\n<\/p>\n
From skating to curling, the thrilling sports of the Winter Olympics have plenty of science behind them. Follow our coverage here to learn more.<\/p>\n
For at least a decade, the quadruple axel jump was figure skating\u2019s white whale. \u201cIt\u2019s been this unreachable thing, like the four-minute mile\u201d once was, says Matthew Lind, a technical specialist for U.S. Figure Skating. Throughout the 2010s male skaters kept landing new jumps that rotate four times in the air: the lutz, the loop, the flip. But at 4.5 rotations, the quad axel is a special case, and it remained incredibly risky to attempt, let alone to perfect.<\/p>\n
Then came Ilia Malinin. In a video on the U.S. skater\u2019s Instagram, he lands two in a row with only a split second between them, like it\u2019s nothing. He became the first\u2014and still, the only\u2014skater to land the quad axel in competition in 2022. He calls himself the Quad God, and it\u2019s hard to disagree with him.<\/p>\n
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\u201cHe\u2019s a phenom,\u201d says figure skating coach and former Olympian Karen Preston. His jumps \u201care pretty darn close to perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n
Malinin represents the direction in which figure skating has been moving for at least 20 years, rewarding harder and flashier jumps. I spoke with figure skating coaches and biomechanics researchers to learn how these jumps became possible, what makes Malinin special, and whether we\u2019re headed toward the era of quintuples.<\/p>\n
From a physics perspective, the six main jumps of figure skating are variations on the same theme. Skaters glide along the ice to build momentum, then twist themselves up like springs and push off with explosive muscle movements. They have two goals: to jump high to maximize their time in the air and to rotate fast to complete the turns before their foot comes slamming back to the ice. During takeoff, skaters push off the ice at an angle, which lets them maximize angular momentum, or the ability to rotate quickly.<\/p>\n
Each jump accomplishes this differently. The axel is the only jump in which skaters take off while facing forward, which is part of what makes it so difficult\u2014because it is landed backward, skaters must rotate an extra half turn before they land. The five other jumps take off backward and can be launched from the figure skate blade\u2019s distinctive toe pick or from either of its two edges.<\/p>\n
Though the jumps may be similar physics-wise, for the human body, every jump is different. And they only get harder with more rotations, requiring skaters to propel higher and rotate faster. The margin for error becomes slim. \u201cYou\u2019re really putting your body at risk,\u201d Lind says. For elite skaters, landing these harder jumps requires strength and conditioning, innate talent, mental focus, great coaches\u2014and a slight body, explains biomechanics researcher Lee Cabell, who coaches figure skating at IceWorks Skating Club in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
The importance of a narrow body comes down to physics. Because angular momentum must be conserved, skaters can\u2019t change their rotation potential once they\u2019re in the air. But they can change their spinning speed by pulling their arms close to their body. This movement brings more of the skater\u2019s mass closer to their axis of rotation, decreasing what\u2019s called their moment of inertia and increasing the speed of their rotation by making it require less force.<\/p>\n
Narrower bodies, then, have the capacity to spin faster. \u201cThese very slight but muscular athletes really have the advantage for rotating,\u201d says Sarah T. Ridge, a biomechanics researcher at the University of Hartford, who studies figure skating. With his slight body, immense talent, and parents who are former Olympians and double as his coaches, Malinin is a rare skater with the whole package, Cabell says. Another outlier is Nathan Chen, who landed five quads in one program at the 2022 Olympics and took home the gold. Both have dominated the sport, with scores far above the rest of the pack.<\/p>\n
Amanda Monta\u00f1ez; Source: skakingscores.com (data)<\/p>\n
For a while, it seemed like quads were taking over women\u2019s skating, too. In the early 2020s the field was dominated by young, predominantly Russian teenagers who could land quads, a feat that is easier in narrower, prepubescent bodies. But after one of these young skaters was caught up in a doping scandal at the 2022 Olympics, the International Skating Union (ISU) raised the minimum age to compete to 17. Now the quad\u2019s relevance in women\u2019s skating has faded. All eyes there are on the triple axel, an element that was once very risky but which skaters are now landing with apparent ease, says Deborah King, who studies biomechanics at Ithaca College. This development is less likely to grab headlines, but it\u2019s another example of figure skating moving toward harder and harder jumps.<\/p>\n
In some ways, the quad race was born from a massive judging scandal at the 2002 Olympics. At the time, judges awarded skaters a maximum of six points for both artistry and technique. During the Games, a French judge was pressured to inflate the scores for a Russian pairs team. In response to \u201cskategate,\u201d the ISU created a new scoring system that capped artistry scores at 10 points per judge but had no ceiling for technical scores, which are awarded for the difficulty of jumps, spins, and more. This means that, theoretically, skaters can always do more and harder jumps to surpass their competition, Lind says.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s precisely what has happened. To be competitive, skaters have kept learning harder skills, and both they and their coaches have accumulated expertise along the way.<\/p>\n
And like athletes in most sports, skaters have gotten a boost from advances in nutrition science, strength and conditioning practices, physical therapy, and injury prevention. \u201cI think just small increments in all of those things can add up\u201d to a skater that has enough strength and skill to land a quad comfortably, King says.<\/p>\n
Technology has also given coaches more resources to teach harder jumps. Pole harnesses, for example, attach around skaters\u2019 torsos and connect to a rod their coach holds like a fishing pole. This allows coaches to support some of their students\u2019 weight in midair so they can try jumps they couldn\u2019t yet land on their own. These harnesses allow skaters to develop muscle memory and also protect them from injury. \u201cWe didn\u2019t have this when I was a skater. I look at these and I\u2019m like, \u2018Oh, that would have been nice,\u2019\u201d says Lind, who progressed to a triple axel before retiring in 2004.<\/p>\n
But perhaps the most important technology is video analysis. About 20 years ago coaches started using a software called Dartfish that allows them to play back and overlay videos of their students\u2019 jumps in real time, Lind explains. \u201cWe\u2019re getting more people from different places doing harder skills, just because the information is more readily available and analyzable\u201d for coaches, he says.<\/p>\n
Preston specializes in Dartfish video analysis at the Toronto Cricket Skating and Curling Club. \u201cThis is where the science also eliminates the frustration,\u201d she says. \u201cBefore, when we were learning how to do a jump, we were told, \u2018Do it again, again, again.\u2019 Now we can break [the jump] down into extremely tangible moments.\u201d The Skating Club of Boston, where Lind coaches, is also experimenting with three-dimensional cameras to give coaches even more valuable information about their skaters\u2019 technique.<\/p>\n
Scrutinizing every moment of a jump has also allowed coaches to re-think and sometimes change how they teach jump technique. For example, skaters were once told to look in the direction of their jump. \u201cNowadays, that is forbidden,\u201d Preston says\u2014it throws the head off axis, which decreases rotation speed. Coaches have also learned that higher jumps aren\u2019t necessarily better; higher jumps are harder to control.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of variables\u201d in any given jump, Preston says. \u201cNobody\u2019s jumps look the same as anybody else\u2019s. And perfection doesn\u2019t really exist\u2014unless you\u2019re looking at Ilia Malinin.\u201d<\/p>\n
Every expert I spoke with gushed about Malinin\u2019s technique. Not only does he land seemingly impossible jumps but he also does it with \u201castounding\u201d ease, Ridge says. \u201cWhen I\u2019m watching his quads, I\u2019m like, is that a triple or a quad\u2014because it looks so easy.\u201d<\/p>\n
To Lind\u2019s expert eye, what makes Malinin\u2019s technique unique is his patience. He doesn\u2019t immediately rush to rotate his quad axel upon takeoff. Instead he waits, allowing him to climb a little higher than he would if he started rotating immediately. This takes a lot of guts, Lind says. \u201cHis personality is kind of a daredevil. He likes taking these risks.\u201d<\/p>\n
At this point, it seems inevitable that Malinin will land a quintuple jump. \u201cI\u2019m sure that kid has done quints. You cannot tell me that he has not tried it in practice,\u201d Ridge says. \u201cIt\u2019s freaking amazing how his body works. And I go back and forth: Are there going to be more people like this?\u201d<\/p>\n
If history is any clue, we\u2019ll see other skaters catch up soon enough, as they eventually did with quadruple jumps. But so long as skate boots and blades do not change, we\u2019ll eventually reach a point where more rotations are impossible. \u201cThere will be a physical limit,\u201d Cabell says. \u201cAnd I think that quintuple is the limit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Whether this movement toward harder jumps is the right direction for skating\u2019s future is fiercely debated, both among the figure skating community and fans. \u201cI do think that quads are here to stay, permanently, in all levels,\u201d Preston says. Yet as jumps get more difficult, it becomes more challenging for skaters to balance technique with artistry.<\/p>\n
One of Preston\u2019s students, Jason Brown, exemplifies the kind of figure skating that the quad era threatens to squash. Brown, a 31-year-old U.S. skater, is renowned for his artistry but has struggled to land quads. \u201cHaving been on Jason Brown\u2019s coaching team and knowing the magic that he has brought to the sport, I would hate to lose that,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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