American figure skater Ilia Malinin admitted that a series of thoughts ‘overwhelmed’ him before his shocking upset defeat in the men’s free skate final at the Milan Winter Olympics on Friday.
After putting together a sublime short program to put him into the lead of the men’s single free skating competition, he would need a routine performance in the free skate to guarantee him a medal.
The Virginia native, known as the ‘Quad God’ for his ability to perform four rotations in the air at rates never seen in the sport, was expected to land multiple quads in his performance.
But Malinin only landed a pair of them. He had to pull out of a quadruple axel and a quadruple loop – hitting only a single axel and a double loop – before falling twice.
An emotional Malinin was seen skating off the ice and angrily muttering to himself before finishing eighth in the competition.
Speaking to reporters after the upset loss, Malinin revealed what was going through his head before he took to the ice.
American skating star Ilia Malinin revealed he was ‘overwhelmed’ before his free skate disaster
Malinin had to pull out of two of his quad jump attempts and fell twice in his performance
After being expected to win the gold, the ‘Quad God’ Malinin ended up finishing eighth
‘I just had so many thoughts and memories flood right before I got into my starting pose, and almost, I think, it maybe overwhelmed me a little bit. I’ve been through a lot in my life, a lot of bad and good experiences,’ Malinin told NBC Washington in a reporter scrum after the competition.
‘So, I just feel like it’s the pressure of especially being that Olympic gold medal hopeful. It was just something I can’t control now.’
The 21-year-old went on to emphasize the amount of stress the Olympics can bring.
‘The pressure of the Olympics, it’s really something different, and I think not a lot of people understand that,’ Malinin added.
‘They only understand that from the inside and going into this competition, especially today, I felt really confident, really good. But it really just went by so fast I did not have time to process.’
Despite the heartbreak in his individual event, Malinin will not be leaving Milan empty handed. He brings back a gold medal that he won with the United States in the team event that America captured earlier in the week.
‘I think that’s definitely a positive for me. And it honestly maybe gives me thoughts that I need to understand why that happened in the individual event,’ he said of winning the medal with the rest of Team USA.
‘I think going into this competition I made sure that I was able to prepare myself for at least four programs or four performances. So, honestly, I haven’t had time to fully understand what went on.’
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Malinin admitted to reporters, ‘The pressure of the Olympics, it’s really something different’
Malinin lost out on the gold medal to Mikhail Shaidorov (L) of Kazakhstan
Back in December, Malinin set a new world record with a free skate score of 238.24. But that form was not seen on the ice on Friday evening in Italy.
The gold went to Mikhail Shaidorov of Kazakhstan, winning gold with a 198.94 in the free skate and a combined score of 291.58.
It marks the first gold medal for Kazakhstan at the Winter Olympics since the 1994 games in Lillehammer.
Japan’s Yuma Kagiyama, the man expected to be the biggest challenger for Malinin, settled for silver – while his countryman Shun Sato clinched the bronze.
