Alysa Liu Made History at US Nationals

The youngest champion in U.S. Women's Figure Skating history, 13-year-old Alysa Liu, reacts to her historic win and shows Jimmy one of her competition rituals.



What Liu did on Friday night—overtaking older, more experienced skaters who are eligible to compete on the senior circuit—was not an isolated incident in the world of women’s figure skating. At last month’s Russian national championships, the top three positions were held by skaters who were also age-ineligible for this year’s senior world championships. (Though they are, unlike Liu, eligible for junior worlds. Liu’s birthdate is about five weeks shy of the cutoff mark, so she was unable to take part in this season’s junior Grand Prix circuit. The most she could do is enter an “advanced novice” competition, against skaters she has already beaten.) The first senior age-eligible skater at the Russian championships was Stanislava Konstantinova, who came in fourth. 2018 Olympic champion Alina Zagitova finished fifth. Sofia Samodurova, who, a month later, would skate to the 2019 European title, was sixth. And two-time world champion Evgenia Medvedeva, who has struggled all season long, was seventh.



What Liu and the young Russians all have in common beyond relative youth—no one we’re talking about is truly “old”—is supernal jumping ability aided by their small size. Liu became the first U.S. woman to land a triple axel in both her long and short programs at nationals. In fact, she did two in her long—the first in combination with a double toe loop. Some of the Russian girls, like junior world champion Alexandra Trusova, can do quad jumps. In Trusova’s case, she can do more than one and in combination with other jumps. When Trusova debuted her quad in competition last year, she was the first woman to rotate one since 2002 when Miki Ando did it. Like Trusova, Ando was a junior when she successfully competed the jump.