Ilia Malinin established such a big lead after his peerless short program at the US Figure Skating Championships that the phenom’s free skate on Sunday was less a competition and more a coronation — even though kings sometimes fall down.
After starting his program with a textbook quad Axel — a jump only Malinin has landed in competition — he doubled a planned quad loop, fell on a quad Lutz and doubled another planned quad.
Even with those miscues, the 19-year-old “Quad God” was still nearly 30 points better than the rest of the competition in Columbus, Ohio, cruising to his second consecutive national championship.
Photo:Adam Cairns-USA TODAY
“Even though it wasn’t what I wished for, it was a fun experience. I enjoyed having the crowd with me every step,” he said.
Malinin finished with 294.35 points, well below the world-leading score of 314.66 points he had at the Grand Prix Final last month in Beijing, but it was well ahead of Jason Brown in second with 264.50 points, while Camden Pulkinen soared from fifth after his short program into the bronze-medal position with 262.33 points.
The bronze medalist at last year’s world championship, Malinin won last month’s Final — where he landed a quad Axel in the short program and a quadruple loop in the free skate to become the first skater to perform all six types of jumps as quads in competition.
He is the favorite to take the crown from Japan’s Shoma Uno at the World Championships in Montreal on March 18-24.
Malinin said that uncertainty stemming from recent boot problems meant he did not decide until Sunday’s warm-up whether to attempt a quadruple Axel — something he surely would not need to win after building a huge lead in the short program.
“Definitely on the warm-up I was really thinking about it,” he told broadcaster NBC. “It was really hard for me to decide.”
Finally, he just decided “I’m going to do this. I’m going to try it, see what happens,” he said.
Additional reporting by AFP
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