At a Glance
- Ilia Malinin landed the first-ever quad axel in competition in September 2022 in Lake Placid.
- The jump is considered the hardest technical feat possible in figure skating.
- Athletes say strict scoring rules now discourage creativity and risk-taking.
- Why it matters: With technical limits reached, skaters and fans worry the sport could lose excitement without artistic innovation.
Ilia Malinin stunned the skating world when he landed a quad axel at a modest event in Lake Placid in September 2022. The maneuver, long thought impossible, added the final half-revolution to the sport’s most difficult jump and drew global headlines.
“My mind was just blown,” said two-time Olympic skater Jason Brown.
By checking the ultimate technical box, Malinin has renewed a long-running debate: once the ceiling is hit, where does figure skating go next?
The Last Frontier
The six standard jumps have not changed since the early 1900s. Evolution has come only through rotations:
| Year | Milestone | Athlete |
|---|---|---|
| 1948 | First double axel | Dick Button |
| 1952 | First triple jump | Dick Button |
| 1988 | First quad (toe loop) | Kurt Browning |
| 1998 | First quad salchow | Timothy Goebel |
| 2022 | First quad axel | Ilia Malinin |
Most sports scientists say five-revolution jumps are beyond human capability, meaning the technical frontier may be closed.
Creativity vs. Code
Malinin, now a two-time world champion and three-time U.S. champion, still looks for ways to stand out. His signature “raspberry twist”-a somersaulting spin he invented-thrills crowds but earns scant points under the International Skating Union’s strict requirements.
“Absolutely, there are a lot of things I’ve wanted to try,” Malinin told Jordan M. Lewis reported, “because I think it would be really cool and appealing. But it’s a bigger risk for the program itself, and the system and scoring means it doesn’t make sense.”
Alysa Liu, reigning world champion, echoed the frustration:
“There are so many rules in your programs that you don’t have too much wiggle room. A lot of these rules really restrict us. Like, all of our spins look the same now, but they could look so different.”
Risk Without Reward
Amber Glenn, a three-time U.S. champion, pointed to training partner Sonja Himler, who spins and jumps in the opposite direction of most skaters. The creativity impresses insiders yet garners lower scores than textbook elements done well.
“My scores will be better,” Glenn said, “even though what she does is way more impressive, in my opinion.”
Justin Dillon, manager of high performance at U.S. Figure Skating, acknowledged the dilemma:
“If they do something so avant-garde that it doesn’t check those boxes, then it really doesn’t serve them.”
Rulebook Tweaks
The ISU has relaxed some restrictions; backflips are now legal, though they carry minimal point value. Glenn called the move fun but terrifying to practice.
Brown, who competes without consistent quads, wonders whether the next leap is artistic, not athletic:
“I think the more that people fixate on executing an element, the less risk people take artistically… maybe the next step for figure skating is to reward the story we’re trying to tell.”
Key Takeaways
- Malinin’s quad axel may mark the end of technical one-upmanship in skating.
- Current scoring rewards clean standard elements over creative ones.
- Athletes want rule changes that encourage individuality without punitive risk.
- Future innovation could shift from jumps to choreography and narrative.
