With the Team Event behind us, the appetizer is complete and first of the main courses is about to be served. The men kick off the individual events at the 2022 Winter Olympics, and make no mistake, though there are four skaters who have separated themselves from the rest of the pack, this is an incredibly deep field. There are some 15-20 skaters who have demonstrated at one point or another that they are capable of finishing in the top ten in this event. And lest we forget, men’s figure skating this season has been overbearingly unpredictable, with tons of movement between the short and the free at many of the international events this season. Get ready for a wild ride.
2022 Winter Olympics men predictions
Official hashtag: #Beijing2022
GOLD Nathan Chen USA - It may very well be the tale of base values here for the three-time World champion. Chen comes in with the most difficult short program ever done by anyone and the highest base value content in the free skate of anyone in this field. This is, by no means, anything close to a done deal, as he still needs to get the job done. If anything was lingering in the back of his mind from PyeongChang coming into Beijing, his Team Event short program likely did a lot to quiet them down. The first jump will set the tone, and unlike PyeongChang, he’s now got four years of high-pressure experience under his belt to guide him through.
SILVER Yuzuru Hanyu JPN - On the topic of base values, where Hanyu’s disadvantage is to not only Chen but also Kagiyama and Uno is his base value. Of the top four men, he’s the one who goes out there with the lowest base values across the board - and that’s precisely why the quad axel is so crucial for him. A clean quad axel gets him close to Chen, but it still sets up a 12-point deficit in base value. And every quarter-rotation under that axel is opens that gap even more. If it’s underrotated, the gap increases by 2.50; if it’s downgraded, it increases by another 2.00. We all know that Hanyu is legendary for having the most impeccable execution in the world, and so his path to his third consecutive gold will need to be a combination of the first quad axel ever landed and skating clean - a very tall task.
BRONZE Shoma Uno JPN - Uno comes in perhaps the most prepared and the most stable he’s ever looked in his career. It remains to be seen whether he can translate what we’ve seen in practice into clean skates in competition. All this and we almost forget that he looked like he might not have survived the Olympic quad just two seasons ago when he went through the coaching change and the slump. He came into this season with a go-big-or-go-home mentality - putting in five quads in his free skate to hang with the best. And his gamble may well pay off for a second individual Olympic medal.
4. Yuma Kagiyama JPN - The reigning World silver medalist showed in the Team Event that he is absolutely a force to be reckoned with in this individual event. Of the four favorites, he’s the one with the least experience, and we’ve seen in the past couple of seasons that he’s sometimes prone to fluke but costly short program errors. He will need to keep it even in the short program, and then bank on hitting the quad loop in the free. The loop is the biggest liability right now for him - he’s been about 10-20% on getting them rotated in practice this season, but he committed to it when it mattered most in the Team Event. Can he make that inexperience work in his favor?
5. Mark Kondratiuk ROC - A season ago, Kondratiuk was a complete unknown to the international figure skating community. He had just come out of nowhere to win bronze at Russian Nationals, and he went on in the fall of this season to earn the third Olympic spot for the Russian men at Nebelhorn Trophy. And after winning the Russian title, he has been on a meteoric rise, winning Europeans and then helping Team ROC grab gold in the Team Event. All signs point to a brilliant Olympic individual debut if he’s able to sustain that momentum.
6. Junhwan Cha KOR - The newly-crowned Four Continents champion has grown not only in the past few seasons but also in this season alone. Though he had some moments in the fall, his fall season had some inconsistencies that kept him from being at his best. But Four Continents was the competition of his career, and he is riding on that excitement - now a much more experienced and much more well-rounded skater than he was when he made his Olympic debut at home four years ago.
7. Vincent Zhou USA - This prediction was made before the news that Zhou tested positive for COVID yesterday - unless the . Zhou looked tight and out of sorts in his free skate during the Team Event, and you wonder if the pressure of keeping the Americans’ door to a surprise team gold open had gotten to him. He has had brilliant skates at big events before, but he’s also left a lot on the table - all in all, consistency in pressure situations has not always been a given, but if he can go clean, his base value can put him with the rest of the favorites.
8. Andrei Mozalev ROC - After winning the short at Europeans, Mozalev couldn’t follow it up with a free skate to keep him on the podium, and it was the opposite at Russian Nationals, where he made an error in the short and came back in the free. Of the three Russian men, Mozalev has the most stable jumps when he does them, and he’s got some fine foundational skating that will keep him competitive for that top ten finish.
9. Jason Brown USA - Eight years removed from his first appearance at the Olympics, Brown is a different skater and a different person, but he’s built his career and brand around his basic skating. Even without a reliable quad, he’s been holding his own internationally for years, as he’s indisputably among the very best skating-skaters of any generation. Get ready for a transcendent short program from Brown as he competes in what is likely his second and final Olympics.
10. Deniss Vasiljevs LAT - The European bronze medalist has been putting down some of the best skating of his career this season. The squeaked-out underrotated jumps of the past have been fewer on the protocol sheets for him this season, and that will be very important for him to get into that top ten. He was 19th four years ago in PyeongChang.
Top 11-24 predictions
11. Kevin Aymoz FRA
12. Daniel Grassl ITA
13. Keegan Messing CAN
14. Evgeni Semenenko ROC
15. Matteo Rizzo ITA
16. Brendan Kerry AUS
17. Adam Siao Him Fa FRA
18. Morisi Kvitelashvili GEO
19. Michal Brezina CZE
20. Boyang Jin CHN
21. Lukas Britschgi SUI
22. Vladimir Litvintsev AZE
23. Sihyeong Lee KOR
24. Alexei Bychenko ISR