Every four years, like clockwork, everyone becomes obsessed with the Winter Olympics. Insanely impressive physical feats dominate our TikTok feeds for a couple weeks, but one specifically stands above all: figure skating. So, here’s a comprehensive guide to understanding (and participating in) the figure skating craze.

There are five different areas of figure skating competition: women’s singles, men’s singles, ice dance, pairs, and the team event. Women’s and men’s singles, as well as pairs, mainly focus on technical mastery and jumps, whereas ice dance features more dance-like characteristics and complex maneuvers. The team competition is based on the total scores of countries’ skaters across all four disciplines.

This year, USA women’s singles features a stacked lineup of skaters: Isabeau Levito (18), Alyssa Liu (19), and Amber Glen (26), who call themselves the “Blade Angels”. Given the Russian ban from the Olympics over past Olympic doping scandals, Japanese, American, and Korean figure skaters compose the majority of contenders for the podium.

American skater Ilia Malinin (21), commonly referred to as the “quad god”,  is regarded as the clear contender for the gold medal.  He was the first man to land a quadruple jump in competition, and has won two consecutive world titles and four consecutive national titles. Other members of the US figure skating team Maxim Naumov and Andrew Torgashev are also contenders for the podium. 

The USA pairs skating team includes Ellie Kam with Danny O’Shea and Emily Chan with Spencer Akira Howe. The ice dance pairs include Madison Chock with Evan Bates, who are three time world champions; Emilea Zingas with Vadym Kolesnik; and Christina Carreira with Anthony Ponomarenko. 

When singles figure skating is broadcasted, a score comes up on the screen after each jump and spin combo. One number is a base value, which is given based on the difficulty of the jumps and spins. 

There are two categories of spins: toe jumps, which start on the front of the black, and edge jumps, which start on the edge of the blade. Toe jumps include the toe loop, flip, and lutz. Edge jumps include salchow, loop, and axel. While these are very hard to differentiate to the untrained eye, they have minor differences in take off, spinning, and landing. Spins are easier to differentiate: an upright spin is when a skater is upright while rotating, a sit spin is when the skater is close to the ice with one knee bent and the other extended, and a camel spin is when the skater’s free leg is held backwards with one knee above hip level. After the base score, an execution score is added, which ranges from -5 to +5. This overall score is their technical score. 

Then a program component score is added which ranges from 0.25 to 10 in five different categories to create a total score. The scores for their free skate and short program are added to determine their final ranking.

So, get off your couch and stop watching figure skating on your couch, drive over to the C&O Canal, put on your skates, and get to skating and jumping. Because you never know, the canal could be your pathway to Olympic fame! •