Barry Werner
AP Sports Writer
Liu Lisa
2022 Olympic and World Championship bronze medalist Alysa Liu will retire from competitive figure skating at the age of 16.
Considering the future of U.S. women’s skating, and already a two-time national champion, Liu posted her decision on Instagram on April 9.
“Honestly, I never thought I would achieve as much as LMAOO, and I’m very happy,” Liu said in her post. “I am very satisfied with the progress of my skating career. Now that I have finally achieved my skating goals, I will move on with my life. … This skating event has taught me a lot more about life than I expected More. I’m really glad I skated.”
And skating better than any American woman at such a young age.
In 2019, 13-year-old Liu won her first national championship and again the following year, taking advantage of the triple axis that few American women have successfully landed. However, she was too young to compete at the advanced level internationally, but as a junior she was still a formidable force and comfortable with the quad jump.
But she lost the last two national championships to Brady Tennell and Maria Bell, and was named to the Olympic team even though she had to drop out of trials in January after testing positive for COVID-19.
Ms. Liu, from Richmond, Calif., recovered in time to skate at the Beijing Olympics, where she completed seven triple jumps in the free skate, finishing seventh.
She then placed third in the watered-down world championships that Russian skaters didn’t take part in, behind Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto and Belgium’s Loena Hendrickx. It was the first medal for an American woman in the world since Ashley Wagner in 2016.
Now, Mr. Liu is done.
“I started skating when I was 5 so I was on the ice for about 11 years and it was a crazy 11 years,” she posted while on the Stars on Ice tour in Japan. “There’s a lot of good and a lot of bad, but (you know) that’s it. I’ve made a lot of friends and have a lot of great memories that I’ll have for the rest of my life.”
