What to watch for: Austria’s Anna Gasser is the two-time defending Olympic gold medalist, but she hurt her shoulder surfing during the summer and has been rehabbing with the hope of making it three straight. New Zealand’s Zoi Sadowski-Synnott, the 2022 big air silver medalist and also a slopestyle star, is another favorite.

MILAN (AP) — Ilia Malinin's quest for Olympic figure skating gold might not be so easy after all. Same goes for his American team. Yuma Kagiyama landed a pair of near-perfect quads, one in combination with a triple toe loop,

Team USA made an immediate impact on the first full day of competition at the 2026 Winter Olympics, headlined by another one-sided performance from the women's hockey team and a five-point lead in figure skating's team event that sets up a pivotal Sunday.

Figure skating has long been a staple of the Winter Games program. From the early days of elegant skating, the high-flying, acrobatic competition of today, fans are consistently wowed by the ability of athletes who lay it all on the line for their country and Olympic glory.

Olympic figure skating is often seems to take athletes to the very edge of perfection, but even the greatest stumble and fall. How do they pull themselves together again on the biggest world stage? Toughness,

World champions Ilia Malinin, Alysa Liu, and Madison Chock and Evan Bates will headline the squad. With three world champions in three out of four divisions, the United States is sending its best figure skating squad to the Winter Olympics in 20 years.