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"Queen" Kim Yu-na's wall that she couldn't get over... 16 years ago, 228 points were amazing. [Milano Olympics]
Alyssa Liu (21, USA) has emerged as the figure skating empress of the 2026 Milan/Cortina D'Ampezzo Winter Olympics. His impeccable performance drew applause.
Rio scored 150.20 points with 77.74 technical points (TES) and 72.46 artistic points (PCS) in the figure skating women's single free skate at the Milan Ice Skating Arena in Italy on the 20th (Korea time).
Adding to the short program score (76.59), Rio's final score of 226.79 derailed Japan's plan to sweep the gold and silver coins. Sakamoto Kaori (224.90 points) fell to silver, Nakai Ami (219.16 points) won bronze, and Chiba Monet (217.88 points) fell to fourth place.
Japan's wishes were not for nothing. Nakai wrote personal best (78.71 points) in the short, Sakamoto (77.23 points) came in second, and Chiba (74.00 points) also came in fourth, which seemed like a possible scenario.
However, Liu's momentum was enormous. Rio, who started acting to "MacArthur Park Suite," seemed to enjoy the Olympic stage more than anyone else.
I started my first task with triple flip and performed the triple Lutz-triple toe loop combination perfectly. It was followed by triple salco, change foot combination spin, and triple loop, followed by flying camel spin in the first half.
Perfect performance was achieved with Tripplerutz-Double Axel-Double Torup Sequence Jump, Triple Flip-Double Torup Combination Jump, Double Axel, Step Sequence, Correo Sequence, and Rayback Spin.
It was a perfect performance, and Sakamoto pointed to Rio even before the score was announced, and he seemed to be already sure of the winner, and when the score was announced, he hugged Rio and expressed his sincere congratulations.
It is even more surprising because it was achieved after returning from announcing his retirement due to burnout due to injuries at a young age in 2022. He became more able to enjoy skating and made viewers smile with his enjoying attitude throughout the day.
Nevertheless, it fell short of Kim Yu-na's score 16 years ago. At the 2010 Vancouver event, Kim set a new world record with 228.56 points. The gap between second and third place reached 23.06 points. When rival Mao Asada of Japan focused on triple axel, Kim responded with a cheerful jump that was standard yet high and took a long time to jump, and even the judges were ecstatic with her fantastic expression.
Kim, who started off with short world records with 44.70 points in TES, 33.80 points in PCS, and 78.50 points in short program, became the first female player to break 220 points in history by setting new world records with 78.30 points in TES in free program, 71.76 points in PCS, and 150.06 points again. The performance was so different that the composition score alone exceeded 70 points. This record was maintained until he broke the record again at the 2013 World Championships.
At the time, NBC caster Tom Hammond said, "The ceremony is over. Long live Her Majesty!(The coronation is complete. Long live the Queen!)", which turned the figure skating world upside down.
It is even more surprising considering that the scoring system has been reorganized since Kim Yu-na retired, resulting in score inflation. Alina Zagitova scored 239.57 points in Pyeongchang in 2018 and Anna Sherbakova scored 255.95 points in Beijing in 2022, which is why Kim Yu-na's name is still not missing if one of the first figures to come to mind in the figure skating world.
Over time, the level of skill has improved a lot, but it is still hard to find a player who can play as "perfect" as Kim Yu-na. The quality of the jump is also the same. Above all, the expressive power that Kim Yu-na valued so much is hard to compare. Some critics in the figure skating world say that athletes focus only on skills, but the more they do, the more Kim Yu-na's value is re-examined.
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*This content was translated by AI.






