MONTREAL — Let the skating apotheosis of Ilia Marin begin.
Why not? In four minutes Saturday night, the 19-year-old Virginian took his sport to athletic heights never seen before, rising from third place after the short program to the top of the world championship podium.
His free skate received the highest score ever. He landed an unprecedented six quad jumps cleanly, including his trademark quad axel and two quads to start the combination late in the program.
When he made his final jump pass with about 20 seconds left, the crowd rose to its feet and roared. The sound got louder and louder until it ended.
The world of figure skating: result
“It was amazing to hear the crowd go wild,” Marinin said.
When he finished speaking, Marin put his head in his hands, feeling as overwhelmed by what he had done as everyone who watched it at Bell Center. Then he fell on his back in pleasure.
“I couldn't even keep myself together. It was so emotional for me,” he said. “I'm still in shock. I still can't believe I did this. It's just unbelievable.”
After Thursday's short program, Marinin said he was full of doubts because of an injury to his left leg. He said he considered staying home.
“There was a little voice in my head that said, 'You have to keep fighting, no matter how good or bad you feel, you have to keep going,'” Marinin said. “I had to know my abilities and stick to my muscle memory.”
For the record, this was Marinin's ability: quad axel, quad lutz, quad loop, quad salchow, quad lutz-half loop-triple salchow, quad toe loop-triple toe loop, triple Lutz – triple axel sequence. Adding an excellent component score (average 9.07 points), his free skate score was 227.79 points, surpassing the record of 224.92 points set by Nathan Chen in 2019.
Marin Ning's overall score of 333.76 is second in history behind Chen's 335.30.
After the short program, where she was in third place behind Japan's Shoma Uno and Yuma Kagiyama, Marinin, who was trailing by a few points, won by herself. Kagiyama took second place with 309.65 points, while France's Adam Hsiao Him Hua made a spectacular leap from 19th place after the short program to take the bronze medal with 284.39 points.
Jason Brown of the United States finished fifth, one place short of the highest finish at the world championships. Uno, who had won the previous two world titles and the short program here, suffered a major slump and fell to fourth place.
“After the short program, I felt very strongly that this is my chance, that I'm not completely out of this situation,” Marinin said.
He didn't try the quad axel because he felt a little unwell in the short program (he had only tried it once in the short program). He wasn't convinced to try out for free until he secured a starting position.
“I definitely felt confident when I landed the quad axel,” Marinin said. “After the first four jump passes (all quads), I really felt like I could do this.”
Marin's gold medal, which came hours after Madison Chock and Evan Bates won the ice dance, was the first time a U.S. skater won two of four events since Michelle Kwan and Todd Eldridge won the singles title in 1996. He capped off the world championships by winning the event.
Olympic silver medalist Kagiyama, 20, admitted he didn't know how he could beat Marin, who skates the same way he did on Saturday.
Kagiyama said, “I don't think we can win even if we both give 100% of our strength.''
Almost three hours before the potential medal candidates took part in their free skate, one of them, Hsiao Him Hua, put in a brilliant performance that lifted him from 19th place to bronze in the short race. He also gave raspberries to sports officials.
Current European champion Hsiao Him Hua missed all three jump passes in the short program, but came back with four clean quadruples without any mistakes in the free skate.
He finished the match with a backflip, a crowd-pleasing move banned by the International Skating Union. Hsiao Him Hua, 23, has been outspoken in asking the ISU for permission to jump in order to increase the appeal of the sport to his generation. He showed it when he won the European Championship in January.
He accomplished that at the cost of a two-point deduction, but his free skate score of 206.90 still ranked him second out of 24 competitors.
“It's for fun and for the audience,” said Hsiao Him Hua. “I had nothing to lose, so I told myself, 'Go for it.'”
Since gaining attention with his first competitive quad axel in the fall of 2022, Malin has been seen as the future of men's figure skating. He won the bronze medal at last year's world championships, the gold medal at this season's Grand Prix Final, and won his second consecutive U.S. title.
Already nearing the limits of his sport, where can Marinin go from here? Five jumps? Quad and quad combination?
“As always, I'll leave it as a surprise,” Marinin said with a mischievous grin.
Philip Hirsch has covered figure skating at the past 12 Winter Olympics. NBCSports.com.
Madison Chock and Evan Bates are world champions again and are undefeated this season.
