EVERETT, Washington — With Alysa Liu taking the season off and Kaori Sakamoto retiring, the new Olympic cycle began with an opening atop women’s figure skating.
Japan’s Ami Nakai is seizing the opportunity.
Nakai, the Olympic bronze medalist behind Liu and Sakamoto, won Saatva Skate America to complete a sweep of her two Grand Prix regular season events.
Nakai landed a triple Axel in both programs and recorded the world’s top total score on the young season — 236.81 points, supplanting countrywoman Mao Shimada’s best tally.
SKATE AMERICA: Full Results
She won by a whopping 22.91 points over 2022 Olympic silver medalist Alexandra Ignatova from Russia, the mother of a 1-year-old who finished runner-up for a second consecutive Grand Prix.
Nakai qualified for December’s Grand Prix Final, the biggest event of the fall that includes the world’s top six per discipline from the six-event Grand Prix regular season.
Nakai was the breakout star of the 2025-26 Olympic season. She began by beating Sakamoto to win her senior Grand Prix debut at age 17 after never placing better than third at the Junior Grand Prix Final and junior worlds.
She was then second to Liu at the 2025 senior Grand Prix Final. She topped the short program at the Olympics. She tailed off from there -- placing ninth in the Olympic free skate, but hanging on for a medal, and then eighth in her senior worlds debut.
In an annual October press conference, Japan’s top skaters are tasked to write their theme for the season on a white board.
This year, Nakai wrote in Japanese, “sprinting through the next four years,” according to Nikkan Sports.
“I ran through the Milan Olympics in about a year, so it really went by in a flash,” she said, according to a translation. “For the next Olympics, I have four years to prepare properly, so I want to spend those four years with determination and care.”
The Grand Prix Final will be Nakai’s next test. Her primary challengers may well be her teammates.
Shimada, the four-time reigning world junior champion, and two-time world medalist Mone Chiba won the other two Grand Prix events so far this season.
Ignatova should also be at the Final and can win, should her quadruple Lutz be reliable.
The U.S. put at least one woman in each of the last five Finals dating to 2019, including Amber Glenn and Liu winning the last two, but there might not be any Americans this year.
Glenn is sitting out the Grand Prix season while competing on Dancing with the Stars.
Isabeau Levito, the third member of the 2026 Olympic blade angels, finished third in her first Grand Prix in Canada. She might need to win this week’s Grand Prix in Finland to get into the Final.
Grand Prix Finland airs live on Peacock on Friday and Saturday.
