'Quad God' Ilia Malinin and the science of figure skating's near-impossible jumps

Figure skater Ilia Malinin became the first person to land the quadruple axel in competition in 2022, a 4.5-rotation jump that had been considered nearly impossible for over a decade. The 17-year-old American represents figure skating's ongoing evolution toward increasingly difficult jumps, driven by a scoring system that rewards technical difficulty. Advances in coaching technology like video analysis and biomechanics research have enabled skaters to master these physics-defying feats, though experts believe quintuple jumps may represent the ultimate physical limit.