Ilia Malinin is getting a lot of attention during the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan. While most of it relates to Malinin’s performance as part of Team USA, there’s plenty of online chatter regarding whether the 21-year-old backflipping figure skater has a significant other in his life.
Malinin, nicknamed the “Quad God” after becoming the first skater in history to land a quadruple axel in competition back in 2022, tells People he’s laser-focused on his career and academic responsibilities as a student at George Mason University, suggesting he has no time for or interest in dating.
“I want to put my priorities into my career first and just see where that takes me,” he told the magazine in January.
In 2023, a then-18-year-old Malinin addressed controversial comments he made on Instagram Live in which a fan asked him if he needed to “prove” he’s straight.
“Let’s be honest, I can’t be straight anymore because I need those (artistic) component scores up, you know,” Malinin said. “I gotta say that I’m not straight, that way my components are gonna go up.”
Malinin quickly apologized for the off-hand remarks on Twitter:
“I want to truly apologize to everyone for my ‘teenage’ behavior and I am aware that this mistake can’t really be undone. … I hope that everyone understands I mean no hate to anyone. Thank you all for understanding this mistake and making it known to me that I made a mistake.”
He also sent a formal apology to U.S. Figure Skating for “linking sexual orientation and scoring by judges” in his comments.
