Ilia Malinin falters in free skate as ‘Quad God’ stunningly misses Olympic medal entirely

MILAN — The Quad God is only human. 

Unable to execute four of the seven planned quad jumps in his free skate routine, American Ilia Malinin fell off the podium entirely into eighth place as Kazakhstan’s Mikhail Shaidorov captured gold with a score of 198.64 on Friday night at Milan Ice Skating Arena. 

The immense disappointment dripped off of Malinin’s face. The disbelief that he had fallen on two of his jumps. 

Ilia Malinin reacts during the men’s free skate program in figure skating at the 2026 Winter Olympics. AP

And when he attempted the most difficult jump in the sport — the quadruple axel — Malinin could only execute a single.