MILAN — Olympic Gold is in sight for the ‘Quad God’ of figure skating.
Men’s singles at the 2026 Winter Olympics is concluding today, and 21-year-old Ilia Malinin is hunting down the top prize to add to his long list of accolades he’s already earned in his young and already epic career. The U.S. star is sitting in first place — by a comfortable margin of five points — entering the free skate. His program is expected to be stunning, featuring both the quad Axel and the backflip.
Watch Olympics figure skating on Peacock
What time is Olympics figure skating today?
The men’s free skate begins at 1 p.m. ET.
Where to watch Olympics figure skating, Ilia Malinin
Men’s figure skating is airing on USA Network beginning at 1 p.m. ET before the competition switches to NBC starting at 3 p.m. Peacock is steaming it live.
When does Ilia Malinin skate?
There are five groups of skaters, and Malinin goes last in Group 5. He’s set to take the ice around 4:48 p.m. ET.
What makes Ilia Malinin so great? Skaters marveled by the ‘Quad God’
These are the few ways to describe Ilia Malinin, and none of them are an exaggeration. Every sport gets an athlete that redefines everything you know about it. Basketball had Michael Jordan. Football had Tom Brady. Baseball has Shohei Ohtani.
Now, figure skating has its phenom, and it’s not just fans that are amazed by the 21-year-old. Those who have championed the sport and been through the grind are just as flabbergasted by how he’s turned figure skating upside down.
‘All the skaters that I sit with in the audience, they throw up their hands, and they think, ‘Oh, my God, this guy’s just so amazing,’” 1988 Olympic champion Brian Boitano said on USA TODAY’s Milan Magic podcast.
Now, the entire world has its chance to be the next spectators wowed at the 2026 Winter Olympics. It’s been a journey four years in the making, and in his Olympic debut, Malinin is out to show why he is the present and future of figure skating.
He already did it in the team event, and now it’s time for him to do it in the men’s singles to become the next great American figure skating champion.
Are backflips allowed in figure skating?
They are now. For nearly 50 years, the backflip was banned in figure skating, after American skater Terry Kubicka became the first one to execute it at the 1976 Innsbruck Games. French skater Surya Bonaly did it at the 1998 Winter Olympics, landing it on one blade, but the move was illegal and she was deducted for it.
The International Skating Union reversed course and made the move legal in 2024, paving the way for it to be done at the 2026 Winter Olympics, 50 years after it was first done.
Men’s figure skating order
Here is the starting order for today’s free skate.
Group 1
- Yu-Hsiang Li (Chinese Taipei)
- Donovan Carrillo (Mexico)
- Kao Miura (Japan)
- Vladimir Samoilov (Poland)
- Adam Hagara (Slovakia)
- Lukas Britschigi (Switzerland)
Group 2
- Aleksandr Selevko (Estonia)
- Deniss Vasiljevs (Latvia)
- Matteo Rizzo (Italy)
- Nika Egadze (Georgia)
- Maxim Naumov (United States)
- Boyang Jin (China)
Group 3
- Petr Gumennik (Individual neutral athletes)
- Kyrylo Marsak (Ukraine)
- Stephen Gogolev (Canada)
- Shun Sato (Japan)
- Andrew Torgashev (United States)
- Kevin Aymoz (France)
Group 4
- Junhwan Cha (Korea)
- Mikhail Shaidorov (Kazakhstan)
- Daniel Grassl (Italy)
- Adam Siao Him Fa (France)
- Yuma Kagiyama (Japan)
- Ilia Malinin (United States)