Replay Lounge 2026 Olympics | Men

[TallyT]

Ilia was on today wearing his olymoic team gold medal.
They show statements by Tara Lipinski and Scott Hamilton that backpeddled on their claims of him prior to olympics.
They added how one moment shouldn't define him.
Wow amazing of all the times they claim their ogm is their defining moment and career defining one.
How they label other skaters when they didn't win.
an oGm is never a defining moment.
It a great moment in their life but not defining

That's human nature. Especially for someone who is now hoping - in four oh soooooo long years' time - to get a second shot (I may not like him but I can say with absolute certainty that I would be saying the same!). And I recall Patrick Chan also wearing his team gold for all his interviews, which is fair enough.

Unless you have more than one and/or get into the GOAT discussion, let's be honest it would be depressing to be told for the next 50-70 years your life defining moment was over...

 

[Magill]

That's human nature. Especially for someone who is now hoping - in four oh soooooo long years' time - to get a second shot (I may not like him but I can say with absolute certainty that I would be saying the same!). And I recall Patrick Chan also wearing his team gold for all his interviews, which is fair enough.

Unless you have more than one and/or get into the GOAT discussion, let's be honest it would be depressing to be told for the next 50-70 years your life defining moment was over...

And yet I admit reading on X that Ilia Malinin put on his IG bio information that he is "2026 Olympic Gold Medalist" somehow managing to omit the word "Team" from this title rubs me the wrong way and at the same time it shows how deeply his ego was hurt if he feels a need to mislead his followers this way and pretend his title is something else from what it is. Not to mention how disrespectful it is to the true individual OGM winner, and any true individual OGM winner, no matter how much he tries to make a different impression.
I mean, really?

 

[Arigato]

And yet I admit reading on X that Ilia Malinin put on his IG bio information that he is "2026 Olympic Gold Medalist" somehow managing to omit the word "Team" from this title rubs me the wrong way and at the same time it shows how deeply his ego was hurt if he feels a need to mislead his followers this way and pretend his title is something else from what it is. Not to mention how disrespectful it is to the true individual OGM winner, no matter how much he tries to make a different impression.
I mean, really?

Why do I suddenly see an Olympic image in my head of another guy who didn't win gold but decided to "walk over" the gold podium.

https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/19f9vpwemkj9fjpg.jpg

 

[Mathman]

And yet I admit reading on X that Ilia Malinin put on his IG bio information that he is "2026 Olympic Gold Medalist" somehow managing to omit the word "Team" from this title rubs me the wrong way...

Ah, that's mean. Let him celebrate his medal. It is not Malinin's job to rub us, whether the right or the wrong way.

 

[Magill]

Ah, that's mean. Let him celebrate his medal. It is not Malinin's job to rub us, whether the right or the wrong way.

It's not mean to expect people not to play appearances. Yes, let him celebrate the medal he won, not the one he didn't. Team medal is not the same as individual one, no matter how you value it, and in official bios they are always properly differentiated by adding the word "Team" to the info. But it's true I wouldn't care with someone less focused on PR and not pre-crowning himself with the medal he never got in the end.
And actually social media are all about rubbing, like it or not.

 

[lariko]

I feel like you are fighting with smoke and imaginary problems. Online hate is not cool, are you upset Shaidorov doesn't get enough hateful messages in comparision to Ilia? And are we sure those haters of Ilia are actually on this forum? Because I wouldn't say so, honestly. At least I don't see anyone here celebrating Ilia having the worst skate of his career. And if you have opinions on Kagiyama and others and their PCS, you can always talk about it, start a thread, say what you mean instead of complaining that no one is talking about it.

See the messages above. Lol, you don’t need to ask twice here...

 

[DizzyFrenchie]

It's not mean to expect people not to play appearances. Yes, let him celebrate the medal he won, not the one he didn't. Team medal is not the same as individual one, no matter how you value it, and in official bios they are always properly differentiated but adding the word "Team" to the info. But it's true I wouldn't care with someone less focused on PR and not pre-crowning himself with the medal he never got in the end.
And actually social media are all about rubbing, like it or not.

I'm sorry, I didn't read many pages of this thread, I would just say one thing in his defence, it's that it seems to be an USA media habit he may have caught. It led a "journalist" write an article on how in 2018 only the Men Bronze Medalist would be remembered... Adam Rippon. IA wasn't there yet to make up things agglomerating randomly the trash read in the press, but (after the event) media were Adam Rippon as if he was the only valuable Men competitor in these Games, to the point of giving a journalist the impression that he had won the Individual Bronze while being the only memorable skater among Men...

 

[Mathman]

This is what I can't get used to: If we want to hate on someone, hate on Hitler. Hate on Genghis Khan, hate on brutal dictators, on crooked politicians, on serial killers, on child molesters.

Figure skaters? Can we be serious for one moment here? Why cruelly and gleefully kick someone while he's down?

 

[frompolandwithlove]

See the messages above. Lol, you don’t need to ask twice here...

I'm sorry, but being critical of someone on closed forum is not the same as sending hateful messages to a skater (or any other public figure, for that matter).

 

[DizzyFrenchie]

This is what I can't get used to: If we want to hate on someone, hate on Hitler. Hate on Genghis Khan, hate on brutal dictators, on crooked politicians, on serial killers, on child molesters.

Figure skaters? Can we be serious for one moment here? Why cruelly and gleefully kick someone while he's down?

Hmmm... Where are you seeing hate? Against which skater? I saw hate and lies against Yuzuru Hanyu lately but I haven't been too much on The Edge or the like, this hate was on Japanese social media; and I suppose that you're not speaking of him anyway because although his maintenance period isn't ended yet, I wouldn't call him down, we even had a Floor Triple Axel from him in this seasonal Ice Rink he helped repair.

 

[lariko]

I'm sorry, but being critical of someone on closed forum is not the same as sending hateful messages to a skater (or any other public figure, for that matter).

Well, you asked about their availability on this forum, and I am just pointing out that there is no shortage. This forum is not closed. You might not be able to post if you have no account, but you can read everything, and it is high in Google search algorithm whenever you search anything in skating. The messages are as visible and public as on another site, Twitter etc.

 

[dorispulaski]

There have been both parents of skaters and skaters themselves who post on GS. You should always write as though your words will told to the skater.

And with translation apps embedded in browsers, even non English speakers may read what you say.

 

[frompolandwithlove]

Well, you asked about their availability on this forum, and I am just pointing out that there is no shortage. This forum is not closed. You might not be able to post if you have no account, but you can read everything, and it is high in Google search algorithm whenever you search anything in skating. The messages are as visible and public as on another site, Twitter etc.

Sure. But is anyone sending those messages to Ilia? Well, we don't know for sure, of course, it is possible that we have some actual haters here willing to disturb the peace of a skater they don't like - but saying that would be just making accusations. And sure, Ilia could go looking for opinions here. And I agree that sometimes those opinions are very harsh. But is every harsh opinion "hate"? In that case you could find many haters of many skaters here.
Like I said - direct hateful messages are not the same as people having opinions. Let's not slap the word "hater" on every more critical member of the party. And I would say admins here are doing good job at keeping the discussion on decent level anyway, it's not like you could just write any nasty comment and get away with it.

 

[lariko]

I'll agree to disagree. There are no drawbacks to courtesy and empathy.

 

[DizzyFrenchie]

In post #322 above. Infatuation with one skater one skater does not justify posting cruelly about another.

Cruelly? In my opinion his A&E emergency coping is likely over but I wouldn't post this (post 322) before he's back home (he still has the Gala to perform); nevertheless there's no cruelty in it?

 

[sisinka]

And yet I admit reading on X that Ilia Malinin put on his IG bio information that he is "2026 Olympic Gold Medalist" somehow managing to omit the word "Team" from this title rubs me the wrong way and at the same time it shows how deeply his ego was hurt if he feels a need to mislead his followers this way and pretend his title is something else from what it is. Not to mention how disrespectful it is to the true individual OGM winner, and any true individual OGM winner, no matter how much he tries to make a different impression.
I mean, really?

Why do I suddenly see an Olympic image in my head of another guy who didn't win gold but decided to "walk over" the gold podium.

https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/19f9vpwemkj9fjpg.jpg

To @Magill and @Arigato, I would like to point out that:

1. You should go and look at Instagram page of for example: Karen Chen, Ekaterina Bobrova, Evgenia Medvedeva, Madison Hubbell, Brandon Frazier, Vincent Zhou, Ellie Kam, ...
What you will see there is mention about being Olympic medalist - no specification of Team / Individual event.

2. I do not remember in Czech press that there would ALWAYS be any specifications whether the athlete is Team or Individual Olympic medalist. There are Olympic medalists, as simple as that.

3. There is Thread in the Edge forum where more users persuaded others that Olympic Team / Individual win should be equal. So...?

4. Instagram (or any other social media) header is used for short summary of the person who is running it. If you indeed want to be precise, then it would be - Ilia Malinin - 2026 Olympic Team Event Gold Medalist skating in Men's Segment both Short and Free Program - 2x time 2025 and 2024 World Individual Figure Skating Medalist in Men's Cathegory - 4x 2026 & 2025 & 2024 & 2023 US National Individual Figure Skating Champion in Men's Cathegory. But personally I find this header to be quite long....and Ilia's PR agency probably finds it too long as well.

5. If thanks to Ilia's Instagram header some people will believe that he won Individual Event...well, it proofs that those people have little to no knowledge about Figure Skating...and are probably not reading newspapers at all.

I think you are too harsh on Ilia.

 

[Demandred]

Almost everyone who wins a team or relay event gold proclaims themselves in their bio a Olympic gold medalist without adding "team" or "relay" to the description. Even athletes who only take parts in the qualification during the Olympics and not the finals often do it and there is nothing wrong about it, they are still Olympic gold medalists. Weird thing to get mad about. I don't see how this is in any way disrespectful about the individual event winners.

 

[DizzyFrenchie]

Almost everyone who wins a team or relay event gold proclaims themselves in their bio a Olympic gold medalist without adding "team" or "relay" to the description. Even athletes who only take parts in the qualification during the Olympics and not the finals often do it and there is nothing wrong about it, they are still Olympic gold medalists. Weird thing to get mad about. I don't see how this is in any way disrespectful about the individual event winners.

I think that it's quite different in Relay or in Sports which are actually performed in teams. In Figure Skating, there's Pairs and Ice Dance, sometimes there are arguments between fans saying that one of the two skaters in the team is better than the other, yet they're both full-fledged medallists.
The Figure Skating Team Event is something completely different, for many reasons. These reasons are maybe out of topic here, Mathman will certainly guess that there's a Statistical reason (hello Condorcet), those who know me may guess there's a priority reason towards Paralympic Games, and others. As we're in this thread anyway let's just say that fundamentally, in facts, no, a Figure Skating Team Event medal is not equivalent to an individual medal, and confusion should not be sought.
But I do agree that many do it and media are encouraging it (they are really to blame), that's why I posted this example of this journalist about Adam Rippon (and this example also shows that yes, this confusion IS detrimental to other skaters, here Javier Fernández whose own individual Bronze is denied) so it's not surprising that some of these Games Team Event Medallists do it maybe without thinking too much (or rather, enough) into it.

 

[Mathman]

If you win an Olympic medal, then you are an Olympic medalist. If you participate in the Olympics, then you are an Olympian.

 

[DizzyFrenchie]

If you win an Olympic medal, then you are an Olympic medalist. If you participate in the Olympics, then you are an Olympian.

This sort of statement is giving argument against its base but of course it's not the right moment for a debate.