Today is the biggest day of Ilia Malinin’s professional career.
After being the anchor for Team USA last Sunday to help his country win the gold medal in the figure skating team event, he now has a chance to win his second gold at the Winter Olympic Games in the men’s individual competition.
The 21-year-old world champion will be the final male skater on the ice on Friday in Milan, as he enters the free skate portion of the event as the leader following a nearly flawless short program.
But what does the Virginia native do before heading out on the ice with the pressure of the whole world on his shoulders?
Well, he does a lot.
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A recent behind-the-scenes video from NBC Sports shows what the four-time United States men’s champion does in his special warmup to prepare for his multitude of quadruple jumps.
He begins by loosening up and stretching. That then leads him to play another sport entirely, soccer, by dribbling around and getting his limbs opened up. After he’s broken a little bit of a sweat, that’s when Malinin will begin flipping and spinning around like an acrobat, performing what he does on the ice in regular shoes.
He also does a few backflips in there for good measure before getting his costume on and skating out to the ice to put on a show of a lifetime.
Malinin wants to carry on the legacy of Nathan Chen, who won men’s gold at the 2022 Beijing Games.
The same skater who rivaled Chen in China will be Malinin’s biggest competition on Friday in Italy, as Japan’s Yuma Kagiyama hopes he can rewrite his own history following a silver medal finish four years ago.
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