Olympian Alysa Liu Doesn’t Care About the Medals

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DAVID GREENE, HOST: From WHYY and PRX, this is Sports in America, where we talk about everything you need to know in the world of sports this week, and then we dive into a story about the triumphs, the heartbreaks, the relationships that really that define an athlete’s career. Right now, of course, we are in the middle of the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan, Italy, and one athlete that a lot of eyes are on is Olympic figure skater Alysa Liu.

She’s just 20 years old, she’s looking like one of the favorites to win gold, and if she medals at all, this is crazy, she’ll be the first American woman to earn any medal in figure skating in more than 20 years. We are going to sit down with Alysa today and hear her story, her journey to the 2026 Games, how she essentially sacrificed her childhood for figure skating. Also, what drove her to quit the sport at just 16 years old, and how she ultimately found her way back to the sport last year.

But first, we have Marcus Thompson on the line. He’s a lead columnist for the athletic. is in Milan right now, covering the Olympics, specifically focusing a lot of his attention on women’s figure skating, and he’s going to talk to us about how things are in Olympic Village and how Team USA is doing so far. Marcus, thanks for being here.

MARCUS THOMPSON: Oh, man, it is my honor. I’m a big fan of OGs like yourself, so I love it.

DG: Wow. OGs. I love that. I do feel like an OG. Wow. Yeah, I got to cover an Olympics, though at some point. That’s my that’s on my goals list.

MT: Do it once. Second time is your fault.

DG: Really? (Laughs) How many is this for you?

MT: This is my second. did Summer Olympics in Paris, and this is my first Winter Olympics.

DG: So how’s it feel? How’s Milan feel? What’s the mood in Olympic Village and for Team USA so far?

MT: Milan is cold! (Laughs).

DG: Yeah, as it might be during the Winter Olympics,

MT: Yeah, it’s Winter Olympics. It’s actually not as bad as I thought. This isn’t like the winter you expect from the Winter Olympics, like, you know, growing up watching the Winter Olympics is always in a place where it’s just all white, like there’s no snow, right? I’m just a California weather wimp, so 45 degrees feels freezing to me.

DG: Bone chilling, yeah.

MT: I mean, to be honest, so much of the energy is kind of political here. And it’s about, you know, the protests and the presence of ICE and the bit of disdain that America is garnering from other nations and how the athletes are dealing with that. It’s a pretty political climate out here, surprisingly to me.

DG: Yeah, I wanted to ask about that because certainly a lot of the headlines here at home have been about that. And in particular, you know, it’s interesting. I feel like a number of U.S. athletes have really found this fine line. I mean, not being critical, say, of the president specifically, but saying things like, I have mixed feelings about representing the United States right now. You know, I want to stay true to my values. I have wondered how that’s landed and how that’s impacted the mood?

MT: You could see them like managing like the backlash while they speak, right?

DG: Oh wow, like seeing what’s coming.

MT: And I think they understand more than anybody because they were raised on social media that there probably isn’t very many wins in this. So you can go and step out and say something. Alysa Liu’s friend, Amber Glenn, spoke out and said something, and you know, she’s getting death threats and had to get off of social media, and then,you know, then they’re wondering like, “What did I even do, actually?” We’ve long passed the days of Tommy Smith and John Carlos, like, really kind of revolutionized sports.

Now it’s just, it doesn’t land when the president could just get on social media and just say, “You’re an idiot,” right? Or, “You’re a loser,” and turn this into like a very petty conversation. So you could see them wrestling in real time with their own principles and what they believe in, and the almost futility of the dialogue because it’s going to bring a backlash regardless, and none of this conversation is actually being solved. So you can watch them like weigh it in a sense, like should I just say what I think, or you know, should I couch it and kind of play the middle because there’s a third rail on either side.

DG: This whole relationship between sports and politics, it’s something that we talk about so often. I mean, how are you even finding the balance as someone covering this, like, in terms of, do I cover this, ike, it’s a global gathering that has all of this political kind of backdrop, or wanting to, you know, focus on just the purity of the sport and, you know, just the elite ways that these athletes perform on a stage like this.

MT: Well, fortunately for us, The Athletic sent a massive team out here. So we’ve got people on the hardcore stuff, and we’ve got people on the purity of the sport. So I’m exclusively figure skating. So when it touches my area, like when Amber Glen talks, then, you know, that’s when we deal with it. But let me tell you, David, in Milano ice skating arena, it’s signs, and there was one woman wearing a pink fur coat with Trump’s name in the back. Like it’s kind of lit in figure skating there. Like when it’s ice dance and when it’s singles, like people are into it, but the presence is still there. So I think it’s going to be a little bit unavoidable, especially as this thing goes along.

DG: Let’s talk about this thing going along. I feel like I’m shocked that there’s been no medal for the United States in women’s figure skating in like two decades. How have I missed that? I mean, this is, that’s crazy.

MT: Yeah, Russia’s pretty good (Laughs).

DG: Yeah.

MT: And they’ve kind of took over the sport, you know, perhaps with some enhancements as has been ruled, right? But they’ve taken over the sport, while USA entered this kind of transition. The Ice Princess era kind of faded over time, and you get the sense that U.S. figure skating was evolving into something and trying to find its way. So, when you look at 2002 being the last gold medal and 2006 being the last medal, it’s been three full cycles as they try to find their way. And I do think this year’s kind of the culmination of that, like, metamorphosis that figure skating has undergone. I mean, we know figure skaters for being a certain type of way, right? Like incredible athletes who, you know, just have the beauty and elegance and grace that belongs in like, you know, a jewelry box, right? (Laughs) Like a ballerina on ice. But these women are different. You know, these women have kind of broken that mold and, you know, shrugged off that box, and like you see them coming into their own.

Like it’s a little bit refreshing when you think about it, and I just think it took some time, and now they’re here, now they’re ready. They still have to contend with some really great figure skaters in Japan. And Russia’s not in this Olympics, they’ve been banned for the nation’s invasion of Ukraine, and there are some athletes who’ve gotten the license to skate, just like as an independent or license participate in the Olympics as an independent. But the super super superstar figure skater, she, from Russia, she was 15 when she got banned for, a four-year ban last year, for performance enhancement drugs She wasn’t able to do it this time. So now it’s like wide open, like this is chance.

DG: Oh, interesting. So that’s what really opened things up for everybody.

MT: Because she’ll be 23 and she can do a quad. Like she’s the woman who can do a quad. So, like at 15, she was, there was no contest. So, like this is America’s time, this is it, the drought needs to break this year.

DG: Well, one of the athletes who might break that drought, we’re gonna hear from in just a moment, and it’s Alysa Liu. And wow, you talk about shrugging things off, I mean, she just embodies shrugging off pressure and just being out there looking like she’s just there to enjoy herself. It’s kind of shocking.

MT: She’s amazing, right? Just flat out, as someone who’s covered athletes from all different walks. Like, she is one of those figure skaters who let you know they’re just as sensational, right? They have many of the same qualities that we adore in athletes, like even more so, right? Because it’s not commercialized, right? It’s like a genuine like swag. I mean, she was a prodigy, like, 13 years old winning the US championship, like the national champion at 13, right? Fourteen years old, she competes in the Olympics at 16\. She’s, where we’re talking about the drought, she was deemed as “Hey, you’re gonna you’re gonna be the next great American figure skater,” and somehow this young woman at 16 years old had the capacity and fortitude to just say, “I’m out. I’m not doing this. I’m not going to like lose my entire youth being governed by your desire.”

DG: So courageous.

MT: Right, and what you think are great. Like, who can do that at 16? At 16, I was consumed with other people’s opinions, right? My entire life was like, hey, I want people to like me, and I’m trying to dress a certain way, look a certain way. At 16, she’s like, no, I’m out. I’m going to go scale mountains and hang out and eat food that I want. It’s just amazing. And then at 19 to have the same capacity to say, “Yeah, I know I made that decision, but I’m back and here are my terms.” And on top of that, she came back amazing, right? She came back as a world champion and a gold medal hopeful. Like, it is insane this story. It is Hollywood-esque, and I do believe these are the type of stories that make us love sports. She is one of those figures, and if you ever, when you talk to her, there’s just not an ounce of animosity in her at all. She’s just an authentic, genuine, fun person who has enough competitive drive and fortitude in herself to, at the same time, not take this too seriously and also give it all she has. Like it’s a very rare combination.

DG: Yeah, it really sounds that way. She’s just a mind-blowingly awesome human being, it seems like. Well, Marcus Thompson, he’s alead columnist at The Athletic covering figure skating and joining us from Milan. Marcus, hope we get to catch up again and stay warm. I know your California roots makes it hard to deal with the bone-chilling cold of Italy.

MT: By the end of this, I’m gonna be a regular mountain man. I’m coming back. I’m listening to Frozen every day. I’m watching Frozen every day. I’ll be a hardened weather gangster by the end of this, I promise.

DG: There you go, we’re all ready for it. (Laughs) Thanks so much, Marcus.

MT: I appreciate it. Thank you.

DG: God, you know, I wish I were with Marcus covering the Olympics in Milan right now. So I want to turn to our conversation now with the young woman we were both talking about. It’s women’s figure skater, Alysa Liu. Her chances are looking pretty good this year. So Alysa won in the World Figure Skating Championships in March of last year. And that basically ended the same drought that Marcus and I were talking about. No American woman had won first place there in the last two decades until Alysa came along.

To clinch the title of world champion last year, Alysa performed a routine set to the song “MacArthur Park.” It was covered by Donna Summer. It came out in the late 1970s; it’s a breakup song set in the real MacArthur Park in Los Angeles.

[MACARTHUR PARK PLAYING IN THE BACKGROUND]

ALYSA LIU: And I love that song. I loved it so much, and so I got to pick out which cuts I liked and which ones I wanted to put in. So my music kind of changed completely from the beginning of the season. It’s a totally different cut.

DG: The first part of the song is sort of like a ballad, and Alysa’s just gliding along the ice in a shimmering gold dress, making it look easy.

AL: And that’s when I started, like, getting it. I understood the concept of the program, and that’s when I started having fun with it.

DG: Yeah, you can tell how much fun she’s having. Alysa is beaming on the ice back in March of last year, throughout this routine. And as the beat picks up in the song, she’s getting super into it, she’s flipping her hair, throwing in some fun dance moves.

AL: Because I finally clicked with it. And I think that’s the most important thing as a skater is you have to click to your music because your performance, that’s what you’re doing, you know, that’s your art, and you don’t wanna show something that you’re not connected to.

DG: The move that won, stay with me here, it’s called the Triple Lutz Double Axel Double Toe Loop. And that means, well, actually, let me just let Alysa explain.

AL: So first you do a triple luts, it’s like three and a half rotations, and it’s a tap jump, you just take off from your like toe basically. It’s like a pole vault, you know, pole vaulting, how they have that stick and then they jump high. That’s pretty much what we do, but we rotate, and we’re vertical. And then double axel, it’s two and a half rotations. You take off forward, though, and then you land backward. And then, double toe is just one and a half revolutions. So, it’s just like a little bow at the end of the jump, basically.

DG: The moment she actually pulls this off, the whole arena goes absolutely nuts.

[CROWD CHEERING]

DG: Even Alysa can’t handle the excitement. She puts her hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath, and she’s smiling the entire time. She wins first place, she’s a world champion, and she is the first American woman to do it in decades.

AL: In the moment you know it was, one it was so shocking, and I love a good twist you know what I mean, I love suspense, and it was very dramatic. I felt like I was in a movie.

DG: In this year’s Olympics, Alysa is planning to compete to the same exact song to try to win gold. But what you might not know about Alysa is that this day almost never came to be because three years earlier, Alysa quit skating completely. She always seemed like a prodigy growing up, and she had Olympic aspirations. Then she shocked the world when she decided to throw it all away at the age of 16.

BROADCASTER: A shocker from American figure skater Alysa Liu, who announced her retirement at the age of 16 years old.

AL: I decided I would never compromise so much of myself to do something that I didn’t want to do.

DG: Fair warning, Alysa is not like most athletes. For one thing, she doesn’t dress like other figure skaters. She’s sort of grungy with bleached streaks in her hair and a piercing between her two front teeth. Alysa grew up skating from a young age, and like so many other sports prodigies, she essentially sacrificed her childhood to compete. She didn’t even realize how little balance she had in her life until COVID happened. And at 14 years old, she got her first day off in years.

AL: There were so many days where I would show up to the rink, and while warming up, I would just start uncontrollably crying.

DG: That realization shook Alysa to her core. It drove her to quit and forced her to reconsider everything about her life. Ultimately, her path led her back to skating. And now she is seen as a bright star heading into the Winter Olympics, a chance for the U.S. to make a name for itself in women’s figure skating once again. But Alysa refuses to take on other people’s expectations, and her story begs a larger question. Do children belong at the highest level of a sport? And whose job is it to protect them? And what happens when they don’t?

This is Sports in America, and we’ll be right back with more from Alysa Liu.

This is Sports in America. Welcome back to our conversation with Olympic figure skater Alysa Liu.

Alysa’s journey to the Olympics started long before she first laced up a pair of skates. She could have never become an elite American athlete if her dad hadn’t made his own precarious journey decades earlier.

Your dad, when I was reading about his own kind of life and journey as an immigrant to the United States, it sounds like in China he was involved in pro-democracy movements in the 80s, is that right?

AL: Yeah, yeah!

DG: What has he told you about that time and what he went through?

AL: Well, he was one of the leaders at Tiananmen Square.

DG: Wow!

AL: So you know the Tiananmen Square protests and massacre. Yeah, it was really crazy!

DG: Of course.

AL: Yeah, so he was actually one of the student leaders, and obviously, he had to escape. And so that’s when I think first he went to Hong Kong, Korea, or something, and then he came over here. Yeah, and he started living his life, and now he’s a lawyer. He worked a lot in immigration law.

DG: Well, so, okay, so talk to me about skating during those very early years. Was it your dad who sort of got you into skating at the beginning?

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[SKATING]

AL: He took me and my sister Selena to the rink for a public session one day. I really liked it. I actually do remember it a little bit. I just loved going fast. I have loved roller coasters ever since I was a kid, so I really, you know, love that feeling of adrenaline, and I love to fall and slide. I was always a hyper kid, too, so you know I could get everything out. And I asked my dad, like we just kept going back, and I took group lessons, and I started taking private lessons, and that’s how I got into it.

DG: Alysa was really good at a really young age. She started skating when she was five years old. And by the time she was 12, she was the youngest woman to land a triple axel in an international competition. Then 13 years old b, she became the youngest US women’s champion ever. Then the following year, she won the same title again.

I mean, Alysa, people call you like a skating prodigy at that point, and so much has been written about like you winning that championship at 13 and like needing help to get up onto the medals podium because you were so short at that point as a 13-year-old.

AL: Yeah.

DG: Like, what do you remember about that period and like the pressure, the expectations, because at 13 years old, like, I can’t totally even process what that must feel like.

AL: Yeah, I mean, to be honest, I don’t think I ever really felt the pressure of skating. Like I never felt I had to win everything, and that the whole country was relying on me. Yeah, I’ve always kind of not cared about that sort of stuff.

DG: You’re grounded. That’s the grounded side of you.

AL: Yeah, I guess so.

DG: Okay, so post-championship, you’re in your teenage years. There had to be a time, since we’re getting close to you deciding to step away from the whole sport, that things were getting rough. What is like a low point that you can point to where it was like, okay, this is not, I’m not enjoying this, this is not fun.

AL: Yeah. So the low point in my mind, that was like my highest point because I realized I didn’t want to skate anymore…

DG: That’s really powerful.

[MUSIC]

AL: Yeah, it was bliss to me, actually, but it was when COVID started, and I got my first day off because my previous coach at that time didn’t allow me to take a day off because there was fear that I would lose all my jumps and that I wouldn’t be a good skater. And so I got my first day off, and then it turned into another day off, and another day off, and like it was weeks off and I loved it! I loved not skating, and I didn’t know that I loved not skating because I’d never done that before, and so this is also when I was starting to go through puberty. So my brain was developing a little bit, so day by day, I was, I realized, man, do I really want to skate?

And then once the pandemic was kind of slowing down, a few ranks were like secretly opening, and so I was going to Delaware to skate. And my dad would just drop me off, and he’d go do his own thing; he was working from his laptop, like at the Airbnb we got. So I was living away from my family, too. And I would just be in the rink by myself, and I would just lay on the ice and blast music, like I wouldn’t even skate. I wouldn’t do anything. And so that was going on for a bit. And, you know, once things started picking back up, I was like, “Oh, man, like, I kind of wanted this to be like forever.” Like, I didn’t want to have to go back to training, and because, like, I never really cared about competitions. So there was no motivation for me, and I didn’t enjoy, you know, skating all the time anymore, because that was all I knew. I had no balance. So I went from one extreme, skating all this time, to the other side, to I don’t want to skate at all. And so it was really hard to, you know, get back into, I guess, the competitive mindset because competitions would start back up. But yeah, that’s during COVID is when I kind of decided I really want to quit. But when am I going to quit is the question, yeah.

DG: It’s so striking that so many, you know, young people like yourself went through COVID, and it was painful because you were deprived of, you know, things you loved and friendships and socializing and, you know, in your journey, it was almost a blessing in this strange way.

AL: Yeah, yeah, it was. It was like good in the way that I got a break from the sport, but I was also away from my friends and family. And once COVID kind of the quarantine ended, I was still away from friends and my family because I would move, and I’ve trained in Italy, I’d train in Colorado, and I would just not be home very much. I would miss like Halloween because of competitions. I wouldn’t do Thanksgiving at home. I mean, we don’t really celebrate. Thanksgiving, but my best friend does, and I had to skip that. I would celebrate Christmas by myself, like, it was horrible.

DG: How do you process, you know, it really struck me when you said my brain was starting to develop as I was going through puberty, and you realized that like you had been through these years of like going to the rink and training, and it hadn’t been your decision. You were just like sort of dropped off at the rink, and like do you, do you have complicated emotions about that with your dad, with your coaches? How do you process that?

AL: I think most of my issues stemmed from the environment that I was in, and my dad knew nothing of it, which, like, sucked, but he wouldn’t be at the rink most of the time. He’d be at work because, you know, he has work, so he couldn’t…

DG: Had a job.

AL: Yeah, exactly. So I was at the rink all day with a lot of time my friends, like this was pre-COVID. I’d be at the rinks with my friends, but there was so many things going on with the adults at the rink. They were not, you know, doing as they should, and it was creating a really bad environment for kids and growing up, like, people set the foundation for your morals, you know what I mean? And they teach you what’s right and what’s wrong. And so a lot of the time I was getting told a lot of negative things, and I was being like all of my friends were being trash-talked to me, and like even my dad was being trash-talked to me. And it was just like, but this person, I was like, yeah, this is true, you know, cause I grew up with this person basically telling me all this stuff. And so what I knew was right and what was wrong, it was, you know, really off, and I was getting told a ton of things. And I, once COVID started, you know, I didn’t see this person anymore. And that’s also when my brain was starting to develop, and I was questioning everything they were saying to me. I was, “This is not right, like why would they tell this to me,” or like, “Why would they do this”, and stuff like that. And so getting out of a toxic environment, I think, also helped me, you know, understand what I wanted.

DG: I’m curious about like the toxicity. Was it people who thought they were doing well by you because they were just driven by nothing else than you succeeding?

AL: Yes!

DG: Like not worrying about your mental health, not worrying about your relationships.

AL: Yeah.

DG: Like, we are gonna make you great and whatever it takes.

AL: Yeah, and I mean, it sucks, but I do understand like their mindset, you know, skating is like so many people for them, like skating is their whole life. And they want to accomplish things, and when they don’t get that, people can become very resentful. And they can push their students to, you know, go to extremes. And jealousy is also, like, horrible. That’s when people start talking bad about others, to, you know, like why would a coach talk bad about other people to their students? I think that’s very odd.

DG: Like they’d be trashing your friends and like your father suggesting that they were bad influences on you and not keeping you motivated enough.

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AL: Yeah. Or, like, you won’t be as good if you do this or that, and most of the time it’s not true, but that’s also how they grew up, you know? That’s how they thought they would succeed, I guess. And they didn’t… It’s also, I think, lack of empathy a little bit that they, like, you know, people do this to others. But sports can be really toxic, especially like body image-wise and food-wise. So many people in this sport are being told like horrible things about, you now, their body, and like what they should and shouldn’t eat. And I think nutrition is almost like so messed up sometimes cause they’re non-professionals trying to tell you how you should eat, and they don’t know anything about nutrition (Laughs). And when you’re a kid, you don’t realize that they know nothing about nutrition; you think they know everything, right? So like, I would be told like, “You can’t eat this,” “You shouldn’t drink water,” and stuff like that…

DG: You shouldn’t drink water?

AL: Because you want to be as light as, you should be as light as possible for you know this sport and like you shouldn’t do this certain workout because we don’t want you to like develop too big of muscles like we don’t want you to be muscular, you don’t need muscles as long as you’re thin you know stuff like that. It’s pretty common in the sport, actually. When you’re a kid, you think that adults know everything, but most of the time, it’s just most BS, and they just say what they think is right. They’re not qualified in any sort of way. And I mean, you can’t really blame them. They truly do not know what they’re doing is that harmful. And it’s just, yeah, ignorance is really a problem. But…

DG: And you were so young.

AL: Yeah, I just believe, I would believe everything. And so when COVID started, and I stopped hearing like all the noise, I could think for myself, and I was like, wait a minute, this is not right. This is not right either. And it, I realized, like so many things, are leading to these big issues, and they don’t have to. And, so that’s when I started to change a little bit in my mindset too, and I’m much smarter now, and I know so much more about like nutrition and how working out works, you know, and what muscles you need and how important stretching is and stuff like that. And so I got all my bases covered. So it’s good to be knowledgeable about the things you do, and as kids, it’s impossible to be.

DG: It’s really sad that you went through that at such a young age.

AL: Yeah, I’m actually glad that I did. I wouldn’t, you know, have it any other way. Because going through such extremes like that, I wouldn’t t be 100% confident in what I know now, if I didn’t go through that. Because I experienced firsthand, like, that it doesn’t work, that certain things don’t work the way you want them to. And there’s, there is a recipe for balance and staying healthy. And I think I only truly understood it now because I had to go through it, basically.

DG: These experiences, followed by the perspective that COVID gave her, brought Alysa to the doorstep of quitting figure skating forever at 14 years old. But first she had to talk to her coaches, Jeremy Abbott and Massimo Scali, who were figure skating champions in their own right before they moved on to coaching.

AL: There was this one day, I was warming up doing jump rope. I was in the SF rink, and I started crying while jumping rope, and I couldn’t stop, but right before I stepped on the ice, I pulled myself together, and I start skating. And then Masmo and Jeremy walk into the rink, and I just start crying again on the ice, and they’re like, “Oh my god, are you okay?” And I was like, “I can’t do this, like I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to skate.” And so they were like, okay then, let’s leave, and we went on a hike in San Francisco. And we just spent the whole day outside of the rink, and I was talking to them, like how I wanna quit, how I don’t enjoy the sport anymore, like there’s so many things I would rather be doing than, you know, being at the rink. And Jeremy was actually like, “Oh yeah, well, like you can quit. Like it’s totally okay. Like you could quit today if you wanted. Like, there is so much more than the sport.” And then, yeah, so we were kind of going in that direction. So I almost quit that day, and then, but then Massimo was like, “Well, maybe sleep on it, you know, sleep on it.” So I slept on it, and I ended up not quitting just because I felt I was, like, I don’t know, actually, but I just kept skating. And it was not that, you know, I don’t know how I feel, but, about that decision to keep going, but I did keep going and obviously I had already been planning to quit for a long time and I thought, well if I can at least, you know, go to the Olympics and, you know, accomplish my childhood dream, because I also didn’t want to feel like I did all that for nothing, because I didn’t enjoy, you know, much of the journey either. And if I don’t get any like result in the end, it’s really not worth it. And so that’s kind of where my thought process was, I was like, okay, just make it to the Olympics, and then you can be done. And so that is kind of exactly what I did.

DG: You went to the Olympics in Beijing, not like feeling like you were driving towards trying to medal at all?

AL: Oh no, I just wanted to go to the Olympics, and once I got there, I had already accomplished what I wanted to, so I was just enjoying the moment.

DG: Like Alysa said, she wasn’t necessarily trying to medal at the Beijing Olympics, but she did pretty well anyway. She placed seventh overall and helped Team USA earn a bronze medal. Then in 2022, she moved forward with her plan to give up figure skating altogether.

AL: When I quit, I decided I would never, like, not that I would never, but I wouldn’t compromise so much of myself to do something that I didn’t want to do, I would never do that again. Like making sacrifices for something I didn’t think was worth it.

DG: Keep in mind, when Alysa makes this decision to quit, she’s only 16 years old. She’s just a kid. She had already finished high school a year earlier at just 15 years old. She was homeschooled so she could focus on skating. So after the Beijing Olympics, she’s a super burnt-out teenager. She takes two years off completely, just trying to catch her breath. And then she enrolls at UCLA to study psychology. While she’s working on her undergrad degree, she and her family go on vacation together. And that trip changes everything for Alysa.

I would love if you would take me to a certain ski slope in Tahoe in 2024, a ski trip that I’ve read about. Can you paint a picture for me? Where were you? Who were you with? What was the weather like? How were the ski conditions?

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AL: Yeah, well, I was with all of my siblings, I have four siblings, and I was also with my best friend, and we were just skiing, it was my first time, we were in Tahoe, I’m pretty sure we were at Heavenly.

DG: Nice, good spot. Wait, this is your first time skiing? Is that what you just said?

AL: Yeah, that was my first time skiing.

DG: Oh, wow, okay.

AL: It was January of 2024, and because before then, I just never really skied, and when I was skating before, they didn’t let me ski because they said it was too dangerous and the risk of injury was not worth it. So I was never allowed to ski either, and it was really fun! It was, it wasn’t really snowing, but there was a lot of snow on the mountain, of course, and man, yeah, I don’t know. I just never had to — since I quit, I didn’t have to, you know, feel that adrenaline rush, and so that was the first time I really felt that, and it was great.

DG: So, how did it change your thinking about skating? I mean, you had been away from figure skating for a couple of years. I think that Sports Illustrated had a wonderful line. The only ice she touched was in her drinks. So you had really been off the ice. (Laughs) So what changed on the slopes? Like what magic thing happened in your mind?

AL: I mean, it’s really similar, so I decided to go back on the ice and try it out because if you can get the same feeling from skiing and skating, that’s just so much easier for me.

DG: Was it the same feeling? Like what is the feeling on the slope that feels similar to skating?

AL: I mean, I guess you could say this for every sport, you just give it your all. Like, there’s not many things in life that you do where you have to give 100% of you, you know what I mean? And I kind of love feeling like I’m on my last breath, I guess, or I physically cannot do more. I love pushing myself to that boundary. And I guess I was just missing that when I quit because life was so easy, you know? You don’t have to push your body to its limits, and I love that feeling because you need to have willpower for it, and I guess I just didn’t feel like I needed to have willpower when I quit because everything was so easy compared to it. So I decided to go back into a sport.

DG: Just so you understand how crazy this whole thing was, just two years earlier, Alysa had announced to the entire world that she was done skating. I mean, at this point, she didn’t even know where her old pair of skates was anymore. And now, after one recreational ski trip, she wanted to just get back into the sport like she never left.

Okay, so you call your coach, you had left skating a couple of years ago, telling the world that you were moving on with your life. What did you tell him?

AL: Well, I was just telling him that I want lessons from him and that I kind of want to give my all again to something like a sport and, you know, he was walking me through what life would be like if I did return to the sport because he knew how hard it was for me the last time and he also knew the reasons why I left and he didn’t want me to make the same mistakes again, you know what I mean? Because it would suck if, at the end of this journey I’m on, I ended up feeling the same exact way as I did the first time. So he was just making sure that I was coming back for the right reasons, you know, because a lot of times it’s not like that, and he just didn’t want me to get hurt again. So I was answering all his questions, and I was answering them quite well, and so I convinced him to start coaching me again. (Laughs).

DG: What did you have to convince him? Because it sounds like he’s such a caring person who knew that you went through pain when you were younger, skating, decide to leave, he’s being protective. Like, what do you feel like you said to win him over and say, “Okay, let’s get back into this, Alysa?”

AL: Yeah, well, I basically had to convince him that I was like a healthy individual, you know, I had to pass his psych test, his psych evaluations.

DG: (Laughs)

AL: Because last time, you have no idea, I was dreading going to the rink every day, I did not want to be there, and I felt like I was doing it against my own will. There were so many days where I would show up to the rink, and while warming up, I would just start uncontrollably crying, and I don’t know, just felt a feeling of dread all the time.

DG: Long story short, Alysa convinced her coaches that she really did want to come back to skating. That she was ready for all the hard work it would take, and the stress it would put on her.

More from Alysa Liu, coming up next.

Welcome back to Sports in America, and let’s get right back into our conversation with Alysa Liu.

Her first major competition back on the ice was the 2025 World Championships last year in Boston, where she did that routine set to “MacArthur Park.”

You know, you show up in Boston for the World Championships after you decide to make this comeback, you know, 2025, and you win.

[MUSIC]

DG: And it’s like, everything I saw in the images was that you were probably the most surprised person in that entire arena, but it was just like you were soaking it in, in this like authentic way that I just don’t feel like we see from athletes that often. So, what was the feeling when you won the 2025 World Championships out of nowhere? Like you were this, you were seen as this comeback story. You had decided not to retire. I don’t think there were any expectations that you were gonna win the championship, and you do!

AL: Oh, yeah, no, there was not even a thought. Yeah, not even the thought in my head. I was really happy, but also like I know it matters to a lot of people, but it didn’t matter too much to me. You know what I’m saying?

DG: Yeah.

AL: Yeah, like I mean, it was great. But I feel like they’re much better things in life than you know winning a world championships, but in the moment, you know, it was I mean one it was so shocking and I love good twist You know, what I mean, I love suspense and it was very dramatic and I felt like I was in a movie for like that whole day I was like what is going on but yeah it was great but also I’m really good at staying grounded.

DG: What does that mean? What does it mean, and how do you do that?

AL: I don’t know. I think the weight of world champion is just not non-existent. There’s no weight because it’s like, it’s fake. You know, it is just a title for that one competition that you do. And there’s so many other competitions, and there’s more world championships like next year, and it’s more about the skate instead of the results, because sometimes the results don’t match your performance. And there’s judges, so it’s all biased. And I feel like it almost takes away. So I actually, rather than people knowing me for winning the title, I would rather people know me for what programs I did.

DG: When you said it doesn’t matter to you, I nodded and said, I know what you’re talking about. I actually, I was lying. I actually, I don’t totally picture it. I was like, how can it not matter to the athlete when we’re sort of all watching you and rooting for you? Is it just a matter of just not putting those expectations on yourself?

AL: Well, it’s like those expectations are so shallow, I guess, like it’s just an experience, it comes and goes, and winning is, it is like that, you know. I missed two world championships, and do I feel a certain way about it? Not at all. I don’t care that I missed two world championships, I don’t care that I won this one, I don’t care if I’m not gonna win the next one, like, it just doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.

DG: This is the part of the conversation with Alysa that was so hard for me to really grasp. I mean, I’ve interviewed a lot of elite athletes for this show, Olympians, NFL players, college athletes, and none of them, and I really do mean none of them talk about their sport like this, that the titles don’t matter to them at all, that they really don’t care about winning, that they can somehow unburden themselves of all the external pressures. Honestly, part of this mentality from Alysa drove me crazy. I mean, hello, you’re a professional athlete, and you’re telling me you don’t really feel any pressure. There’s just no way that’s true. But then another part of me was kind of inspired.

[MUSIC]

Alysa had been through a lot from a young age. Not all of it was fair to her. If she really can shake off the expectations that everyone is putting on her and just compete for herself, for the love of the sport, then that’s pretty amazing.

All right, well, let’s talk about these upcoming Olympics in Italy, because I am, I mean, you said your life feels like a movie, and it really, I will say as an, as an outside observer, like it almost, it feels that way after everything. I mean, the toxicity that you dealt with at such a young age, the retiring from the sport, and then the decision to come back in a totally different way, like how are you approaching these Olympics?

AL: Honestly, it’s almost similar to the time the last time I was at the Olympics, but I’m actually enjoying the sport. So I’m really excited for it. I also heard that this Olympics will be better just because it won’t be a COVID Olympics. And I mean, listen, I’m really excited. It’s like the biggest stage ever. And I have programs I really like and that I really want to show, so kind of all I feel is excitement, you know? I mean, I have a ways to go before I reach the programs that I’m really super proud of. I have a lot of work to do, but by Olympics, I’ll have those programs the way I want. And hopefully, I’ll be able to perform it the way that I want as well. But yeah, I mean so much anticipation.

DG: I mean, I don’t have to tell you this, the international attention, you know, since you won the world championship in Boston, it’s only going to grow as we get closer. the hopes of so many Americans are going to be riding on your shoulders. Figure skating is a sport that so many people love. I mean, I just read this line from a piece in The Guardian, “Were she to win a medal of any color in Milan, Liu would become the first American woman to reach the Olympic podium since Sasha Cohen won silver in 2006\. Like, how do you not let those expectations and those narratives take you out of this unbelievably impressive kind of like state of just flow that you’re in right now, just like going with the flow and enjoying this and having fun.

AL: Yeah, I mean, things will play out the way they’re meant to, I think. And I mean, we have other U.S. women too, so luckily it won’t only be me. So I guess that also takes pressure off because there’s other people that are metal potentials. And yeah, I just really don’t care, I guess. I just personally can’t bring myself to truly care about winning a medal or not.

DG: And sounds like that’s part of your success. Like you do your best when you’re not caring as much. When you’re having fun, I guess is what I’m saying. When you’re enjoying performing.

AL: Yeah, I mean, when I’m enjoying performing, it doesn’t matter what happens. And also, oh yeah, like for example, if I skate horribly but somehow get a medal, I will not be happy with that. I would rather skate really well and not get a medal, you know what I mean? I also like when other people skate well. Ugh, I love a good competition, you know?

DG: As we kind of finish up your journey, a prodigy you were called, like a incredibly young athlete competing at the highest level and winning a championship at the age of 13, all of that pressure, the toxicity as you described it, and then leaving, leaving the sport, and then like this comeback journey, Like, as you look at that whole trajectory, what does your life and journey tell us about sports, about skating, about life?

AL: Moral of the story is trying to have a good balance, you know, balance is so important, and that’s for anyone, like athlete or not. You shouldn’t be 100% into something and, you know, not exploring the rest of your potential, basically. That would be doing yourself a disservice. Literally as long as you’re having fun, you know, I feel like I don’t take life very seriously, because it’s not. So, yeah, I’m just going with it. There’s just so many different paths you could take in life. Like if I quit today, oh my God, there’s so many possibilities. Like I would not be mad. There’s so many other things I could be doing.

DG: Alysa, this has been a true pleasure, and I don’t want to put pressure on you, but we’re all rooting for you in Italy and can’t wait to see you on the ice. Best of luck to you. And thank you so much for the time.

AL: Yes, thank you so much. This was really fun!

[THEME MUSIC]

DG: Next time, on Sports in America…

BROADCASTER: Nick Goepper, another silver!

DG: We take the leap with freestyle skier and three-time Olympic medalist Nick Goepper, as he prepares to compete in Milan.

NICK GOEPPER: I’ve been on a different track than most people for my entire life.

DG: We’ll talk about the highs and lows of preparing for the Games, the struggle when the world’s obsession with you moves on, and the challenge of managing mental health and addiction alongside an elite level of training.

NG: Oh my God, you won an Olympic medal, you’ve got some money, you’re on national TV. Like, what could possibly be going wrong for you, kid?

DG: We also want to hear from you, maybe your favorite Olympic underdog stories, maybe the best place to grab an espresso in Milan. Whatever it is, how about you drop us a line? You can write us at sportsinamerica@whyy.org, that’s sportsinamerica@whyy.org.

This is Sports in America. I’m your host, David Greene.

Our executive producers are Joan Isabella and Tom Grahsler.

Our senior producer is Michael Olcott. Our producer is Michaela Winberg, and our associate producer is Bibiana Correa.

Our engineer is Mike Villers. Our talent booker is Brit Kahn. Our tile artwork was created by Bea Walling.

Sports in America is a production of WHYY in Philadelphia and is distributed by PRX. Some of our interviews were originally created by Religion of Sports, with special thanks to Adam Schlossman. You can find Sports in America on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, the iHeart Radio app, you know, wherever you get your podcasts.

Oh, and just one quick reminder, new podcast episodes of the show drop every Thursday now. So Thursday is when you can expect the feed to update. Thanks so much for listening to Sports in America.

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Host: David Greene
Executive Producers: Joan Isabella, Tom Grahsler
Senior Producer: Michael Olcott
Producer: Michaela Winberg
Associate Producer: Bibiana Correa
Talent Booker: Britt Kahn
Engineer: Mike Villers
Tile Art: Bea Walling

Sports in America is a production of WHYY, distributed by PRX, and part of the NPR podcast network.

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