Latest news with #Levito
Yahoo
27-03-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Alysa Liu finds the joy — and the lead — at World Figure Skating Championships
BOSTON – In her first figure skating career, the one she ended with a retirement three years ago at age 16, Alysa Liu won national titles, made history as the youngest this and the youngest that, did landmark jumps for a U.S. woman, competed in the Olympics and won a world championships bronze medal. The way Liu describes all that now, it was a pretty joyless experience. She didn't like to practice. That meant she rarely went into a competition as prepared as she needed to be. That — and injuries — made her performances erratic. 'It was a job,' she said. FIGURE SKATING WORLDS: Results | Broadcast Schedule Her unexpected return this season, on her own terms, has been so enjoyable that Liu literally turned a cartwheel on the entry walkway before taking the ice for Wednesday afternoon's short program at the 2025 World Championships. The way she skated, it would not have been surprising if Liu turned multiple cartwheels on the ice after a performance that not only brought the TD Garden crowd to its feet but put her in first place going into Friday night's free skate. 'It is so much more fun this time,' Liu said. 'I really don't think I wanted to do any competitions before, but now I really do want to.' With 74.58 points, her highest short program score in international competition, Liu leads Japan's Mone Chiba by 1.14 points and U.S. teammate Isabeau Levito, the reigning world silver medalist, by 1.25. U.S. champion Amber Glenn, a title favorite, fought back from a fall on her opening element, a triple Axel. The big mistake left Glenn ninth, but just 5.68 points from third. Three-time defending champion Kaori Sakamoto of Japan made lesser errors on her jump combination, footwork sequence and a spin. They left her fifth, 2.30 from third and 3.55 from first. It was a top three few would have foreseen. Chiba, seventh at her first worlds appearance last year, was sixth at last month's Four Continents Championships. Levito had been sidelined by a foot injury from last fall until late February, when her comeback performance at a lesser event in Italy was both cautiously restrained and decidedly underwhelming. 'That injury traumatized me a little bit,' Levito said. 'I would be in constant fear I was going to do something to make it hurt again.' Not since Gracie Gold in 2016, also in Boston, had a U.S. woman led worlds after the short program. That was near the beginning of an eight-year period when Russians came to utterly dominate women's singles on both junior and senior levels. Russians have been barred from international figure skating competition since their country's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine just after the 2022 Olympics. The International Skating Union has decided to allow one Russian entry per discipline next season, including at the Winter Olympics. To the question of whether worlds would be more interesting with the Russians, Liu answered, 'Maybe. I think competitions are more fun, the more people you can include.' Skating to Laufey's 'Promise,' music that describes an off-and-on love relationship that mirrors her bond with figure skating, Liu flowed flawlessly through the 2 minutes, 50 seconds, executing the seven elements with utter command. 'Without the music, the moving is just not the same,' Liu said. 'You have to pick the right piece for yourself.' Ironically, the melancholy mood of the music does not match Liu's unabashed new enthusiasm for her sport, the attitude that led her to express herself with the cartwheel. 'I was trying to think, 'What am I gonna do?'' Liu said. 'I got to that moment and I was like, 'You haven't thought of anything,' but immediately saw open space and (went), 'Cartwheel.''' The 2022 Worlds, where she won bronze, had been Liu's final competition before a retirement that seemed permanent when she announced it. She then spent one season hanging with friends near her Oakland, Calif., home. She enrolled at UCLA the next. She travelled. Suddenly, a ski trip rekindled her desire to do a sport, and it led her back to a rink after 18 months of not putting on skates. People told her she was crazy to retire at what should have been the peak of her career. Her once and current coach, Phillip DiGuglielmo, told her she was crazy to try to come back when she first broached the idea with him. It was a sign of her growing maturity that Liu took control of her future after years of simply doing what others expected her to do. Her goal would be making another Olympic team. 'I wouldn't be here if I didn't decide to retire for a little bit,' Liu said. 'I'm glad I listened to myself.' She returned to competition last fall, improving incrementally, recapturing the skills that had at age 13 made her in 2019 the youngest U.S. champion in history, adding to it the élan and sophistication of a young woman. She made the U.S. world team by finishing a close second to Glenn at January's U.S. Championships. 'This isn't going to be my best season,' Liu said. 'This is definitely gonna be the starter season for me.' Yet her performance in the short program was that of a polished skater, one who never had skated better in either of her careers than she did Wednesday. The audience's reaction reminded her of how special her sport can be. 'I just love the feeling towards the end of the program, when you hear the crowd and you see them,' she said. 'You can't find that feeling like anywhere else. It's really cool.' It's what you can get with fire on ice. Philip Hersh is a special contributor to He has covered figure skating at the last 12 Winter Olympics. Max Naumov 'We Must Fight.' Figure Skater Max Naumov Hears his Father's Words and Carries On Max Naumov reflects on his final moments with his parents, and their legacy, two months after their plane crashed over Washington, D.C.
NBC Sports
26-03-2025
- Sport
- NBC Sports
Alysa Liu finds the joy — and the lead — at World Figure Skating Championships
BOSTON – In her first figure skating career, the one she ended with a retirement three years ago at age 16, Alysa Liu won national titles, made history as the youngest this and the youngest that, did landmark jumps for a U.S. woman, competed in the Olympics and won a world championships bronze medal. The way Liu describes all that now, it was a pretty joyless experience. She didn't like to practice. That meant she rarely went into a competition as prepared as she needed to be. That — and injuries — made her performances erratic. 'It was a job,' she said. FIGURE SKATING WORLDS: Results | Broadcast Schedule Her unexpected return this season, on her own terms, has been so enjoyable that Liu literally turned a cartwheel on the entry walkway before taking the ice for Wednesday afternoon's short program at the 2025 World Championships. The way she skated, it would not have been surprising if Liu turned multiple cartwheels on the ice after a performance that not only brought the TD Garden crowd to its feet but put her in first place going into Friday night's free skate. 'It is so much more fun this time,' Liu said. 'I really don't think I wanted to do any competitions before, but now I really do want to.' With 74.58 points, her highest short program score in international competition, Liu leads Japan's Mone Chiba by 1.14 points and U.S. teammate Isabeau Levito, the reigning world silver medalist, by 1.25. U.S. champion Amber Glenn, a title favorite, fought back from a fall on her opening element, a triple Axel. The big mistake left Glenn ninth, but just 5.68 points from third. Three-time defending champion Kaori Sakamoto of Japan made lesser errors on her jump combination, footwork sequence and a spin. They left her fifth, 2.30 from third and 3.55 from first. It was a top three few would have foreseen. Chiba, seventh at her first worlds appearance last year, was sixth at last month's Four Continents Championships. Levito had been sidelined by a foot injury from last fall until late February, when her comeback performance at a lesser event in Italy was both cautiously restrained and decidedly underwhelming. 'That injury traumatized me a little bit,' Levito said. 'I would be in constant fear I was going to do something to make it hurt again.' Not since Gracie Gold in 2016, also in Boston, had a U.S. woman led worlds after the short program. That was near the beginning of an eight-year period when Russians came to utterly dominate women's singles on both junior and senior levels. Russians have been barred from international figure skating competition since their country's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine just after the 2022 Olympics. The International Skating Union has decided to allow one Russian entry per discipline next season, including at the Winter Olympics. To the question of whether worlds would be more interesting with the Russians, Liu answered, 'Maybe. I think competitions are more fun, the more people you can include.' Skating to Laufey's 'Promise,' music that describes an off-and-on love relationship that mirrors her bond with figure skating, Liu flowed flawlessly through the 2 minutes, 50 seconds, executing the seven elements with utter command. 'Without the music, the moving is just not the same,' Liu said. 'You have to pick the right piece for yourself.' Ironically, the melancholy mood of the music does not match Liu's unabashed new enthusiasm for her sport, the attitude that led her to express herself with the cartwheel. 'I was trying to think, 'What am I gonna do?'' Liu said. 'I got to that moment and I was like, 'You haven't thought of anything,' but immediately saw open space and (went), 'Cartwheel.''' The 2022 Worlds, where she won bronze, had been Liu's final competition before a retirement that seemed permanent when she announced it. She then spent one season hanging with friends near her Oakland, Calif., home. She enrolled at UCLA the next. She travelled. Suddenly, a ski trip rekindled her desire to do a sport, and it led her back to a rink after 18 months of not putting on skates. People told her she was crazy to retire at what should have been the peak of her career. Her once and current coach, Phillip DiGuglielmo, told her she was crazy to try to come back when she first broached the idea with him. It was a sign of her growing maturity that Liu took control of her future after years of simply doing what others expected her to do. Her goal would be making another Olympic team. 'I wouldn't be here if I didn't decide to retire for a little bit,' Liu said. 'I'm glad I listened to myself.' She returned to competition last fall, improving incrementally, recapturing the skills that had at age 13 made her in 2019 the youngest U.S. champion in history, adding to it the élan and sophistication of a young woman. She made the U.S. world team by finishing a close second to Glenn at January's U.S. Championships. 'This isn't going to be my best season,' Liu said. 'This is definitely gonna be the starter season for me.' Yet her performance in the short program was that of a polished skater, one who never had skated better in either of her careers than she did Wednesday. The audience's reaction reminded her of how special her sport can be. 'I just love the feeling towards the end of the program, when you hear the crowd and you see them,' she said. 'You can't find that feeling like anywhere else. It's really cool.' It's what you can get with fire on ice. Philip Hersh is a special contributor to He has covered figure skating at the last 12 Winter Olympics. Tim Layden, Alysa Liu tells Andrea Joyce why her state of mind seems to work for her during competition, and despite leading ahead of the free skate, says nothing changes and the goals remain the same.
NBC Sports
25-03-2025
- Sport
- NBC Sports
Isabeau Levito back from injury at figure skating worlds, recalling a perfect moment
Isabeau Levito still draws a beaming smile when asked about the 2024 World Championships, even though more recent months have been some of the most difficult of her figure skating career. Levito, who between the ages of 13 and 15 won U.S. junior, world junior and U.S. senior titles, took silver at last March's senior worlds in Montreal, three weeks after her 17th birthday. She matched the best U.S. women's finish at worlds since 2006 (when Kimmie Meissner won). Levito stepped on the Bell Centre ice for that free skate 'overwhelmed and stressed.' When she finished her clutch four-minute program, she had an eye-popping look of astonishment. Nick Zaccardi, That all belied the confidence she developed in the prior two months, since falling three times in her 2024 U.S. Championships free skate (she ended up third in defense of her 2023 national title). 'I really locked into my training like a machine,' she said last week. 'I just drilled into it, and then by the time I got to worlds, everything was like breathing to me. My programs were just like tracing the back of my hand.' Levito placed the silver medal on a shoulder-level shelf on her New Jersey bedroom wall. 'You could just see it all the time,' she said. 'It was always looking at you.' This week's World Championships in Boston will mark the first time she'll skate injury-free in a top-level competition since last year's worlds. 'I'm not going into this worlds thinking I have to podium. I have to be like last year. I have to do better,' Levito said. 'I barely have been able to skate this season, barely been able to compete this season. So I'm just glad that I'm competing again and that I'm in shape again.' She began feeling right foot pain in practices leading up to last October's Skate America, the first event of the fall Grand Prix Series. She skated through it to place third, then underwent an MRI and learned it was a bone injury. A stress reaction. She withdrew from her second Grand Prix event in November. In all, Levito spent most of three months off the ice and some of it in a boot. She would take three weeks off, try to come back and have to stop again. The cycle repeated. She filled the time with pre-calculus, psychology, economics and chemistry, working on her senior year of online schoolwork. It was the longest she had ever been sidelined by injury, 'and the hardest to come back from,' she said. Levito withdrew one week before January's U.S. Championships. Then the week of nationals, she was able to do a single Lutz without pain. A U.S. Figure Skating committee put her on the three-woman team for worlds, pending she show readiness closer to the competition. So Levito flew to Milan — her mother's hometown and where her grandmother still lives — and competed in the 2026 Olympic test event from Feb. 19-20. Levito estimated she skated 'at 50%" there. She had done just one free skate run-through in practice before performing it in front of an audience and judges in Italy. Still, Levito got the job done with her runner-up finish, showing enough progress with her triple jumps to secure her spot in Boston. 'Especially my free program, I was very fatigued from the get-go,' she said. 'Some of my friends from Bergamo that were in the stands were like, 'Girl, you were fighting from start to finish. We saw you fighting.' 'If I didn't know myself so well, I would have been nervous, like, oh my god, am I going to land the triples in the second half? Because it's the free program, and I haven't run it many times. But knowing myself, I would never let that happen. Never let myself go down in competition like that because I'm tired.' Levito started feeling like herself again two weeks ago. Last Tuesday, she said her coaches would probably assess her readiness at 85%. 'She's looking OK. She's looking good right now,' Yulia Kuznetsova, her coach since age 4, said last Thursday. 'I don't want to make any predictions or any promises because Isabeau did miss three months of skating.' Levito's silver medal from 2024 is no longer on the shelf. She — and the medal — moved to a new room in her house. 'Sometimes I try to think of what I was thinking before that (2024 Worlds) free program,' she said. 'I have no idea. I just felt like I wasn't even thinking the whole program. But before I knew it, it was done, and I had done it so well, and it was just completely because of the training. 'It just felt so right, and it was just such a high moment in my life. It was so perfect.'
