Japanese teenager Ami Nakai was the surprise leader after the short program of the Olympic women’s figure skating competition on a night when her country’s skaters largely stole the spotlight from Team USA’s Blade Angels in their bid to end America’s two-decade medal drought.
Nakai delivered a clean, commanding skate on Tuesday, highlighted by a soaring triple axel for a personal-best score of 78.71, edging three-time world champion Kaori Sakamoto (77.23) into second. Only Alysa Liu of the United States was able to break the Japanese hold on the top spots, scoring 76.59 to come in ahead of fourth-placed Mone Choba (74.00).
There has never been a clean podium sweep in Olympic women’s figure skating, but Nakai, Sakamoto and Chiba will fancy their chances at making history for their skating-mad nation entering Thursday’s free skate, when the medals will be doled out.
The 17-year-old Nakai, the youngest of the 29 skaters in the field, laid down the early marker from the top of the second-to-last group, landed the three-and-a-half-revolution jump to open her program to La Strada by Nino Rosa and racking up points with a triple lutz-triple toeloop combo followed by a triple loop. Her score improbably held up through the next 11 skaters.
“I feel like I’m dreaming,” Nakai said. “I just tried to stay in my skate, and have a good time for the rest of the skate. “The Americans push me with their difficult jumps, including the triple axel. But at the same time, they’re all very nice people, so I just want to enjoy my time with them on the ice.”
Sakamoto, who backed up her 2022 Olympic bronze medal with three consecutive world titles, delivered an elegant performance to Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman’s Time To Say Goodbye, earning high marks for her triple lutz and a double axel but lost points on a slightly under-roated triple lutz and triple flip-triple toe combo.
“I made small, tiny mistakes, but I did it well,” Sakamoto said. “In the first half, I was a little bit anxious, but as the music went on I got very comfortable and was able to really enjoy my performance. Although it was a little bit lower than the score I did in the team event, this will be a good step to the free skate.”
Liu, the 20-year-old who won last year’s world championship after coming back from a two-year retirement prompted by burnout, earned her season-best score with a near-perfect routine set to Promise by Laufey and Dan Wilson to remain squarely in the podium hunt. Were she to win a medal of any color on Thursday, she would become the first American woman to reach the Olympic podium in this event since Sasha Cohen won silver in 2006.
“Whether I beat them or not is not my goal,” Liu said of her Japanese rivals. “My goal is just to do my programs and share my story and I don’t need to be over or under anyone to do that.”
Her American teammates, who entered this contest with high hopes of medal contention, didn’t fare as well.
Skating immediately after Liu kicked off the final group, 18-year-old Isabeau Levito was docked a level on her step sequence and finished eighth with 70.84 points. Later, Amber Glenn’s skate to Madonna’s Like a Prayer – which had prompted a video message of encouragement from the singer – started off well enough with the only other triple axel of the night, sending the building into delirious roars. But the 26-year-old Texan and three-time US champion was left in tears after a popped triple loop cost her seven points, derailing her program and dropping her to 13th place with 67.39.
“I don’t know what happened,” Glenn told her coach as she left the ice. “I had it.”
Adeliia Petrosian, the three-time Russian champion who entered these Olympics as an individual neutral athlete, went off in the first group due to a lack of international competition experience as a result of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Her clean skate to a Michael Jackson medley – including They Don’t Care About Us at the climax – was good for fifth with a personal-best score of 72.89, leaving her within striking distance of the medals.
“At first I was worried, not about my skate, but about my [emotional] state. This was the most important start of my life,” Petrosian said. “I’m feeling really calm, and I hope this will help me with my free skate because this [short program] already helped me today.”
The 18-year-old from Moscow, who is coached by the controversial Eteri Tutberidze, attempted none of the quadruple jumps nor the triple axel which are in her arsenal, but remained coy when asked whether she’d attempt them in Thursday’s free skate.
“I would like to keep this a secret because I never tell about my program,” she said.
