Ilia Malinin Stuns The World With Two Falls In Olympic Final, Quad Axel Dream Collapses And Gold Favorite Finishes Eighth In Heartbreaking Meltdown

Ilia Malinin shocked with two falls and several failed elements during the men’s figure skating final at the 2026 Winter Olympics.

The 21-year-old figure skater finished eighth in men’s figure skating on Friday, Feb. 13, shocking the crowd at the Milano Ice Skating Arena as he struggled through his free skate program and was holding back tears as he stepped off the ice.

“I blew it,” he said in an interview with NBC just after his score of 156.33 in the free skate, and 264.49 overall, was announced. “Honestly, that was the first thing that came to my mind. I have no words, honestly.”

Malinin started with a quadruple flip, which he executed, but didn’t complete his famed quadruple axel, instead doing a single axel. His next move, a quadruple lutz, was clean, but his quadruple loop turned into a double loop. He fell twice from there, and did his best to finish out the four-minute program, throwing in a backflip at the end.

Malinin — self-nicknamed the “Quad God” — is the only figure skater in history to successfully land a quadruple axel in competition, which he did cleanly for the first time at the U.S. International Figure Skating Classic in Sept. 2022 and has repeated multiple times since. He was expected to make history with the move on Friday, but nerves got the best of him.

“I think it was definitely mental,” he told NBC afterwards, and when asked if the Olympics stage caused him to struggle, he agreed, saying, “It’s not like any other competition.”

Malinin, who was already an Olympic gold medalist after he helped Team USA secure a team event gold on Sunday, came into the night in first place, after earning a score of 108.16 in the men’s short program on Tuesday.

Coming into his skate, it was Malinin’s to lose, with the two previous skaters and his biggest rivals both falling during their programs. But with Malinin’s errors, a jubilant Kazakhstan’s Mikhail Shaidorov won gold, his country’s first-ever first place finish in Olympic figure skating.

Fans have been waiting all Olympics for Malinin to bring out the quadruple axel, which two-time Olympic skater and NBC commentator Johnny Weir previously told PEOPLE was groundbreaking.

“It’s rare in our sport for something to completely shock and awe, and the quad axel does that,” Weir said. “Ilia is the figure skating version of the first man on the moon.”

“The skill, talent and bravery to even attempt the quad axel is outrageous, let alone to perform it under the stress of competition,” Weir added.