American superstar Alysa Liu added Olympic figure skating gold to her world title as she beat a standout field in the women’s final.
Liu came into the free skate in third place following a couple of errors in the short program, but produced a performance for the ages.
Appropriately wearing a sparkly gold dress and performing to Donna Summer, she scored a staggering 150.20 in her free skate.
It pushed her to the top of the leaderboard with an overall score of 226.79, narrowly beating Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto – who Liu beat to the world title last year.
Sakamoto, in her final performance before retirement, won silver with 17-year-old compatriot Ami Nakai claiming bronze.
Japan’s Mone Chiba finished fourth, ahead of Amber Glenn – who rose from 13th to fifth after an excellent free skate – while Russian champion Adeliia Petrosian came sixth following a fall.
Liu, 20, becomes the first American Olympic champion in women’s figure skating since Sarah Hughes in 2002, and the first USA medallist since Sasha Cohen in 2006.
She was playing catch up on Nakai – leader after the short program – and Sakamoto after Tuesday night following a mistake on her triple lutz where she failed to fully rotate in the element.
But there were no mistakes here with a truly showstopping routine that drew deafening cheers from the crowd.
It was a much needed boost for the USA, as their only gold in singles figure skating following Ilia Malinin’s collapse in the men’s event.
Malinin was among those in the crowd who gave Liu – the alt girl with her iconic halo hair and lip piercing – a standing ovation as she wrote herself into Olympic folklore.
It completes a remarkable comeback for Liu, who previously quit the sport aged 16 after missing out on a medal at Beijing 2022.
Sakamoto meanwhile has to settle for silver as her stellar career ends without an Olympic crown.
She is retiring aged 25 having won three world titles and bronze at Beijing 2022.
Her final performance here was to Non, je ne regrette rien by Edith Piaf, and Sakamoto must have no regrets about a performance in which all 12 elements were given positive grades of execution.
But it scored five points lower than Liu in the technical elements, with the American’s routine judged to have been more challenging.
Sakamoto wept as she left the ice, but by the medal ceremony rightly looked delighted with another major honour.
That initial disappointment was in stark contrast to the joy of compatriot Nakai, who ends a phenomenal debut campaign with an Olympic medal.
The youngest skater in the competition, Nakai stormed to the top of the leaderboard following the short program and opened her free skate with a triple axel – a brutally tough element she is now making her trademark.
But Nakai stumbled on her triple lutz, which played a major role in knocking her down below Liu and Sakamoto.
For a while, it looked like American champion Glenn might have produced an all-time great Olympic comeback.
She was down in 13th following a disastrous short program which left her in tears after she missed her triple loop, meaning it was scored zero as an invalid element.
Glenn – who is open about her bisexuality and criticism of USA president Donald Trump – has been a magnet for online backlash, and came out on Thursday in Milan with a point to prove.
Despite suffering a heavy fall in the warm-up she attacked her free skate, including a triple axel to start then a complex triple loop and double axel sequence.
She punched the air at the conclusion, and even as she missed out on a medal she had the body language of someone pleased to have brought her best to the Olympic stage.
