Olympic Figure Skaters
Over the course of history in the winter Olympics figure skating has been one of the most popular events of the Olympics and there have been many great Olympic figure skaters over the years as well. There are different competitions among Olympic figure skaters involving solo competitions and couples competitions. The figure skating we see in the modern day Winter Olympics was to have been started by a New York man named Jackson Haines who came up with a combo ballet, music and skating show which failed in America originally but flourished when he brought the show to Europe. Figure skating originally started in the Summer Olympics before they began hosting the Winter Olympics, but figure skating was what helped spawn the idea of the Winter Olympics in the first place. It was a sport they wanted in The Olympic but it didn’t fit well with other summer events since it had to be indoors.
Since the inception of figure skating in the Olympics there have been many famous Olympic figure skaters but a lot of the really well known Olympic figure skaters were some of the competitors in the last couple decades. A very famous American skater was Brian Boitano. He was one of the most famous American skaters and he won the Olympic gold in 1988, when he was the first American figure skater to land a triple axel jump in skating. Brian Boitano was also the first male skater to make the cover of Sports Illustrated. Michelle Kwan is one of the most famous female Olympic figure skaters and she is also the most decorated figure skater in American history. She has won many championships and has two Olympic medals under her belt. Some other well known figure skaters are Dorothy Hamill and Kristi Yamaguchi. There have been many great figure skaters and there will continue to be many more as the sport keeps bringing up new young talent.