MILAN, Feb 20 — American Alysa Liu surged from third at the start of the day to win the Olympic women’s singles figure skating gold with an electrifying performance at the Milan-Cortina Games on Thursday.

World champion Liu took the title ahead of Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto who missed out on gold by just 1.89 points with 17-year-old Ami Nakai winning bronze after the free skating final at the Milano Ice Skating Arena.

Liu hit a career-best score in the free skate and her overall 226.79 points was also a lifetime best as she grabbed her second gold in Milan after helping the US team to the title.

“I was so calm when I started,” Liu said.

“I have this breathing technique that I use throughout this programme, and I was just making sure to lock in on that, be as smooth as I can and look out into the crowd during all my transitions.

“I felt everyone’s energy. I felt my energy and I put it all out there.”

The 20-year-old put the US women back on top of the Olympic women’s podium in this event for the first time since Sarah Hughes took gold at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games.

Watched by 1956 women’s champion Tenley Albright, the first American woman to win Olympic gold in the Cortina d’Ampezzo Games, Liu became the eighth US woman to take the title.

The US women had not won a medal of any colour since Sasha Cohen took silver in Turin 2006.

Sakamoto left the ice in tears knowing that she had not done enough for gold in her final competition, achieving 224.90 for the silver.

The effervescent Nakai scored 219.16 to snatch bronze having led Sakamoto and Liu after the short programme.

Wearing a sparkling golden costume Liu, who stands out with her “halo” stripped hairstyle and mouth piercing, outshone her rivals with her pulsating routine to Donna Summer’s disco version of MacArthur Park which brought the crowd to their feet.

Liu, the daughter of a Chinese immigrant who fled to the United States after participating in the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, finished sixth at the Beijing Olympics four years ago aged 16.

She retired from competing after taking bronze at the 2022 world championships but the Californian powered back last season, upsetting Sakamoto to take the world title and win the ISU Grand Prix final in December.

“Oh my god. It was just right,” she said of her decision to return.

Sakamoto skated to a version of Non, je ne regrette rien sung by Patricia Kaas but lost points for not doing her planned triple-triple combination.

The 25-year-old nevertheless achieved a fourth Olympic medal after singles bronze in Beijing four years ago, and two team silvers with Japan.

“The points I lost on those mistakes were exactly the margin that cost me the gold medal. That’s the most frustrating part — I know I left something out there,” Sakamoto said.

“Still, I achieved my goal of winning medals in both the team (silver) and individual events, so I want to recognise that.”

Nakai, the youngest competitor, skated last to What a Wonderful World and hit an opening three-and-a-half rotation triple axel but only achieved the ninth best score for her free skate.

Japanese skater Mone Chiba was fourth ahead of American Amber Glenn who rose from 13th after the short programme to fifth.

Glenn, the reigning and three-time US champion, delivered a spirited performance with an opening triple Axel jump in a routine only marred by her touching the ice on the final triple jump of eight on the night.

Glenn, at 26 the oldest US woman to compete in the Olympics in nearly a century, earned her season’s best 147.52 points for the free skate and 214.91 overall.

“It wasn’t easy,” said Glenn. “There’s been a bombardment of attacks and hate on me, using my lacklustre performance as fuel for hate, and that was disheartening.

“I just thought, I’m going do what I do best, which is enjoy skating, and that’s what I did today.”

Russia’s Adeliia Petrosian, competing under a neutral flag, finished sixth after the 18-year-old fell on her opening attempt to land a quadruple four-rotation jump. — AFP