WICHITA, Kansas – Ilia Malinin doesn’t back down.
When all of his jumping passes at last month’s Grand Prix Final were judged to contain under-rotation, he still had a sweatshirt made that reproduced the scoresheet, a memento of his having tried a free skate program with unprecedented difficulty.
And it was a program he had never previously tried in practice.
Hubris?
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Nah. Just the quadg0d being himself.
“I really like to push my physical limits and just challenge myself,” he said.
When he could have easily won a third straight U.S. title Sunday with a safely watered-down program, Malinin instead rolled out the same one he used in the Grand Prix Final, packed with the same unprecedented jumping difficulty.
“I just never give up, and I try to find ways to achieve everything, no matter what happens,” he said.
That meant seven quadruple jumps, which only he has ever attempted in a free skate. And at least one quad of all figure skating’s six types, which only he has attempted in a free skate.
And, just for the heck of it, a successful attempt to make his backflip more difficult by landing it on one foot instead of the customary two.
“For me, this is going to be the perfect layout I’d like to achieve,” Malinin said. “Hopefully, I can get it to a point where it can be comfortable before the (2026) Olympics or at the Olympics. So (trying it again) is like a stepping stone.”
The result, even with one big mistake and one smaller one, was a victory at the Prevagen U.S. Figure Skating Championships by a whopping 46.82 points over Andrew Torgashev, who had the best overall performance of his career.
Malinin and Torgashev made the U.S. men’s team for the World Championships in late March. They will be joined by two-time Olympian Jason Brown, who missed nationals with equipment issues, if he is judged fit to compete.
In his fourth appearance at the senior championships, Malinin’s scores for the short program (114.08), free skate (219.23) and total (333.31) were all his national personal bests. Torgashev had 286.49 and bronze medalist Camden Pulkinen 252.92.
“It was a pretty good performance,” Malinin said.
Malinin cleanly landed five of the seven quads, including an otherworldly Axel. He reeled off the flip, Axel and Lutz before falling hard on an underrotated loop, sprawling on the ice for what felt a lot longer than the few seconds it took for him to recover.
The loop fall actually seemed predictable after Malinin struggled on several attempts with loop takeoffs during the warmup before his group competed. It was, ironically, the jump he had most wanted to do well.
“I couldn’t stay on that (mistake) too long,” he said. “I had to just keep moving so the rest of the program would go well.”
Malinin immediately botched a spin but rallied to nail successive combinations with quad opening jumps before the flawed quad salchow and the backflip. He called landing it on one foot (he briefly put a hand on the ice) a “side quest.”
When the program ended, Malinin lay supine on the ice, smiling as he rued the failed loop.
“I was a bit annoyed with myself for not being able to do it here,” he said.
Next for Malinin is the World Championships. That could be the last time he tries the landmark program with the same layout. He may drop a quad or reorder the jumps so that there is one closer to the end rather than having the jumps be seven of the first eight elements in the 12-element free skate.
The energy and time needed to do all those big jumps necessarily affects the rest of his skating, especially the presentation. Malinin figures he can improve his artistry by jumping more efficiently.
“I would have to make sure the jumps come so easily that you don’t have to really think a lot about them, so you can use all the energy you’ve saved on other aspects of skating,” he said.
It makes no sense, though, for him to downsize the gigantic impact of his jumps, especially in a sport that rewards them so highly, for better or for worse.
His agent, Ari Zakarian, had three sweatshirts made to commemorate Malinin’s first attempt at the ground-breaking program. Zakarian said they sold one of the shirts for $1,000, with $800 going to the U.S. Figure Skating Fund, which supports national team skaters.
Imagine how much a revised version of the shirt might go for if it includes a scoresheet that records not only history but perfection.
Philip Hersh, who has covered figure skating at the last 12 Winter Olympics, is a special contributor to NBCSports.com.
