanese star was nearly perfect, producing an easier but cleaner program than Malinin had earlier. He pumped his fist the moment his music ended, then had to wait to hear whether it was enough.It wasn’t quite.The pairs were first on the ice Sunday night, and Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea delivered the best free skate of their pairs career when the U.S. needed it the most, beating the Canadians to avoid dropping a much-needed point to the winning Japanese pairs team.Kam and O’Shea scored 135.36 points for their program, which opened with “Sweet Dreams” by the Eurythmics and finished with “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears. Miura and Kihara won the segment with a career-best of their own of 155.55 points, pulling the Japanese to within two points of the Americans with two events remaining.”We couldn’t be more proud to be able to perform under what we felt was so much energy,” said the 34-year-old O’Shea, who was an Olympic alternate in 2018 but is making his debut at the Winter Games. “We walked into the day, walked into the rink with positive emotions, with an offensive attitude, and that showed out there on the ice.”Then the women took the stage with the U.S. swapping out world champion Alysa Liu for Amber Glenn.The three-time national champion spun out of her opening triple axel, the most difficult triple jump and one only she tried among the women, and Glenn had to add a late double toe loop after missing an earlier triple as part of a combination. Those two mistakes, and a couple of other errors along the way, left her with 138.62 points — and more crucially, third in the segment.Kaori Sakamoto, the individual bronze medalist at the Beijing Games, won the free skate with 148.62 points, pulling Japan into a tie for the lead. Anastasiia Gubanova took second in the free skate as she tried to keep Georgia in the race for bronze.”It wasn’t how I wanted to feel,” Glenn said afterward. “The adrenaline was really up and I think I just crashed a little bit.”Malinin was there to pick her and the rest of the American team up.

Ilia Malinin beat Japanese rival Shun Sato in a head-to-head showdown at the Milan Cortina Olympics on Sunday night, helping the U.S. defend its team figure skating gold medal by breaking a deadlock with Japan in the final session of the competition.

The 21-year-old nicknamed the “Quad God” landed five quadruple jumps and scored 200.03 points for his free skate, atoning for his mediocre short program — at least by his lofty standards — one night earlier. Sato followed him with three quads in his program, but he could only manage 194.86 points, leaving the Japanese with a second straight silver medal in the team event.

The U.S. ended up on 69 points while Japan finished with 68. Matteo Rizzo delivered one of the best free skates of his career as Italy was trying to hold onto the bronze medal, allowing the host nation to finish third with 60 points.

Georgia wound up fourth with 56. It still has never medaled in any sport at the Winter Games.

The U.S. had a five-point lead over Japan after two days of competition. But the advantage dwindled to nothing when world champions Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara won the pairs free skate and Kaori Sakamoto won the women’s free skate earlier Sunday night.

Leave it to the best closer in the business to deliver for the Americans.

Malinin opened with a big quad flip, opted for a safer triple axel over his quad, and overcome a couple of mistakes along the way to finish with aplomb. The son of Olympic skaters Tatiana Malinina and Roman Skorniakov ended with back-to-back combos, a quad toe-triple flip and a quad salchow-triple axel, leaving a crowd full of American and Japanese fans roaring in approval.

Sato did everything he could to give Japan a chance.

From his opening quad lutz to his finishing triple lutz, the Japanese star was nearly perfect, producing an easier but cleaner program than Malinin had earlier. He pumped his fist the moment his music ended, then had to wait to hear whether it was enough.

It wasn’t quite.

The pairs were first on the ice Sunday night, and Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea delivered the best free skate of their pairs career when the U.S. needed it the most, beating the Canadians to avoid dropping a much-needed point to the winning Japanese pairs team.

Kam and O’Shea scored 135.36 points for their program, which opened with “Sweet Dreams” by the Eurythmics and finished with “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears. Miura and Kihara won the segment with a career-best of their own of 155.55 points, pulling the Japanese to within two points of the Americans with two events remaining.

“We couldn’t be more proud to be able to perform under what we felt was so much energy,” said the 34-year-old O’Shea, who was an Olympic alternate in 2018 but is making his debut at the Winter Games. “We walked into the day, walked into the rink with positive emotions, with an offensive attitude, and that showed out there on the ice.”

Then the women took the stage with the U.S. swapping out world champion Alysa Liu for Amber Glenn.

The three-time national champion spun out of her opening triple axel, the most difficult triple jump and one only she tried among the women, and Glenn had to add a late double toe loop after missing an earlier triple as part of a combination. Those two mistakes, and a couple of other errors along the way, left her with 138.62 points — and more crucially, third in the segment.

Kaori Sakamoto, the individual bronze medalist at the Beijing Games, won the free skate with 148.62 points, pulling Japan into a tie for the lead. Anastasiia Gubanova took second in the free skate as she tried to keep Georgia in the race for bronze.

“It wasn’t how I wanted to feel,” Glenn said afterward. “The adrenaline was really up and I think I just crashed a little bit.”

Malinin was there to pick her and the rest of the American team up.

[ad_2]

Source link

February 8, 2026
‘Dying to Ask’ podcast: From burnout to world champion: Alysa Liu’s unlikely comeback
[ad_1]

THEIR CAREER LONGEVITY. SPEAKING OF DEFYING STEREOTYPES, AMERICA’S TOP FIGURE SKATER IS GOOD AT A LOT OF THINGS, BUT IT TURNS OUT RETIREMENT WASN’T ONE OF THEM. SHOULD SOUND FAMILIAR HERE. ALYSA LIU JOINS US ON OUR OLYMPIC PODCAST THIS WEEK. THE OAKLAND SKATER RETIRED AT THE AGE OF 16 AFTER THE 2022 BEIJING OLYMPICS. SHE WAS BURNED OUT. SHE JUST WANTED TO KNOW WHAT IT WAS LIKE TO BE A NORMAL TEENAGER, LIKE, LEFT THE SPORT COMPLETELY. LIKE I WOULDN’T EVEN STEP IN THE RINK. HONESTLY, I WAS LOW KEY, A LITTLE BIT TRAUMATIZED. TWO YEARS LATER, SHE STARTED TO GET THE ITCH TO SKATE AGAIN. NOW SHE’S A FAVORITE TO WIN GOLD IN MILAN-CORTINA ON THIS NIGHT, TO ASK THE ROAD TO MILAN CORTINA. THE POWER OF TAKING A BREAK, RETHINKING HOW WE LOOK AT THE ROLE AGE PLAYS IN SPORTS LIKE FIGURE SKATING. OR, AS LINDSEY VONN SHOWED US TODAY, SKIING. A VERY FRANK LOOK AT WHAT YOUNG TEEN ATHLETES GIVE UP TO BE THE VERY BEST IN THEIR SPORT AND THE IMPACT THAT COULD HAVE LONG TERM ON MENTAL HEALTH, AND WHY ALYSSA’S COACH THINKS SHE WAS ABLE TO PULL OFF A TWO YEAR GAP IN TRAINING AND EMERGE STRONGER THAN EVER. SCAN THE QR CODE TO WATCH. DYING TO ASK THE ROAD TO MILAN CORTINA ON YOUTUBE. YOU CAN ALSO DOWNLOAD IT ON APPLE OR SPOTIFY. WE PUT THE YOUTUBE EPISODE UP LATE LAST NIGHT. WOKE UP THIS MORNING. I ALWAYS CHECK TO SEE LIKE, HOW MANY PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE INTO IT OR NOT. IT IS BLOWING. IS IT GOOD? FIGURE SKATING IS JUST ONE OF THOSE THINGS LIKE IT IS. IT’S SO THERE’S SO MUCH DRAMA AND THERE’S SO MUCH BEAUTY TO IT AND SOME CONTROVERSY SOMETIMES. SO YEAH, I WOULD SAY DEFINITELY WATCH THE YOUTUBE VERSION OF THIS ONE. APPLE AND SPOTIFY IS GREAT TOO, BUT THERE’S SOMETHING FUN ABOUT WATCHING HER AND HER COACH AT THE RINK GET THAT. AND THEY SAID, LIKE THEY ANSWERED EVERY QUESTION, DID THEY? EVERYTHING. I’VE ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT FIGURE SKATI
‘Dying to Ask’ podcast: From burnout to world champion: Alysa Liu’s unlikely comeback

Updated: 8:19 AM PST Dec 12, 2025

Editorial Standards ⓘ

Whoever said quitters never win, never met Olympic figure skater Alysa Liu.Liu quit figure skating after the 2022 Winter Olympics. At age 16, she was burned out and wanted to be a normal teenager. “I was done a year before I quit. I knew I wanted to be done way before I actually announced my retirement,” Liu said. For two years, Liu embraced life as a teenager, making up for lost time she’d spent on the ice. She got a driver’s license, drove her four siblings to school, stayed up late and hung out with friends. She traveled for fun instead of competitions and even hiked in the Himalayas. She enrolled at UCLA and even took up skiing, a sport she’d never had time to try as an elite figure skater. She loved the feel of the cold air on her face when she skied. It reminded her of skating and two years after retiring, Alysa went to a local rink with a friend. Alysa started skating for fun, and it wasn’t long before she got the itch to skate more seriously. She called a former coach, Phillip DiGuglielmo, and asked him what he thought about her coming out of retirement. At first, he wasn’t a fan. “I said, ‘Please don’t. I really did.’ I said, ‘Please don’t. Respect your legacy,’” DiGuglielmo said. “We had a Zoom call for two hours. The story is I had a lot of glasses of wine over those two hours. And she talked me into a comeback.”The two started training together, and seven months later, Liu won a world title in a sport she left as a child but returned to as an adult. In November, she won and claimed her first title at the 2025 Saatva Skate America.On this Dying to Ask, The Road to Milan-Cortina:The power of taking a breakRe-thinking how we look at the role age plays in sports like figure skating A frank look at what young teen athletes give up to be the best in their sport and the impact that can have long-term on mental healthAnd why Liu’s coach thinks she could pull off a two-year gap in training and emerge stronger than everOther places to listenCLICK HERE to listen on iTunesCLICK HERE to listen on StitcherCLICK HERE to listen on SpotifySee more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel
SAN FRANCISCO —

Whoever said quitters never win, never met Olympic figure skater Alysa Liu.

Liu quit figure skating after the 2022 Winter Olympics. At age 16, she was burned out and wanted to be a normal teenager.

“I was done a year before I quit. I knew I wanted to be done way before I actually announced my retirement,” Liu said.

For two years, Liu embraced life as a teenager, making up for lost time she’d spent on the ice. She got a driver’s license, drove her four siblings to school, stayed up late and hung out with friends. She traveled for fun instead of competitions and even hiked in the Himalayas.

She enrolled at UCLA and even took up skiing, a sport she’d never had time to try as an elite figure skater.

She loved the feel of the cold air on her face when she skied. It reminded her of skating and two years after retiring, Alysa went to a local rink with a friend.

Alysa started skating for fun, and it wasn’t long before she got the itch to skate more seriously. She called a former coach, Phillip DiGuglielmo, and asked him what he thought about her coming out of retirement. At first, he wasn’t a fan.

“I said, ‘Please don’t. I really did.’ I said, ‘Please don’t. Respect your legacy,’” DiGuglielmo said. “We had a Zoom call for two hours. The story is I had a lot of glasses of wine over those two hours. And she talked me into a comeback.”

The two started training together, and seven months later, Liu won a world title in a sport she left as a child but returned to as an adult. In November, she won and claimed her first title at the 2025 Saatva Skate America.

On this Dying to Ask, The Road to Milan-Cortina:

The power of taking a break

Re-thinking how we look at the role age plays in sports like figure skating

A frank look at what young teen athletes give up to be the best in their sport and the impact that can have long-term on mental health

And why Liu’s coach thinks she could pull off a two-year gap in training and emerge stronger than ever

Other places to listen

CLICK HERE to listen on iTunes
CLICK HERE to listen on Stitcher
CLICK HERE to listen on Spotify

See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel
[ad_2]

Source link
December 12, 2025