Photo credit Melanie Heaney/U.S. Figure Skating
By Elvin Walker
It has been nearly two decades since an American woman has climbed to the top step of a World Championships podium.
Though a few have gotten close – Ashley Wagner won silver in 2016, Alysa Liu earned bronze in 2022, and just last season Isabeau Levito barely missed out on ending the drought when she finished in second place. In all, 13 U.S. women have earned the global crown, the last being Kimmie Meissner all the way back in 2006.
Today in Boston, with Wagner serving as one of the hosts of the event, Liu and Levito put themselves into contention to become the next American woman to wear the title of World champion, finishing the short program in first and third place, respectively. Reigning U.S. champion Amber Glenn sits in ninth.
“We'll just have to see Friday, if any of us win or not," Liu said after the competition. "I didn't know that. That's a fun fact.”
Liu is returning to the world stage after a self-imposed retirement following her bronze medal win in Montpellier, France, three years ago. When asked about her hiatus, Liu leaned into her decision to step away and seek out life away from the rink, emphasizing that she may not be leading this competition if she had not listened to her inner voice.
“I think that I have good intuition, and I have learned to trust it,” she said. “I don’t think that I would be where I am right now if I had not listened to myself. Others told me that I was making a mistake, but I knew that I was doing what was right for me.”
The pint-sized powerhouse who needed to be lifted to the top step of the podium when she captured two consecutive U.S. titles back in 2019 and 2020 is still inside Liu, but she is all grown up. It is evident that Liu has taken command of her skating career and is doing it all in her own way.
Before the six-minute warm up, for example, the Californian playfully ripped off a cartwheel when her name was announced, to the delight of the home crowd.
“I give myself a plus six GOE,” she said with a laugh.
Her program, set to “Promise” by Laufey and Dan Wilson, was a testament to Liu’s newfound authenticity. The 19-year-old molded modern choreography around strong technical elements, including a triple flip-triple toe loop combination that was awarded more than 10 points, to create a dreamlike experience for the audience. Following a nearly flawless performance, Liu struck her closing pose and flashed her megawatt smile, revealing her frenulum piercing or ‘smilie’ as it is called.
“I just love the feeling towards the end of a program when you hear the crowd and see them. You really can’t find that kind of feeling anywhere else,” Liu explained. “I’m really happy with how things went today, but I haven’t watched it back yet to see what things that I can work on.”
Liu finished the short program with an international personal best 74.58 points.
After being sidelined for most of the fall season, Levito came back with a roar in Boston, even if that roar was packaged to Audrey Hepburn perfection. Skating to Henry Mancini’s “Moon River,” the reigning World silver medalist showed no signs of being rusty after recovering from an injury to her right foot.
“I felt relaxed and am satisfied with how I skated today,” the 18-year-old said. “I feel like that wasn’t the best that I could have done today, but with everything that I went through this year, I am so happy to have kept it together.”
Like her teammate, Levito opened with an impressive triple flip-triple toe loop combination, but the star of the program was her Level 4 step sequence that seemed as if Hepburn’s Holly Golightly performed it herself.
“At that point in the program, I feel really relaxed and can really just focus on the choreo segments,” she shared. “I know that this is the moment where the program really shines. I love this program so much.”
Levito earned a season’s best 73.33 points for her efforts.
Glenn fell on her trademark triple Axel at the start of her powerful Janet Jackson program, but got back on track with a powerful triple flip-triple toe loop combination.
“To miss the first element is very hard, but I mentally fought through it,” Glenn said. “I’m disappointed with the result, of course, but I will try my best on Friday.”
Despite being undefeated so far this season, Glenn reported that nerves and expectations were not a factor in her ninth-place performance.
“It was no more or no less than the (Grand Prix) Final,” she said of the nerves. “Just the usual.”
Glenn finished with 67.65 points, just seven points out of first place, giving the Grand Prix Final winner an outside chance of finishing the season undefeated.
In the pairs event, 2024 U.S. champions Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea finished in fifth place with a solid performance to "Rain, in Your Black Eyes" by Ezio Bosso. A few small errors early in the program were all but forgotten by the time they got to their cheer-inducing innovative lift to close the program.
Kam and O’Shea head into tomorrow’s free skate with 68.61 points.
“The energy was amazing. Boston sports fans are something else,” O’Shea said. “I’m really proud of us that we put out a good performance today – some messy things but nothing too crazy. We are a little disappointed in a few of the levels that we didn’t quite understand, but we performed to the extent that we wanted to.”
Reigning U.S. champions Alisa Efimova and Misha Mitrofanov gave an emotional performance of their Taalbi Brothers short program, finishing in ninth place with 63.70 points.
The duo, who are making their World Championships debut in just their second season together, were thinking of their rink mates who succumbed in the January 29 plane crash following the U.S. Championships.
“I was thinking about the strength that Jinna (Han) and Spencer (Lane) had on the ice,” Efimova said. I was thinking about Jinna’s free skate where she has the little Spanish part in the second half and how she always skated with fire. When she was on the ice she never ever gave up. She was a star each time she was on the ice, and I feel that is something that I was even looking up to her for because it was a good mindset. I feel that she deserved this kind of moment in her athletic career.”
Competition continues Thursday with the men’s short program and pairs free skate. Follow all the action, including live results, how to watch and more on the ISU World Figure Skating Championships 2025 Competition Central.
