Ilia Malinin’s Journey To A Figure Skating World Championships Medal

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by Jacob Solomon Mar 26, 2023 News
Ilia Malinin’s Journey To A Figure Skating World Championships Medal

The men's free skate medal ceremony will take place at the ISU World Figure Skating Championships in Saitama, Japan.

Still, Malinin’s gratitude for winning bronze seemed tinged with a bit of regret. At the event’s final press conference, he hinted that we may not see him attempt six quads again. “You have to take a lot of risks, sometimes you look back and think, there’s no need going for so much risk,” he said. “It’s hard to perform for the audience (doing so many quads). Next season I really want to focus on the performing side.” Here are six things to know about the sport’s new U.S. star:

Figure Skating Runs Deep In His Family

Malinin’s Russian-born parents, Tatiana Malinina and Roman Skorniakov, represented Uzbekistan at the Olympic Winter Games and have trained their son in Reston, Virginia, since he was 6. The skating bloodline doesn’t start there, though: Ilia’s grandfather Valery Malinin is also a coach. A former competitor for the Soviet Union, Valery trains skaters in Novosibirsk, a large city in southwestern Siberia, where he put Tatiana on the ice when she was 5 years old. And like mother, like son. “At age 9, (Tatiana) did a double axel, which was considered a good result at the time,” Valery said in an interview with Sport24, a Russian news site. In the same interview, Valery attributed much of his grandson’s success to his daughter, calling her “a very goal-oriented person. … If she wanted it, she would achieve it. If she wanted (Ilia) to become a good athlete, she made every effort.” 

Soccer Was His First Love

According to his grandfather, as a young child Ilia often preferred playing soccer to training in a cold arena. But his parents, with advice from Valery, made him stick with his skating lessons. Valery told them, “Be patient, he’ll (gain) his triple jumps, (and then) you won’t be able to drag him away.”  Valery was right, but Ilia still shows off his soccer moves at competitions. “As a kid, I really enjoyed soccer,” he said. “I incorporated it into my (off-ice) warm-up, because it warms up my whole body, doing some tricks.”

This Year Marked His Third U.S. Title

It may seem as if Malinin burst on to the scene in 2022, when he placed second to Nathan Chen at the U.S. Championships, was named an alternate to the 2022 U.S. Olympic Team and won the world junior title with a record score, outpacing the field by 42 points. But there are no overnight success stories in figure skating. An 11-year-old Malinin landed two strong double axels in his free skate at the 2016 U.S. Championships to win the juvenile boy’s title, telling this reporter at that competition, “I’ve been working to land both of my axels for a long time, probably six months.”  The next season, the youngster added a few triple jumps to his repertoire and won the intermediate men’s crown. “As a coach and a mother, I’m double proud of him,” Tatiana Malinin said at the 2017 U.S. Championships. “He only skates in the morning, for two hours. We live in Woodbridge (Virginia) but train at the rink in Reston, about an hour away. We get up at 4:30 in the morning to start practice at 6 a.m. My son is working so hard.” The family moved to Vienna, Virginia, about 15 minutes away from the Reston rink, but Malinin failed to qualify for the 2018 U.S. Championships. In 2019, he placed third in the novice division and 16th at junior worlds. Recognizing his potential, U.S. Figure Skating invited him to compete at 2020 Skate America, where COVID-19 pandemic concerns limited the field to mostly Americans. There, he landed two quads — toe loop and salchow — and placed fifth.

“After junior worlds last season, all the rinks shut down, so I did three hours a day off ice practicing jumps, spins and choreography, and that helped me a lot,” Malinin said at that Skate America. “When I got back on the ice in summer, it started feeling really comfortable, and I went from there.”

Junhwan Cha (South Korea), Shoma Uno (Japan), and Ilia Malinin pose for a picture during the men's free skate medal ceremony at the ISU World Figure Skating Championships in Saitama, Japan.

Before He Was “Quadg0d” On Instagram, He Was “Lutzgod.”

His 81,000 Instagram followers know Malinin by the now famous “quadg0d” handle, which he adopted about two years ago. Before he hit his quads at 2020 Skate America, though, he went by “lutzgod.” Changing monikers wasn’t just a clever marketing move. Aiming high forced him to live up to his nickname. “I have to keep my reputation up, because I can’t be ‘quad god’ without any quads,” he told U.S. Figure Skating in 2021. “So I need to learn everything I can right now. It’s kind of like inspiration.” His Instagram is an interesting follow. Malinin posted practice video of his quad axel weeks before he first landed it in competition last September. He continues to post new elements — including quad-quad combinations, and a quad axel, triple salchow combination — he may try in competition.

He’s A Senior In High School

Malinin has many fans at George C. Marshall High School, where the soon-to-graduate senior attends some classes in-person, and some online. “I have to travel places sometimes. I don’t miss a lot but when I do the teachers work with me and are understanding about making up work and extensions,” he told the local Patch publication. “Teachers will stop me and say, ‘I just say you on TV, why didn’t you tell me?’” Early this month, his school district’s board of supervisors presented a resolution to the figure skater to honor his accomplishments, including landing the quad axel. “I want to say thank you to the school and the teachers because they’ve been very supportive and (understanding) and tried to help him with any work,” coach and dad Skorniakov said at the ceremony. “He missed lots of school days. So teachers were very supportive.” Physics is his favorite subject — just like his predecessor as U.S. champion, 2022 Olympic gold medalist Chen. And speaking of Chen …

Malinin’s Career Path Is Similar To Chen’s — So Far

Rafael Arutunian, Chen’s longtime coach, also works with Malinin and accompanied the skater and his father to Saitama. Shae-Lynn Bourne, who choreographed many of Chen’s most notable programs — including the Elton John free skate that won gold at the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 — created Malinin’s short program this season. The two skaters occasionally shared practice ice in Irvine, California, during Malinin’s visits to work with Arutunian. Both Chen and Malinin landed their first quadruple jumps at age 15. Chen won his first U.S. title at age 17; Malinin was just seven months older when he took the crown in January. At the PyeongChang Games in 2018, Chen became the first skater to land six quads in a free skate, the same number Malinin tried in Saitama.

Finally, like Malinin, in the early part of his senior career, Chen was known more for his quadruple jumps than his artistry. By the time he won in Beijing, his program component scores were among the best in the world. It’s a goal Malinin must also achieve if he hopes to win gold at the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026.