Ilia Malinin opens Olympic season with 40-point blowout at Grand Prix de France | Figure skating
Ilia Malinin started his Olympic season in devastating form, winning the French Grand Prix by an extraordinary margin of 40 points to underline his dominance of men’s figure skating.
The 20-year-old American, nicknamed the God of the Quad, landed five quadruple jumps during his free program on Sunday in Angers to finish with 321.00 points in total – well ahead of three-time reigning French champion Adam Siao Him Fa with 280.95. Georgian Nika Egadze finished third with 259.41.
Slight under-rotation on a quad was the only obvious flaw, but Malinin felt there was still a lot of work to be done.
“I think I’m going to improve a lot more,” he said. “I think I can take a lot away from this competition. It was so much fun and I’m really looking forward to next season.”
This extended Malinin’s unbeaten run to almost two years since his last defeat, at the same event in 2023. Remarkably, he did not need to attempt his quadruple axel, a jump that only he has successfully completed in competition.
The French Grand Prix, the first of six events leading to the December final, provides an initial test for the contenders before the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics in February.
The home crowd had reason to celebrate when Olympic ice dancing champion Guillaume Cizeron and his new partner Laurence Fournier Beaudry produced a captivating free dance to win gold in their first international competition together.
Third after the rhythm dance despite a fall at the end of the program, they rose to victory thanks to a great performance to the soundtrack of The Whale, with a score of 133.02 in free and 211.02 in total, 0.8 points ahead of the British Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson (210.24).
“It’s really comforting to be home with this incredible crowd and this incredible partner,” Cizeron said. “We were really looking forward to making our debut here and it couldn’t have gone better.”
“There is always apprehension, of course,” he added. “But I think that with everyone’s experience and energy, we manage to let go and enter into our characters and the magic of the moment.”
