American teenager Ilia Malinin made history, landing six quads to win the World Figure Skating Championship.
The 19-year-old athlete is known as the “quad God” and had been in third place after the short program on Thursday. However, during his free skate performance on Saturday, he impressed judges and scored 227.79 points, the highest score in the competition.
“It means so much to me,” Malinin said, per the International Skating Union. “The last few weeks were such a mental and physical challenge to go through.”
He continued, “I was even debating whether I should come here or not. It was the last minute, but I wanted to come here to see what I can put out on the ice. I am so glad to be here on top right now.”
Malinin’s performance was paired with the Succession theme song. During the four-minute free skate, the athlete landed a quadruple Axel, quad Lutz, quad loop, quad Salchow, another quad Lutz, and a quad toe loop, finishing with a triple Lutz-triple Axel.
Watch Malinin’s performance in the video below.
Nicholas Britell, who composed the theme song for the HBO series, reshared Malinin’s performance on Instagram Stories and congratulated him on his big win.
Nicholas Britell, composer of ‘Succession’s theme song, congratulates Ilia Malinin
Instagram @nicholasbritell
During his program, Malinin heard the audience cheering every time he landed a quad, made the experience emotional for the champion.
“To hear the crowd go wild when I didn’t even finish my program yet is just an incredible experience,” Malinin said, according to AP. “It was so amazing to me. I couldn’t even hold myself up, it was just that emotional to me.”
