With brilliant skating by the top three, Nathan Chen still leaves no room at the top

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With brilliant skating by the top three, Nathan Chen still leaves no room at the top

When a skater has been as dominant as Nathan Chen has for three seasons, it is not surprising many others look at him as untouchable.

That feeling is even shared by a skater like Vincent Zhou, the reigning world bronze medalist and, like Chen, a 2018 Olympian.

“I have come to the realization that pretty much everyone – and also myself, inadvertently – puts whoever is at the top on a pedestal, and anyone not on that pedestal has no chance of winning,” Zhou said.

“Obviously, Nathan is an amazing skater. But I want to be the best I can and if that means I can win, that’s great.”

In Saturday’s short program at the U.S. Championships, when the top three finishers all skated brilliantly, Zhou came as close as he ever has to making room for himself at the top next to a Chen at the top of his game.

“I was aware of what he did,” said Chen, who skated more than an hour later. “Vincent is extremely talented, and I know he is going to throw it down every time he skates. I’m thrilled I was able to skate the way that I did.”

It was hard to remember another competition in which three men skated short programs as well as Chen, Zhou and Jason Brown. One can only imagine what the crowd reaction would have been had they not been compelled to compete in an empty Las Vegas arena out of COVID-19 safety concerns.

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Gracie Gold’s progress stalled again after poor short program at U.S. Championships

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Gracie Gold’s progress stalled again after poor short program at U.S. Championships

With her characteristic and often searing honesty, Gracie Gold had minced no words in evaluating her dismayingly poor performances at Skate America in October.

“Terrible today and yesterday,” Gold said after finishing dead last of 12 competitors in both the short program and free skate, with the lowest free skate and overall scores of her eight years in senior competition.

“We have to salvage what we can from the wreckage,” she said. “I’m a little worse off than I thought.”

And the two-time U.S. champion had to reassemble herself in barely a month for what became a virtual qualifying competition to earn a place for this week’s U.S. Championships.

She made it to nationals but wound up feeling the same way after Thursday’s short program as she had at Skate America.

“It was pretty terrible. There’s not much else to say,” Gold said.

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Nathan Chen digs into advanced statistics textbook while writing his own such numbers in U.S. skating record book

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Nathan Chen digs into advanced statistics textbook while writing his own such numbers in U.S. skating record book

The wonk in Nathan Chen has ensured that even while he is taking time off from attending college, he isn’t taking time off from studying.

Chen, a rising junior at Yale, decided last fall was as good a time as any to begin a leave of absence from school to prepare for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics because his classes would have been remote even if he had been in New Haven, Connecticut.

But he got friends to send him the textbooks he will eventually be using in chemistry and advanced statistics courses for a little light reading.

“Nothing super serious,” he said during a Zoom interview last week. “Just trying to get through a chapter a day.”

After two seasons of questions about whether he could remain among the world’s leading skaters with a full course load at a university 3,000 miles from his coach (the answer was an emphatic, “yes”), Chen came to realize that the balance between school and skating helped him with both.

On the skating side, Chen’s results speak for themselves as he seeks a fifth straight title at the U.S. Championships in Las Vegas, with the men’s short program Saturday and free skate Sunday.

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For reigning U.S. figure skating champion Alysa Liu, growing pains shrink expectations

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For reigning U.S. figure skating champion Alysa Liu, growing pains shrink expectations


It’s easy to understand why Alysa Liu has altered her perspective for the U.S. Figure Skating Championships next week in Las Vegas.

“I don’t necessarily care about my placement anymore,” Liu said via telephone Wednesday.

The two-time defending champion realizes she will be hard-pressed to make it three straight. Getting onto the awards podium might even be out of reach, given what the 15-year-old Liu has been dealing with this season:

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His optimism challenged by ‘life on repeat,’ Jason Brown learns to take each day as it comes

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His optimism challenged by ‘life on repeat,’ Jason Brown learns to take each day as it comes

Jason Brown’s usually boundless optimism finally hit its limits about a month ago.

“I just shut down,” Brown said.

His intrinsic motivation to keep improving and his consummate love for figure skating had already been challenged several times since Brown returned from his parents’ home in the Chicago suburbs to his Toronto training base in late June. Eventually, in December, he found himself thinking about practice like a 26-year-old terrible two, his mind saying louder and louder, “I DON’T WANT TO GO.”

“A lot of weird moments,” he said.

There were days when his training was going so well he felt the sky was the limit but more days when, for the first time in his two decades in the sport, he felt burned out and done.

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