Shiffrin, seeking fourth straight world title, highlights Olympic action this week

By Rachel ThompsonFeb 12, 2019, 4:09 PM EST

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Two-time Olympic gold medalist Mikaela Shiffrin has already claimed one title at the World Alpine Skiing Championships in Are, Sweden (in the first race of the competition, super-G), but her two best events are still ahead: the 23-year-old is expected to compete for her first world title in giant slalom on Thursday after winning Olympic gold in the event last year. And on Saturday, she will go for a fourth straight slalom title, trying to become the first skier to win four consecutive world titles in the same event.

Two-time Olympic gold medalist Ted Ligety is expected to highlight the U.S. men’s field in giant slalom. The second run of that event will air live on NBCSN Friday at 11 a.m. ET.

And a trio of Olympic medalists in freestyle skiing headline the U.S. contingent at the Freestyle Skiing and Snowboarding World Cup in Calgary, Alberta: two-time Olympic champion David Wise, Sochi gold medalist Maddie Bowman and 2014 Olympic silver medalist Gus Kenworthy. Coverage of ski halfpipe will air live Saturday on Olympic Channel at 9 p.m.

WORLD ALPINE SKIING CHAMPIONSHIPS — Are, Sweden

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Thursday	8:00 a.m.	Women’s Giant Slalom (Run 1)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
	10:30 a.m.	Women’s Giant Slalom (Run 1)*	NBCSN
	11:30 a.m.	Women’s Giant Slalom (Run 2)	NBCSN	NBCSN/NBC Sports Gold
Friday	8:00 a.m.	Men’s Giant Slalom (Run 1)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
	11:00 a.m.	Men’s Giant Slalom (Run 2)	NBCSN	NBCSN
	11:30 a.m.	Men’s Giant Slalom (Run 2)		NBC Sports Gold
Saturday	5:00 a.m.	Women’s Slalom (Run 1)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
	7:00 a.m.	Women’s Slalom (Run 1)*	NBCSN
	8:00 a.m.	Women’s Slalom (Run 2)	NBCSN	NBCSN/NBC Sports Gold
	1:00 p.m.	Women’s Slalom*	NBC
Sunday	5:00 a.m.	Men’s Slalom (Run 1)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
	7:00 a.m.	Men’s Slalom (Run 1)*	NBCSN
	8:00 a.m.	Men’s Slalom (Run 2)	NBCSN	NBCSN/NBC Sports Gold

*Same-day delay

BIATHLON WORLD CUP — Salt Lake City, Utah (Soldier Hollow)

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Thursday	1:00 p.m.	Women’s 7.5km Sprint	NBCSN	NBCSN/NBC Sports Gold
Friday	1:00 p.m.	Men’s 10km Sprint	NBCSN	NBCSN/NBC Sports Gold
Saturday	12:00 p.m.	Women’s Pursuit	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
	4:00 p.m.	Men’s Pursuit	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
Sunday	1:00 a.m.	Women’s Pursuit*	NBCSN
	12:00 p.m.	Single Mixed Relay	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
	4:00 p.m.	2x6km + 2×7.5km Mixed Relay	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
	9:30 p.m.	2x6km + 2×7.5km Mixed Relay*	NBCSN

*Next-day and same-day delay

BOBSLED AND SKELETON WORLD CUP — Lake Placid, New York

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Friday	8:30 a.m.	Women’s Skeleton (Run 1)		OlympicChannel.com
	10:00 a.m.	Women’s Skeleton (Run 2)	NBCSN	NBCSN
	1:00 p.m.	Women’s Bobsled (Run 1)		OlympicChannel.com
	2:00 p.m.	Two-Man Bobsled (Run 1)		OlympicChannel.com
	3:15 p.m.	Women’s Bobsled (Run 2)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel
	4:15 p.m.	Two-Man Bobsled (Run 2)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel
	9:00 p.m.	From Lake Placid, New York*	NBCSN
Saturday	9:00 a.m.	Men’s Skeleton (Run 1)		OlympicChannel.com
	10:45 a.m.	Men’s Skeleton (Run 2)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel
	1:30 p.m.	Four-Man Bobsled (Run 1)		OlympicChannel.com
	3:00 p.m.	Four-Man Bobsled (Run 2)	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel
	11:30 p.m.	From Lake Placid, New York*	NBCSN

*Same-day delay

CROSS-COUNTRY SKIING WORLD CUP — Cogne, Italy

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Saturday	6:30 a.m.	Men’s & Women’s Sprint	Olympic Channel	Olympic Channel/NBC Sports Gold
Sunday	3:45 a.m.	Women’s 10km		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	6:30 a.m.	Men’s 15km		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	2:00 p.m.	Women’s 10km*	Olympic Channel

*Same-day delay

SHOW JUMPING WORLD CUP: NORTH AMERICAN LEAGUE — Wellington, Florida; Valle de Bravo, Mexico

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Monday	12:00 p.m.	From Wellington, Florida*	NBCSN
Sunday	11:00 a.m.	From Valle de Bravo, Mexico*	Olympic Channel

*Pre-recorded

U.S. FIGURE SKATING CHAMPIONSHIPS

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Saturday	2:30 p.m.	Exhibition*	NBC

*Pre-recorded

FOUR CONTINENTS FIGURE SKATING CHAMPIONSHIPS

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Saturday	4:00 p.m.	Ladies’ & Men’s Free Skate*	NBC

*Pre-recorded

FREESTYLE SKIING AND FREESKI WORLD CUP — Feldberg, Germany; Moscow, Russia; Calgary, Alberta

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Saturday	3:45 a.m.	Ski Cross		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	11:30 a.m.	Aerials		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	8:00 p.m.	Aerials*	Olympic Channel
	9:00 p.m.	Halfpipe	Olympic Channel	OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
Sunday	5:30 a.m.	Ski Cross		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold

*Same-day delay

SKI JUMPING WORLD CUP — Willingen, Germany; Oberstdorf, Germany

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Friday	9:45 a.m.	Men’s Team		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	6:30 p.m.	Men’s Team*	Olympic Channel
Saturday	7:00 a.m.	Women’s Individual		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	10:00 a.m.	Men’s Individual		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	5:00 p.m.	Women’s Individual*	Olympic Channel
	6:30 p.m.	Men’s Individual*	Olympic Channel
Sunday	7:00 a.m.	Women’s Individual		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	9:15 a.m.	Men’s Individual		OlympicChannel.com/NBC Sports Gold
	5:30 p.m.	Women’s Individual*	Olympic Channel
	7:00 p.m.	Men’s Individual*	Olympic Channel

*Same-day delay

WORLD SINGLE DISTANCE SPEED SKATING CHAMPIONSHIPS — Inzell, Germany

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Monday	10:30 p.m.	Day 3*	NBCSN
	11:30 p.m.	Day 4*	NBCSN

*Pre-recorded

WORLD INDOOR TRACK & FIELD TOUR — Birmingham, England

Day	Time (ET)	Event	TV	Stream
Saturday	8:30 a.m.	Indoor Track & Field		NBC Sports Gold
	Midnight	Indoor Track & Field	NBCSN

Swiss extend best streak in curling history; Norway continues epic winter sports season

By OlympicTalkMar 27, 2023, 9:37 AM EDT

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Switzerland’s Silvana Tirinzoni extended the most dominant run in world curling championships history, skipping a women’s team to a fourth consecutive title and pushing an unbeaten streak to 36 consecutive games.

Tirinzoni, along with Alina Pätz (who throws the last stones), Carole Howald and Briar Schwaller-Hürlimann, beat Norway 6-3 in Sunday’s final in Sandviken, Sweden.

They went 14-0 for the tournament after a Swiss team also skipped by Tirinzoni also went 14-0 to win the 2022 World title. Tirinzoni’s last defeat in world championship play came during round-robin in 2021 at the hands of Swede Anna Hasselborg, the 2018 Olympic champion.

In all, Tirinzoni’s Swiss are 42-1 over the last three world championships and 45-1 in world championship play dating to the start of the 2019 playoffs. Tirinzoni also skipped the Swiss at the last two Olympics, finishing seventh and then fourth.

Tirinzoni, a 43-year-old who has worked as a project management officer for Migros Bank, is the lone female skip to win three or more consecutive world titles.

The lone man to do it is reigning Olympic champion Niklas Edin of Sweden, who goes for a fifth in a row next week in Ottawa. Edin’s teams lost at least once in round-robin play in each of their four title runs.

Norway extended its incredible winter sports season by earning its first world medal in women’s curling since 2005.

Norway has 53 medals, including 18 golds, in world championships in Winter Olympic program events this season, surpassing its records for medals and gold medals at a single edition of a Winter Olympics (39 and 16).

A Canadian team skipped by Kerri Einarson took bronze. Canada has gone four consecutive women’s worlds without making the final, a record drought for its men’s or women’s teams.

A U.S. team skipped by Olympian Tabitha Peterson finished seventh in round-robin, missing the playoffs by one spot.

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Ilia Malinin eyed new heights at figure skating worlds, but a jump to gold requires more

By Philip HershMar 25, 2023, 1:10 PM EDT

At 18 years old, Ilia Malinin already has reached immortality in figure skating for technical achievement, being the first to land a quadruple Axel jump in competition.

The self-styled “Quadg0d” already has shown the chutzpah (or hubris?) to go for the most technically difficult free skate program ever attempted at the world championships, including that quad Axel, the hardest jump anyone has tried.

It helped bring U.S. champion Malinin the world bronze medal Saturday in Saitama, Japan, where he made more history as the first to land the quad Axel at worlds.

But it already had him thinking that the way to reach the tops of both the worlds and Olympus might be to acknowledge his mortal limits.

Yes, if Malinin (288.44 points) had cleanly landed all six quads he did instead of going clean on just three of the six, it would have closed or even overcome the gap between him and repeat champion Shoma Uno of Japan (301.14) and surprise silver medalist Cha Jun-Hwan (296.03), the first South Korean man to win a world medal.

That’s a big if, as no one ever has done six clean quads in a free skate.

And the energy needed for those quads, physical and mental, hurts Malinin’s chances of closing another big gap with the world leaders: the difference in their “artistic” marks, known as component scores.

Malinin’s technical scores led the field in both the short program and free skate. But his component scores were lower than at last year’s worlds, when he finished ninth, and they ranked 10th in the short program and 11th in the free this time. Uno had an 18.44-point overall advantage over Malinin in PCS, Cha a 13.47 advantage.

FIGURE SKATING WORLDS: Chock, Bates, and a long road to gold | Results

As usual in figure skating, some of the PCS difference owes to the idea of paying your dues. After all, at his first world championships, eventual Olympic champion Nathan Chen had PCS scores only slightly better than Malinin’s, and Chen’s numbers improved substantially by the next season.

But credit Malinin for quickly grasping the reality that his current skating has a lot of rough edges on the performance side.

“I’ve noticed that it’s really hard to go for a lot of risks,” he said in answer to a press conference question about what he had learned from this competition. “Sometimes going for the risks you get really good rewards, but I think that maybe sometimes it’s OK to lower the risks and go for a lot cleaner skate. I think it will be beneficial next season to lower the standards a bit.”

So could it be “been-there, done-that” with the quad Axel? (and the talk of quints and quad-quad combinations?)

Saturday’s was his fourth clean quad Axel in seven attempts this season, but it got substantially the lowest grade of execution (0.36) of the four with positive marks. It was his opening jump in the four-minute free, and, after a stopped-in-your tracks landing, his next two quads, flip and Lutz, were both badly flawed.

And there were still some three minutes to go.

Malinin did not directly answer about letting the quad Axel go now that he has definitively proved he can do it. What he did say could be seen as hinting at it.

“With the whole components factor … it’s probably because you know, after doing a lot of these jumps, (which) are difficult jumps, it’s really hard to try to perform for the audience,” he said.

“Even though some people might enjoy jumping, and it’s one of the things I enjoy, but I also like to perform to the audience. So I think next season, I would really want to focus on this performing side.”

Chen had told me essentially the same thing for a 2017 Ice Network story (reposted last year by NBCOlympics.com) about his several years of ballet training. He regretted not being able to show that training more because of the program-consuming athletic demands that come with being an elite figure skater.

“When I watch my skating when I was younger, I definitely see all this balletic movement and this artistry come through,” Chen said then. “When I watch my artistry now, it’s like, ‘Yes, it’s still there,’ but at the same time, I’m so focused on the jumps, it takes away from it.”

The artistry can still be developed and displayed, as Chen showed and as prolific and proficient quad jumpers like Uno and the now retired two-time Olympic champion Yuzuru Hanyu of Japan have proved.

For another perspective on how hard it is to combine both, look at the difficulty it posed for the consummate performer, Jason Brown, who had the highest PCS scores while finishing a strong fifth (280.84).

Since Brown dropped his Sisyphean attempts to do a clean quad after 26 tries (20 in a free skate), the last at the 2022 U.S. Championships, he has received the two highest international free skate scores of his career, at the 2022 Olympics and this world meet.

It meant Brown’s coming to terms with his limitations and the fact that in the sport’s current iteration, his lack of quads gives him little chance of winning a global championship medal. What he did instead was give people the chance to see the beauty of his blade work, his striking movement, his expressiveness.

He has, at 28, become an audience favorite more than ever. And the judges Saturday gave Brown six maximum PCS scores (10.0.)

“I’m so happy about today’s performance,” Brown told media in the mixed zone. “I did my best to go out there and skate my skate. And that’s what I did.”

The quadg0d is realizing that he, too, must accept limitations if he wants to achieve his goals. Ilia Malinin can’t simply jump his way onto the highest steps of the most prized podiums.

Philip Hersh, who has covered figure skating at the last 12 Winter Olympics, is a special contributor to NBCSports.com.

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