Ilia Malinin reflected on his undefeated 2024-25 figure skating season and looked ahead to the 2025-26 Olympic campaign while appearing on TODAY on Monday.
The 2026 Milan Cortina Games open in 270 days.
“I feel really good,” Malinin said. “I’m really excited to start off this Olympic season.”
Malinin, a 20-year-old from Virginia, won his last nine individual competitions dating to December 2023.
In March, he repeated as world champion by becoming the first skater to land all six different types of quadruple jumps in one program without any under-rotations.
The self-nicknamed “quad god” is the only skater to ever land the most difficult quad — the four-and-a-half-revolution quad Axel.
Malinin is coached by his parents, who each skated at the Olympics for Uzbekistan and moved to the U.S. before Malinin was born.
“They’re such an inspiration to me,” Malinin said, while joking that his mom is the stricter parent.
Malinin is expected to begin his 2025-26 Olympic season in earnest on the top-level Grand Prix Series in October and November.
Maia Shibutani and Alex Shibutani, 2018 Olympic medalists, are returning for the 2025-26 Olympic season.
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