Nathan Chen, a polymath on ice, honored by Ice Theatre of New York as Olympic champion who bridges world between sport and dance

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Nathan Chen, a polymath on ice, honored by Ice Theatre of New York as Olympic champion who bridges world between sport and dance

In 2017, not long after Nathan Chen had won his first of what would be six straight U.S. titles in figure skating, we talked briefly about his background in ballet.

Now, a lot of figure skaters mention having done ballet, but it is usually little more than something for a sentence in their bios.

But he did not see it the way most skaters do, as just another box to check, like sessions to work on strength, flexibility and endurance.

Chen was serious about the dance lessons, as many as six per week, that he took for 6 ½ years at Ballet West Academy in Salt Lake City.  He started the lessons at age seven to help his skating.  He kept them up for a less pragmatic reason.

“I love ballet,” he said.

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Alysa Liu's new reality: fame, fashion and the fast lane

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Alysa Liu's new reality: fame, fashion and the fast lane

Phillip DiGuglielmo began to see the handwriting on the wall not long after murals of Alysa Liu went up in Oakland and suburban Los Angeles.

For two weeks after Liu won the Olympic women’s singles title Feb. 19 in Milan, she and DiGuglielmo, her coach, still planned on going to Prague later this month so she could defend her world title.

“I knew her training wouldn’t be optimal, but we’re used to that,” DiGuglielmo said by telephone. “But this was going to be far from optimal.”

He understood that it was time for Liu to optimize the things coming her way since she became a sensation at the Olympics.

“She is just exploding,” he said. “Even her agents are overwhelmed. You have to balance what is her opportunity to build her brand versus going to worlds.”

By last Friday, she and her team agreed it was best for Liu to withdraw from the World Championships.

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In pairs skating, Deanna Stellato-Dudek succeeds in 10-year quest

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In pairs skating, Deanna Stellato-Dudek succeeds in 10-year quest

The results will tell you that Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps of Canada finished 14th of 19 teams in Sunday’s pairs short program at the 2026 Winter Olympics.

The results won’t tell that just by skating, Stellato-Dudek had succeeded in what seemed an utterly quixotic quest when she began it 10 years ago, that she had realized an improbable dream that nearly became an impossible one two weeks ago.

Stellato-Dudek, of course, couldn’t see it quite that way right now. The fierce competitive fire that carried her and Deschamps to the world title two years ago won’t be entirely banked by knowing that at age 42, she had become the oldest woman to compete in Olympic figure skating since 1928 and the third oldest in history, according to Olympedia.org.

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Quad God Ilia Malinin just might be human after all

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Quad God Ilia Malinin just might be human after all

Yes, there has been a lot of attention on figure skater Ilia Malinin, to the point where someone just dropping in on the sport would have been utterly shocked to see what happened when Malinin made his Olympic debut in the short program of the team event.

Isn’t this guy supposed to be the quadg0d? An overwhelming favorite for the men’s singles gold medal? Winner of the last two world titles?

Then how did he finish second Saturday at the Milano Ice Center Arena to Yuma Kagiyama of Japan…and by 10 points??

On ice, of course, even the divine can slip into fallibility, as Malinin did, losing points on an under-rotated quad Lutz jump and a spin that did not get the maximum base value.

And this wasn’t the first time Kagiyama had beaten Malinin in a short program. In fact, it happened in their last meeting, at the Grand Prix Final in December.

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Figure skating officials weigh major changes in rules, schedule

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Figure skating officials weigh major changes in rules, schedule

nternational figure skating federation officials are weighing changes in competition rules that would alter the sport radically, including a potentially dramatic reduction in jumps in singles events.

And the federation’s governing board, the International Skating Union (ISU) council, has already supported significant changes to the figure skating season schedule and Grand Prix format to take effect in the 2027-28 season.

All this is still in discussion stages but moving forward. Under the new ISU Constitution, the 14-member council (rather than the biennial ISU Congress) has the “ultimate authority to adopt, amend or repeal” competition and event regulations and sports rules.

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