Figure skater Cha Jun-hwan (Seoul City Hall) made mistakes in his first appearance at the 2026 Milan-Cortina d'Ampezzo Winter Olympics men's single and finished with disappointment.
Cha Jun-hwan received a technical element score (TES) of 41.78, a program component score (PCS) of 41.75, and a total of 83.53 in the men's single short program of the figure team event at the Milan Ice Skating Arena in Italy on the 7th local time. He placed eighth among the 10 skaters.
Cha began his short program to "Rain in Your Black Eyes." He nailed the first element, a quadruple Salchow, and also landed the second jumping element, a triple Lutz–triple loop combination, perfectly.
However, on the first element of the second half and the final jumping element, the triple Axel, his rotation unraveled during takeoff and it was downgraded to a single Axel, which is one and a half rotations. In the men's single short program, a double Axel or triple Axel is mandatory. A single Axel receives zero points.
After finishing, Cha met reporters in the mixed zone and said, "It's a bit disappointing that I made a mistake on the third jump, the triple Axel, but I have two days until the individual event, so I want to recover well and skate better," adding, "I wanted to deliver a performance that could give energy to my teammates, but I made a mistake. I will make up for that in the individual event."
Cha said, "It's my first time taking part in the opening ceremony, and with the team event as well, I've been handling a really busy schedule and enjoying it." He added, "First of all, I'm really enjoying the Korean boxed meals delivered for lunch and dinner. It's also really nice to interact with athletes from other sports whom I don't usually get to meet."
Korea finished seventh in the team standings with a total of 14 points. It failed to advance to the free, which is contested by the top five teams.
In the team event, a national team competition, 10 countries compete across four disciplines: men's single, women's single, pairs, and ice dance. Points from 10 to 1 are awarded by placement in each discipline. The top five countries in total points advance to the free skating to determine the final standings.
However, Korea has no entry in pairs. Among the 10 countries, Korea was the only team competing in just three disciplines, so the chances of reaching the free were slim to begin with.
Japan's Kagiyama Yuma won the men's single short program in the figure team event with 108.67 points, and "quad king" Ilia Malinin (United States) placed second with 98.00.
Malinin is called a "jump machine." During his program, he drew attention by performing a backflip.
With this, the backflip returned after 50 years. The backflip was first performed by U.S. men's single skater Terry Kubicka at the 1976 Innsbruck Olympics. But the International Skating Union (ISU) banned the move due to injury risk. Then in 2024, the ISU said, "In modern figure skating, where high-difficulty elements have become common, it is not logical to ban the backflip," and recognized it as an official element.