Madison Chock, Evan Bates and everything you need to know about ice skating

What this episode is about

The discussion revolves around the heated rivalries and standout performances in individual events of the Winter Olympic figure skating competition, highlighting Team USA's Madison Chock and Evan Bates alongside Ilia Malinin's historic backflip. The analysis also includes insights into the technical demands of figure skating and a recap of the U.S. women's hockey team's commanding win, setting the stage for upcoming matchups and personal challenges faced by athletes.

Key takeaways

• Ilia Malinin's backflip: a 50-year Olympic first and a reminder that skating is a high-stakes art form.
• Chock and Bates exemplify Olympic love—where marriage meets competition, turning pressure into poetry on ice.
• US women's hockey crushes Switzerland 5-0, proving they’re not just good; they’re gold medal threats.
• Nineties nostalgia shines in ice dance—a retro playlist and sequins elevate intensity, bringing back the magic.
• Cizone and Bodri's partnership faces scrutiny, showing that every athlete's journey often hides deeper personal drama.

Who speaks in this episode?

• Ime Martinez (Host) · 7 min speaking
• Rachel Trezman (Guest) · 6 min speaking
• Josh Sullivan (Guest) · 6 min speaking
• Emily Kuang (Guest) · 5 min speaking

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 5:00: Madison Chalk, Guom Cizeron, Laurence Fornier Bodri, Ilia Malinin
2. 5:00 – 10:00: Ilia Malinin, Khloe Kim, Maddie Schaffer
3. 10:00 – 15:00: Khloe Kim, Mattie Mastro, Fay Telen, Nick Baumgartner
4. 15:00 – 20:00: Ilia Malinin, Emily Kuang, Alons's Travel Insurance
5. 20:00 – 22:51: Emily Kuang

Notable quotes from "Madison Chock, Evan Bates and everything you need to know about ice skating"

• Boy bands, and a leaderboard separated by less than half a point. US favorites and reigning world champs Madison Shock and Evan Bates skated strong but finished the night just…

  about Madison Chalk · at 1:37

• They're facing controversy because of their former partners. In Cisone's case, his former partner just published a tell- all book accusing him of controlling behavior, which he denies.

  about Guom Cizeron · at 3:35

• Particular women's halfpipe is what most Americans are going to be the most interested in. I think Khloe Kim, she's one of the best halfpipe riders of all time. soon to be the…

  about Khloe Kim · at 9:17

• Also specialized in halfpipe and so that allows her to really like progress the discipline even more. behind her we have Mattie Mastro. This is going to be Mattiey's third…

  about Mattie Mastro · at 10:52

• Someone, you need to get airborne. You need to jump up in the air and pass over someone. A lot of eyes are going to be on Nick Bombgartner. He's in his 40s. I won't do him a…

  about Nick Baumgartner · at 13:23

• They call him the quad god, and that's because team USA men's figure skater Ilia Molinin can do something on skates that no one has done in competition before. four and a half…

  about Ilia Malinin · at 16:19

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Ilia Malinin — Person · Referenced athlete (men's figure skating) · 3 mentions · first at 0:11
  Central example in the men’s event preview and the physics segment—highlighted for backflips and ultra-high-rotation quad jumping.
• Khloe Kim — Person · Referenced athlete (women's snowboard halfpipe) · 4 mentions · first at 9:20
  Positioned as the headline U.S. women’s halfpipe rider and favorite for a third straight Olympic gold; discussed with injury context and competitive field.
• Emily Kuang — Person · Main guest (science explainer) · 2 mentions · first at 16:39
  Leads the technical explanation of figure skating physics (torque, angular momentum, moment of inertia) and uses Malinin’s jumps as the anchor example.
  Podcast. All right, Emily, you host NPR Shortwave Podcast, the science podcast. So, what are the physics behind the quad jump?
• Madison Chalk — Person · Referenced athlete (ice dance) · 2 mentions · first at 1:41
  Featured as part of the leading U.S. ice dance team; discussed for competitive standing, chemistry, and being married to her partner.
• Laurence Fornier Bodri — Person · Referenced athlete (ice dance competitor) · 2 mentions · first at 1:47
  Named as the other half of the French pair challenging the U.S. leaders; discussed as a newer partnership with controversy tied to a former partner’s ban/allegations.
  And Evan Bates skated strong but finished the night just behind the French team trailing by about 4/10en of a point. The Americans are firmly in reach of the podium but things…
• Guom Cizeron — Person · Referenced athlete (ice dance competitor) · 2 mentions · first at 3:17
  Named as part of the French ice dance pair leading/competing closely with Chock/Bates; discussed with controversy involving a former partner’s allegations.
• Maddie Schaffer — Person · Referenced athlete (women's snowboard halfpipe) · 1 mention · first at 9:37
  Highlighted as a comeback story within the strong U.S. halfpipe pipeline—burnout, quitting, trying plumbing/trades, then returning to compete at her first Games.
  These Olympics. and the team is pretty stacked behind her. But, one particular story I'm interested is the story of Maddie Schaffer. Maddie was a child prodigy. She was on a US…
• Mattie Mastro — Person · Referenced athlete (women's snowboard halfpipe) · 1 mention · first at 10:57
  Presented as a key U.S. contender behind Khloe Kim—third Olympics, highly competitive, and discussed for mindset changes to improve performance.
• Lindsay Vonn — Person · Referenced athlete (alpine skiing) · 1 mention · first at 1:12
  Mentioned in a news update about an Instagram post after a crash ending her Olympic comeback and requiring multiple surgeries.
  Olympic comeback. Now, posting on Instagram, the 41-year-old says that she'll need multiple surgeries after suffering a complex fracture to her left leg. Still, she says she…
• Nick Baumgartner — Person · Referenced athlete (snowboard cross) · 1 mention · first at 13:26
  Mentioned as a notable older competitor (in his 40s) drawing attention in snowboard cross, including the mixed/combined event context.
• Fay Telen — Person · Referenced athlete (snowboard cross) · 1 mention · first at 13:53
  Discussed as a veteran competitor at her fifth Games, returning with motivation tied to family/role-modeling and seeking a first medal.
  Child. And so, she won't be at the Olympics, but FA, Fay Telen, formerly known as Fagini. She is going to be at her fifth games as well. And she's looking for her first medal.…

Sponsors

• Alons's Travel Insurance — Product · Sponsor · 1 mention · first at 16:07
  Sponsor of the podcast segment, providing travel insurance for winter sports and adventures.
  Thanks for having me. Support for Upfirst Winter Games comes from NPR sponsor Alons's Travel Insurance. Get ready to give ordinary the cold shoulder with protection for…

Full transcript with timestamps

0:00 After Team USA figure skating captured gold, the focus now turns to heated rivalries in the individual events. Who is peing at the right moment and who is holding back their biggest moves from Metal Knight?

0:11 Of course, Ilia Malinin from the US. He's got everybody talking with his back flips. A note on that, he is the first person to legally land a backflip at the Olympics in five decades. But he's not the only one to have ever done it.

0:22 Plus, NPR science team is here to break down what makes figure skating one of the most technical sports of the games. and I get a lesson of my own.

0:30 So, if I were to spin in this chair, right, I'm going to Woo! I'm making rotational momentum. Uh, and I'm like the Earth spinning around its access to

0:38 and the US women's snowboarding pipeline is stacked. We have the names to watch for as competition gets underway. I'm Martinez and this is Up First, Winter Games. It's Tuesday, February 10th, and here's what you need to know. The US women's hockey team continues to shut out the competition, beating Switzerland Monday 5- nothing. Five different Americans scored in the win. Next, they'll face Canada, which could be an early preview of the gold medal game. We're hearing from Lindsey Vaughn now for the first time since that crash that ended her Olympic comeback. Now, posting on Instagram, the 41-year-old says that she'll need multiple surgeries after suffering a complex fracture to her left leg. Still, she says she has no regrets and that quote, "Standing at the starting gate was an incredible feeling that I will never forget." It was a razor thin start to the Olympic ice dance. Round one of the individual

1:32 competition turned into a highstakes '90s throwback complete with sequins, boy bands, and a leaderboard separated by less than half a point. US favorites and reigning world champs Madison Shock and Evan Bates skated strong but finished the night just behind the French team trailing by about 4/10en of a point. The Americans are firmly in reach of the podium but things are shaping up for an epic battle on the ice Wednesday. NPR's Rachel Trezman has been watching it all. So Rachel, tell us about Chock and Bates.

2:04 Sure. So, you've probably heard a lot about them already. Not just because they're the seventime reigning US champions, but because they're married in real life. They have amazing chemistry on the ice, off the ice, amazing outfits that Chalk makes herself. This is their fourth Olympics together, but they haven't won an individual ice dance medal yet. They came in fourth just off the podium in Beijing. So, that's what everyone is hoping to see this year. It's one of the most amazing dynamics to me, Rachel, when a couple at this level in sports are also like, you know, competing and married. I mean, where where do they draw the line? There has to be a line at some point, right? When a married couple is competing in a sporting event.

2:41 Yeah. Ice dance also, for the record is a lot of couples and siblings, which is a very interesting dynamic. But I had the same question for Chalk and Bates and I actually asked them back at a media event in October and they just talked about how it really makes their partnership stronger in both places. They seem to be very happy with each other on and off the ice, so I have to believe them.

2:59 Good. I mean, they're successful, right? So, maybe both things are successful. Now, tell us about how they did.

3:04 They did really well. They finished the night. They were the last skaters of the night. They finished really strong. They had a super fun, sultry program set to Lenny Kravitz. We'll get into that, but they finished just a hair of a point behind their main competition or what many are seeing as their main competitors, which are this French pairing of Guom Scizeron and Laurance Fornier Bodri.

3:23 So, tell us about them. What what what's the competition like? Sure. So, Bodri and Cizone, and pardon my French, are a very interesting pairing because they've only been together for a year and yet they still managed to make it to the Olympics. Um, they're facing controversy because of their former partners. In Cisone's case, his former partner just published a tell- all book accusing him of controlling behavior, which he denies. He's calling that a smear campaign. And in Bodri's case, her former ice dance partner um is banned from the sport right now because of allegations of sexual malreatment which he denies and is fighting.

3:54 And last night there was a theme to the whole event. Last night there was a theme. So actually every year in rhythm dance, which is one of the ice dance competitions, there is a musical theme. And this year I think we really lucked out. The theme was music from the 1990s. So the playlist was awesome. The outfits were awesome. There was a lot of crimped hair. I would say more sequins than usual or at least in different places. Patterns, denim. Um, it was awesome. I heard at least two George Michael songs, a lot of Backstreet Boys, Madonna. Um, the crowd was really loving it, too.

4:24 Yeah. You know what I was thinking? You know, if I ever had to do something like this, what song would I choose? If it had to be a '90s song, it' be PM Dawn. I Die Without You because I can completely see myself, you know, moving with the music, you know, putting my arms up and down, and then when the beat starts, then I can kind of get into the athleticism part of the whole thing. I would love to see that.

4:42 I know I put that mental picture in your head, Rachel. I'm sorry for that. I'm just I wish there was a way that we could illustrate it for everyone, but but I think the crowd would go wild for that. E

4:51 yeah, the things I lack though, talent, ability, athleticis. So, yeah, I couldn't I couldn't do it if I tried. Now, so tell us what the difference is between ice dancing and pairs.

4:59 Sure. I learned this myself pretty recently. So, ice dance, think of it more as ballroom dancing. It's really not about being thrown in the air or spinning around as many times as possible. It's much more about how in sync you are with the music and with your partner. So, one of the big moves that you'll hear commentators talking about um are twizzles. That's sort of like when you travel across the rank side by side, spinning in total unison or ideally in total unison with your partner. Um pairs, which is a different discipline, is more of the like acrobatics that you're thinking of when the guy is lifting the girl overhead on just one arm or holding her hand while she spins around on the ice really, really close to it. that I learned is called a death spiral. Um, so you all will get to see that when the pairs competitions start. That's this weekend.

5:43 If they could ever combine like that death spiral with say RuPaul and you know supermodel and then a death drop all that. Can you imagine if that was all combined into one performance?

5:56 The names I the names are all really interesting. I I want to do a little more research into where they come from because a lot of figure skating moves are named after people and then there's the death spiral. So

6:07 I know. Yeah. A lot of Yeah. Well, danger, right? Because if they fall, all of a sudden, you know, there's a lot of danger attached to it. So tell us about what's coming up with the men tonight.

6:14 Right. So we've already seen some of the men take the ice in the team event, including of course Ilia Malinin from the US. He's got everybody talking with his back flips. Um, a note on that, he is the first person to legally land a backflip at the Olympics in five decades, but he's not the only one to have ever done it. Um, so you can read more about that in my newsletter or online. Um, we've seen Ilia perform. There are a bunch of other great skaters, I think 29 of them in the short program that we can look out for. Um, so of course there are other Americans, Max Namov and Andrew Toresev. There are really incredible Japanese skaters, including Yuma Kagayyama, who actually placed ahead of Malinin in the first day of the team event. Um, some of the others that I'm really excited to see are Kevin Amos of France. He has a Lady Gaga routine. Um, of course, I think everyone's going to be really happy to

7:03 see the Spanish skater who has risen to fame with Minion Gate. He's going to finally get to do his Despicable Me program. Um, and then another name that I think should be on people's radar is Matteo Ritzi. He performed in the team event this weekend and he helped Italy win bronze. And his routine was so dynamic that the crowd was honestly losing their minds before he even finished. Really excited to see him on home ice and I think he'll be fun to watch even on TV.

7:28 Now Rachel, before uh you go, I want to ask you about a Canadian figure skater, Matteline. She's a student and she had homework to do at the Olympics.

7:38 Relatable. Um she did have homework to do. I think she didn't realize the deadline was like going to fall right on top of this other huge deadline in her life. And so she emailed her professor for an extension and attached proof of her inclusion in the Olympic roster um as evidence that she wasn't just, you know, faking it, trying to get out of the uh get out of the assignment.

7:58 Did she get the extension? She did. And I think she for sure won over a new fan cuz her professor has been posting online in support and she's been reposting. Um I think it worked out pretty well for her. Can you imagine, Rachel? The professor said, "Sorry, nothing I can do. A deadline's a deadline."

8:15 I think when you have the the PDF attachment of your name on the Olympic list, um, they have they have to give you at least a day, right?

8:22 At least, right? And Canadians are nice. Of course, you would have done it. That's NPR's Rachel Trezman. Uh, and Rachel, thank you very much uh for uh for this information.

8:31 Of course. Nice talking to you. As a snowboarding halfpipe kicks off, the US women's team looks exceptionally strong. And here to tell us what and who to look for is Josh Sullivan of NPR member station WUNC in North Carolina. Josh, I see a snowboard right behind you. That can't be a coincidence. I think we got the right person for this conversation.

8:51 Yeah, thank you so much for having me. A uh this is, you know, the most important thing uh in my life a lot of days of the year and every four years it's kind of my own personal Super Bowl when everyone else decides decides to tune in. So, thanks for having me. Excited to talk about it.

9:04 Yeah, absolutely. So tell us a little bit about uh this event in the Olympics and and just yeah give us a primer on what people can expect to see.

9:11 Definitely. So there's a bunch of different disciplines uh slope style, border cross, uh but halfpipe and in particular women's halfpipe is what most Americans are going to be the most interested in. I think Khloe Kim, she's one of the best halfpipe riders of all time. Uh soon to be the best halfpipe rider of all time. She's trying to win her third straight gold medal uh in these Olympics. Um, and you know, the team is pretty stacked behind her. But, uh, one particular story I'm interested is the story of Maddie Schaffer. Uh, Maddie was a child prodigy. She was on a US team uh, when she was younger, got really burned out, and quit. Quit the team at the age of 20. Tried plumbing.

9:49 Uh, decided to get into the trades. That didn't really work out. Snowboarding threw her back in. And now she's at her first game. She's in Italy right now, and she's going to try and get on that podium.

9:57 She tried plumbing, which actually makes sense if her event is the halfpipe, right? I mean, that joke's been made a few times before.

10:04 Good. Much better than me that way. I just did it. I think she acknowledges people love that part of the story. The plumbing era of her life was very short, very brief.

10:14 Uh, but she needed something to do when she moved back home to Steamboat Springs, Colorado. She didn't have a college education. She didn't really think about a career path ahead of her. She decided to give the trades a try. Um, and then she decided to coach uh some youth riders at Steamboat Resort for a free season pass. uh and she got roped all the way back in and that's kind of uh the short of how she ended up here today.

10:34 All right. Nice. So, tell us a little bit more about some of her teammates that we're going to be seeing.

10:38 Yeah. So, uh this is a really tough team to make. You know, we have Khloe Kim right at the top. She's the best uh Olympic halfpipe rider for women ever. Um she has been like adding tricks to her arsenal year after year and she's also specialized in halfpipe and so that allows her to really like progress the discipline even more. Uh behind her we have Mattie Mastro. This is going to be Mattiey's third Olympics. Um, she hasn't yet meddled, but she's definitely a favorite. Uh, she's been really, really competitive. She won an uh fist crystal globe uh last year, and um really the big thing for her, I talked to her last year, and she's really switched up her mindset. She's like a really fierce competitor. You obviously have to be to be an Olympian, but she's trying to have more fun with it. She said the competitiveness of like contest snowboarding really kind of killed her drive and didn't allow her to perform at

11:25 her best in previous contests. Um, so she's really switched up. She's in Italy. She's trying to have as much fun as possible. Hopefully that ends her up on the podium. Uh, and then we have B Kim. No relation to Khloe Kim. She's only 19 years old. She actually just celebrated her birthday about 2 weeks ago. Um, and you know, to make this team full of powerhouses as a 19-year-old is super impressive. Um, and I wouldn't write her off at all. She's got a good deep bag of tricks. She is recovering from a shoulder injury, but um, she's going to be really exciting to watch, too. And she's kind of the future.

11:54 All right. All right, so we've talked a lot about Team USA and they obviously do have a great team lined up. Uh, tell us about some international competitors that might make it tough for them to win gold.

12:02 Definitely. I mean, everybody in snowboarding is kind of looking toward Japan. Japan really beefed up their program in the last few years. Senotita has been a powerhouse. She's going to be pretty tough to uh to take down. Uh, Mitsuki Ono is another big name that you're going to have to watch out for. And she's from Korea. Um, she's been doing really, really well in the snow league, which is a professional halfpipe contest. Um, you know, it's going to be really hard to take down some of these other riders. Khloe is projected to kind of be at the top of the podium, but she's also coming back from a labum injury in her shoulder. Um, kind of a best case scenario if you're going to get hurt right before the games, but an injury nonetheless. So, it's going to be a battle and that definitely opens up a little bit of room for someone to sweep uh sweep in that might be a little underrated and and

12:47 kind of surprise people. All right, tell us now about snowboard cross. I love the name of this event, snowboard cross.

12:54 Totally. So, uh, think of it like motocross, right? Like dirt bikes. You're on bicycle BMX, except you're on a snowboard. Um, it's different than alpine snowboarding. You know, alpine is like bashing gates kind of you think like traditional ski racing. Snowboard crosses uh jumps bumps uh tables and it's a race downhill, four at a time usually. Um, wow. And it's really cool. It's kind of the purest. A lot of people will say it's the purest form of snowboarding because sometimes to pass someone, you need to get airborne. You need to jump up in the air and pass over someone. A lot of eyes are going to be on Nick Bombgartner. He's in his 40s. Uh I won't do him a disservice of telling you exactly how old he is, but I will say there's a huge age gap between him and the youngest person on the team.

13:37 It's also the first uh uh event that combines both men and women. Uh you'll have mixed snowboard cross and so or sorry, combined snowboard cross. So, uh, that's how he won his gold last year with teammate Lindsay Jacob Ellis. Uh, Lindsay is coming off of having, uh, a child. And so, um, she won't be at the Olympics, but FA, uh, Fay Telen, uh, formerly known as Fagini. She is going to be at her fifth games as well. And she's looking for her first medal. Um, I rode with her earlier this year and she was basically saying to come out of retirement, winning a medal would a be awesome, right? She everyone wants to win a medal. But really, she couldn't not show her children. She still had something in the tank, but kind of put it off and and decided not to go for it.

14:18 Just so she's there. She's trying to set like a really good example for her children and uh you know, hopefully along the way that ends her up on the podium as well.

14:25 Josh, if someone's in their 40s competing against 20somes, I want to know about it because they become my automatic new hero. I mean, right. It's just a tough thing to do the older you get.

14:35 Yeah. Snowboarding especially. I mean, when you slam, you slam hard and uh you know, I'm in my 30s and it hurts a lot harder when I fall as it did even 5 years ago. So, there's a lot of uh a lot of big age gaps. Uh Louis Veto, who formerly rode for Team USA, he's up there uh in age. Sorry, Lou. And he's going to be riding for team Italy this year, the home the host country. And so, uh there's going to be a few names out there that you might recognize that are just like unable to give it up and they're they're looking for Olympic glory one one more time.

15:01 Josh, you mentioned that you're in North Carolina where snowboarding uh is actually getting really popular if it not if it hasn't been already for a while. Tell us about how that happened.

15:10 Totally. Well, I think that it's been popular for a while. It's just that the rest of us are finding out about it. I moved down to North Carolina four years ago. Uh, its burgeoning snowboard scene is actually a big contributor as to why I decided to move from New England. Uh, a few people, one of who almost made the Olympic team. His name is Luke Wkelman. He was he was close. He was coming back from an injury. Um, but him and another rider called Zeb Powell really really putting the state on the map. Uh, although if you ask them, they're just kind of like furthering the the spotlight that's been shown on the state. you know, it's mountains are smaller, uh, shorter vertical, uh, vertical drop, but um, if you have to if you want to snowboard in North Carolina, you have to love it, and you have to have a really burning passion for it.

15:50 And, you know, the the scene here, it's it's shorter. Um, or excuse me, it's smaller, but it's deeper. You know, those who love it really love it, and they fully commit their their lives to it.

16:00 All right, that's WNC's Josh Sullivan. Josh, thanks a lot. Thanks for having me. Support for Upfirst Winter Games comes from NPR sponsor Alons's Travel Insurance. Get ready to give ordinary the cold shoulder with protection for adventures that give you the best kind of chills. Learn more at Alons Travel Insurance.com.

16:19 They call him the quad god, and that's because team USA men's figure skater Ilia Molinin can do something on skates that no one has done in competition before. four and a half full rotations in the air before landing on a blade barely an eighth of an inch wide. Now, some call it magic, and it may look like that, but it's actually a master class in physics. Here's our conversation with Emily Kuang, host of NPR's Shortwave Podcast. All right, Emily, you host NPR Shortwave Podcast, uh, the science podcast. So, what are the physics behind the quad jump?

16:52 Let's start with some fundamentals. The spin. Do you figure skate? Have you attempted a spin on ice? No, but when I was a boy, I would be like Linda Carter and try to spin thinking I could turn into Wonder Woman and get some superpowers.

17:03 Maybe one day that will happen. Same kind of deal. Okay. Okay. All spin is, it's a change of direction, and you need to create what's called angular momentum. Some people call it rotational momentum, and it's like related to the shape and mass of the skater and how fast they're moving about an axis. So, if I were to spin in this chair, right, I'm going to Woo! I'm making rotational momentum. Uh, and I'm like the Earth spinning around its axis, too.

17:26 Yeah. Okay. So when the earth spins on its axis, I mean that's what we're talking about. Exactly like that. That's what a skater is doing essentially.

17:32 Yes. But first they need to generate something called torque. Torque. What's torque?

17:35 Well, you have cars, I assume. Have you heard torque in that sense? Yeah. Like in car land, it's like the force required to start the engine and that rotation. In physics, it's the force required to make something rotate. And for that, you need a lever. The longer the better. So think about a wrench, right? The longer the wrench is, the easier it is to loosen the nut.

17:59 Yeah. And uh the same applies for a skater. If you watch them as they go into a spin, their leg becomes their lever. It stretches out really far, a little off to the side before the spin, and then they generate that kick, that torque, which allows them to change direction and create that rotational momentum. And to show you this, here's a clip from my queen Michelle Quan at the 1998 National Championships.

18:27 All right, let's watch. So, here she is. She goes and you see her leg. It's all the way out.

18:31 And then just the skill, the artistry. She makes it look so effortless. Watch her change directions with her other leg. See how the lever is creating the torque that allows her to spin.

18:41 Yeah. So, okay. So, does does she speed up when she brings the leg in? It's It looks like that's kind of what's going on there.

18:47 Yes. So artistic as it seems, there is physics at work. She is playing around with her moment of inertia. That just describes like the ma how the mass of a skater is distributed relative to the axis of a spin. So uh when you pull your arms out really far, your moment of inertia is really big. But as Michelle draws her arms closer to her body, her mass gets concentrated at her center and her moment of inertia shrinks.

19:13 And then that's when her spinning accelerates. You can see her pulling in and pulling out to mess with her speed and create that beautiful choreography that she's known for.

19:20 That's always the exciting part when a when a skater is doing the spin when they're out and it gets faster and faster and faster. It's just an amazing part of this whole thing.

19:27 It's and the sound of that's kind of my favorite part of the sport. So, how do they go then from spinning to jumping?

19:33 That's a whole other uh bag of chips cuz like similar similar physics are at work. You got angular momentum, you got torque, but then the skater has to like somehow turn themselves into a projectile. like they're a ball and they're the quarterback. They're like hurling themselves in the air, right? So for that, like a gymnast, they need to generate upward velocity.

19:53 Upward velocity. Whatever vertical velocity they can create with the strength of their bodies is going to decide how high and how far they jump. And the moment they're airborne, they need to get themselves into that rotating position to complete as many rotations as possible. Um, and that's where you hear like double axle.

20:10 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. those terms, what how do those terms come about?

20:13 It's like how many rotations they can go. Okay, so our friend Ilia Mullinin, the quad god,

20:18 I love that nickname. That's amazing nickname too. So, how is he doing those four and a half rotations, you ask? Um, let's watch him at the games where he made his mark. Um, the 2022 International Skating Union Grand Prix. This is

20:31 the first time. There you are. So smooth. So difficult, right? I mean, it just it's got to be. and he does five in this performance in this free skate. It's astonishing. So, you saw how he pulled his arms really tight. He made his moment of inertia as small as possible to give himself as many rotations in the air for the time he had up in the air.

20:54 And just to be clear, this is in competition, too. It's not like it's in practice where you can make mistakes and you can fall, but he actually did it. Yeah.

21:02 You he got one chance to do each of those five quads, five rotations. My goodness. or to each of those four. Uh he got one chance to do four rotations, right?

21:10 Four and a half rotations. So, how about this? Five. Is that something that's possible?

21:14 Because if he can do four and a half, I mean, what's why not five? I love the ambition that you're bringing to this question. Um you know, no skater has yet done a quintuple jump in competition. And I asked a bio and I asked a scientist who studies biomechanics, who has looked at the movement of figure skaters since grad school, Deborah King at Ithaca College about this. And she said, "Listen, unless there's some kind of rules change or some special equipment that comes along that makes skaters able to achieve extra special speed or strength on the ice, the human body has its limits. Like you can only jump so high, the width of your shoulders are the width of your shoulders. So you can only make your moment of inertia so so small and rotate as many times as is allowed in the air.

22:00 But I Yeah, but see I never when when I saw Usain Bolt run in the summer Olympics and set those records, I never thought that what he did could be possible yet he did it. So I mean

22:08 and look at what Simone Biles has done with the sport of gymnastics. And every generation with training can accomplish incredible things on just an eighth of an inch of a blade.

22:17 I hope to live long enough to see all these things all these records get broken axles. Oh, can you or how about six? Is there a word for that yet?

22:24 Uh, you're you're you're shooting too. I'm too ambitious. You're going too far. A

22:27 I'll just keep it in the present. All right. Emily Kuang is the host of NPR Shortwave podcast. Emily, thanks a lot.

22:31 Thank you so much. That's up first. Winter games for Tuesday, February 10th. I mean Martinez. We'll see you right back here Wednesday and most days during the Olympic Games. Have a great day.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Madison Chock, Evan Bates and everything you need to know about ice skating"?

Ime Martinez (Host), Rachel Trezman (Guest), Josh Sullivan (Guest), Emily Kuang (Guest).

What is "Madison Chock, Evan Bates and everything you need to know about ice skating" about?

The discussion revolves around the heated rivalries and standout performances in individual events of the Winter Olympic figure skating competition, highlighting Team USA's Madison Chock and Evan Bates alongside Ilia Malinin's historic backflip. The analysis also includes insights into the technical demands of figure skating and a recap of the U.S. women's hockey team's commanding win, setting…

What is mentioned in this NPR episode?

12 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Ilia Malinin, Khloe Kim, Emily Kuang, Madison Chalk, Laurence Fornier Bodri, Guom Cizeron. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Madison Chock, Evan Bates and everything you need to know about ice skating"?

The episode runs 23 min; the transcript is about 5,010 words in 79 timestamped sections.

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