Jackie Wong

And so the only Russians who are competing will be one Russian woman, Adelia Petrosyan, and one Russian man, Peter Gumenik, both of whom have the potential to be on the podium.

Picker skating is expensive, if folks don't know.

You know, training costs, ice costs, off-ice costs, equipment costs, costuming costs, right?

Injuries.

Yeah, injuries.

If you're looking at an Olympic-level elite athlete, they're spending $50,000 to $100,000 a year just on, you know,

know being as good as they are right and and so um figure skating does not pay very much uh people rely on shows people rely on there's some prize money involved in in figure skating competitions um not chump change but also it's not like you're it's not golf right you're not getting millions of dollars for winning

some random golf tournament.

It's very different in terms of the actual financials.

And so, you know, we see skaters having to, who qualify for the Olympics, having to put GoFundMes out there because they want to have their family out there

in, in, uh, in Milan to, to support them.

Right.

And so the, the skating community is actually very big on supporting its own skaters.

Um,

But it is, the harsh reality is unless you are one of the very top skaters from one of the very top nations of figure skating, you are not getting endorsement deals.

And if you are, they're not like a huge part of your income.

And it gets to be, it all adds up.

You know, your Ilian Malinans of the world or your Kari Sakamoto's of the world are getting endorsements.

those opportunities but they are also getting them in very small chunks right like you get you get your flash in the pan especially during the Olympics um and you got to take advantage of it all right real quick before we go to a break what is your favorite non-figure skating Winter Olympic sports to watch

Short track is certainly one.