How it feels to watch @ilia_quadg0d_malinin’s Quadruple Axel for the first time (and every time since). In 2022, I recorded Ilia Malinin landing the first ever Quadruple Axel (4.5 revolutions) in Grand Prix competition. Specifically, I wanted to capture the crowd’s reaction after the jump. Every single face in that sold out crowd was there to watch something once deemed impossible. I know at least one photographer who didn’t even want to shoot it—he just wanted to witness it with his own two eye

For decades, it was considered the holy grail of figure skating, a jump so difficult, so daring, so completely defiant of the laws of physics that nobody would ever land it—until the quadruple axel was conquered by a young American who calls himself the Quad God. His real name is Ilia Malinin. And that name is everywhere this Olympics. The 21-year old from Northern Virginia comes into the Milan Cortina Olympics as one of Team USA’s biggest stars. Since mastering the quad axel, he has continued t