BOSTON – In her first figure skating career, the one she ended with a retirement three years ago at age 16, Alysa Liu won national titles, made history as the youngest this and the youngest that, did landmark jumps for a U.S. woman, competed in the Olympics and won a world championships bronze medal.
The way Liu describes all that now, it was a pretty joyless experience.
She didn’t like to practice. That meant she rarely went into a competition as prepared as she needed to be. That — and injuries — made her performances erratic.
“It was a job,” she said.
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Her unexpected return this season, on her own terms, has been so enjoyable that Liu literally turned a cartwheel on the entry walkway before taking the ice for Wednesday afternoon’s short program at the 2025 World Championships.
The way she skated, it would not have been surprising if Liu turned multiple cartwheels on the ice after a performance that not only brought the TD Garden crowd to its feet but put her in first place going into Friday night’s free skate.
“It is so much more fun this time,” Liu said. “I really don’t think I wanted to do any competitions before, but now I really do want to.”
With 74.58 points, her highest short program score in international competition, Liu leads Japan’s Mone Chiba by 1.14 points and U.S. teammate Isabeau Levito, the reigning world silver medalist, by 1.25.
U.S. champion Amber Glenn, a title favorite, fought back from a fall on her opening element, a triple Axel. The big mistake left Glenn ninth, but just 5.68 points from third.
Three-time defending champion Kaori Sakamoto of Japan made lesser errors on her jump combination, footwork sequence and a spin. They left her fifth, 2.30 from third and 3.55 from first.
It was a top three few would have foreseen. Chiba, seventh at her first worlds appearance last year, was sixth at last month’s Four Continents Championships. Levito had been sidelined by a foot injury from last fall until late February, when her comeback performance at a lesser event in Italy was both cautiously restrained and decidedly underwhelming.
“That injury traumatized me a little bit,” Levito said. “I would be in constant fear I was going to do something to make it hurt again.”
Not since Gracie Gold in 2016, also in Boston, had a U.S. woman led worlds after the short program. That was near the beginning of an eight-year period when Russians came to utterly dominate women’s singles on both junior and senior levels.
Russians have been barred from international figure skating competition since their country’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine just after the 2022 Olympics. The International Skating Union has decided to allow one Russian entry per discipline next season, including at the Winter Olympics.
To the question of whether worlds would be more interesting with the Russians, Liu answered, “Maybe. I think competitions are more fun, the more people you can include.”
Skating to Laufey’s “Promise,” music that describes an off-and-on love relationship that mirrors her bond with figure skating, Liu flowed flawlessly through the 2 minutes, 50 seconds, executing the seven elements with utter command.
“Without the music, the moving is just not the same,” Liu said. “You have to pick the right piece for yourself.”
Ironically, the melancholy mood of the music does not match Liu’s unabashed new enthusiasm for her sport, the attitude that led her to express herself with the cartwheel.
“I was trying to think, ‘What am I gonna do?’” Liu said. “I got to that moment and I was like, ‘You haven’t thought of anything,’ but immediately saw open space and (went), ‘Cartwheel.’’’
The 2022 Worlds, where she won bronze, had been Liu’s final competition before a retirement that seemed permanent when she announced it.
She then spent one season hanging with friends near her Oakland, Calif., home. She enrolled at UCLA the next. She travelled. Suddenly, a ski trip rekindled her desire to do a sport, and it led her back to a rink after 18 months of not putting on skates.
People told her she was crazy to retire at what should have been the peak of her career. Her once and current coach, Phillip DiGuglielmo, told her she was crazy to try to come back when she first broached the idea with him.
It was a sign of her growing maturity that Liu took control of her future after years of simply doing what others expected her to do. Her goal would be making another Olympic team.
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t decide to retire for a little bit,” Liu said. “I’m glad I listened to myself.”
She returned to competition last fall, improving incrementally, recapturing the skills that had at age 13 made her in 2019 the youngest U.S. champion in history, adding to it the élan and sophistication of a young woman. She made the U.S. world team by finishing a close second to Glenn at January’s U.S. Championships.
“This isn’t going to be my best season,” Liu said. “This is definitely gonna be the starter season for me.”
Yet her performance in the short program was that of a polished skater, one who never had skated better in either of her careers than she did Wednesday. The audience’s reaction reminded her of how special her sport can be.
“I just love the feeling towards the end of the program, when you hear the crowd and you see them,” she said. “You can’t find that feeling like anywhere else. It’s really cool.”
It’s what you can get with fire on ice.
Philip Hersh is a special contributor to NBCSports.com. He has covered figure skating at the last 12 Winter Olympics.
