Alysa Liu Gold Medal — alysa liu gold medal: American superstar wins 2026 women's figure skating gold
alysa liu gold medal arrived after a stunning free skate that pushed the 20-year-old to an overall score of 226. 79 and Olympic history. Wearing a sparkly gold dress and skating to Donna Summer, Liu scored 150. 20 in the free skate to leap from third place into gold.
Alysa Liu Gold Medal Moment
"Oh my word!" was among the reactions as Liu added Olympic figure skating gold to her world title and beat a standout field in the women's final. She had entered the free skate in third place following a couple of errors in the short program, including a mistake on her triple lutz where she failed to fully rotate the element, but produced a performance described in the moment as "for the ages. "
Podium and final placements
Liu narrowly beat Japan's Kaori Sakamoto for gold; Sakamoto took silver in what was her final performance before retirement. Seventeen-year-old Ami Nakai claimed bronze after leading following the short program. Mone Chiba finished fourth. Amber Glenn rose from 13th after the short program to finish fifth following an excellent free skate. Russian champion Adeliia Petrosian came sixth after a fall.
Scores, history and milestones
Liu's free skate mark of 150. 20 and overall 226. 79 put her on top of the leaderboard. The result makes Liu the first American Olympic champion in women's figure skating since Sarah Hughes in 2002 and the first USA medallist in the discipline since Sasha Cohen in 2006. The result completed a comeback for Liu, who previously quit the sport aged 16 after missing out on a medal at Beijing 2022.
Performance, reaction and setting
Her showstopping routine drew deafening cheers from the crowd. Ilia Malinin's collapse in the men's event had left the United States with a single gold in singles figure skating, and Malinin was among those in the crowd who gave Liu—a noted alt girl with iconic halo hair and a lip piercing—a standing ovation as she wrote herself into Olympic folklore. After the free skate Liu said, "My family is out there, my friends are out there. I had to put on a show for them. " She added, "When I see other people smiling, because I see them in the audience, I have to smile, too. I have no poker face. "
Family story and surrogacy background
Liu's personal story includes a notable family background. Her father, Arthur Liu, is not a figure skater; he is a political refugee and a lawyer who became a single father by choice. Arthur decided at age 40 to start a family on his own and has fathered five children through a pair of surrogates and anonymous egg donors. The family lives in California, a state noted in the context as highly surrogacy-friendly.
Surrogacy, visibility and legal hurdles
Her father's path—single father by choice through surrogacy—has been described as understudied and lacking visibility. Portuguese psychologists Henrique Pereira and Colleen Beatriz described the phenomenon as "a social event that lacks visibility. " Research shows that single-father households in the U. S. have increased roughly fourfold since 1960; the total number as of 2016 stood at about 2 million single dads, or 17 percent of all single parents, living with children under 18, with the majority of those fathers divorced, separated, or widowed. High-profile single fathers who have used surrogacy include TV host Andy Cohen and singer Ricky Martin.
Access to surrogacy varies. In the United Kingdom the surrogate starts as the legal parent of the child and couples must formally apply for parentage, though the law was recently updated so that prospective single parents could do this as well. In the United States surrogacy laws differ by state: Alaska is noted for issuing prebirth orders of parentage only to married couples with a genetic connection to the baby; Kansas issues prebirth orders to married couples regardless of genetic relationship; Arizona allows a single person with no genetic relationship to gain parental status only by filing for adoption after the baby is born. California remains identified as surrogacy-friendly.
Kaori Sakamoto, Alysa Liu and Ami Nakai received their medals from IOC president Kirsty Coventry. Full schedule including times of medal events was provided in the original coverage. Sakamoto must settle for silver as her stellar career ends without an Olympic crown.
alysa liu gold medal now joins her world title and a comeback story that included retirement at age 16 during the COVID-19 pandemic, a two-year break, and a return on her own terms—choosing choreography and costumes, controlling her meals and skating when she wanted—which translated into effervescent joy on the ice and ultimately the Olympic gold.
