Figure Skating Today



2010 Olympic Gold Medalist Evan Lysacek

 Modern day figure skating is separated into four categories of competition: single skating events for both genders, pair skating, ice dancing, and synchronized skating.  Male skaters from the United States, Russia, and Canada have demonstrated dominance in the sport for the past several years.  Brian Orser, Brian Boitano, Alexander Fadeev, Viktor Petrenko, Kurt Browning, Elvis Stojko, Alexei Yagudin, Evgeni Plushenko, Evan Lysacek, and Patrick Chan are just a few of those skaters who have excelled in figure skating recently.


2010 Olympic Gold Medalist Yuna Kim      


On the ladies' spectrum, the field of dominance in figure skating has been much more internationally varied. Katarina Witt, a skater from East Germany, was considered to be the world's best figure skater after winning the gold medal in the 1984 Winter Olympics and continuing her reign as Olympic Champion by winning gold yet again at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary.  Other tremendous female figure skaters of the past few decades include Michelle Kwan, Midori Ito, Kristi Yamaguchi, Nancy Kerrigan, Oksana Baiul, Yuka Sato, Surya Bonaly, Chen Lu, Tara Lipinski, Maria Butyrskaya, Sarah Hughes, Irina Slutskaya, Shizuka Arakawa, Fumie Suguri, Kimmie Meissner, Sasha Cohen, Joannie Rochette, Carolina Kostner, Miki Ando, Yuna Kim, and Mao Asada. 

Pairs figure skating has been dominated most recently by a female and male skater of Russia and China, while Canada and the United States have been dominating the field of ice dancing.