You Young

One of her coaches was Singapore-based Zhang Wei, a former Chinese national ice dancer who won gold with partner Wang Rui at the 1999 Asian Winter Games, who she trained with for six months in 2012.

Zhang said her talent was evident even then and told TODAY: "She's not the most talented athlete I've coached. But her jumps, explosive energy, flexibility and coordination were very good then, and it is very rare that you get all these qualities in one athlete, particularly at that age."

He is confident that You has what it takes to become a future world and Olympic champion.

You Young (Hangul: 유영; born May 27, 2004) is a South Korean figure skater.

You Young began skating after watching Yuna Kim's victory at the 2010 Winter Olympic Games.

Though maintaining South Korean nationality, she was raised in Singapore, trained under various coaches, and competed in the Singapore National Figure Skating Championships from 2011 to 2013.

On his advice, You returned to South Korea with her mother in March 2013 to further her development as the training environment is better.

You is the youngest ever national champion of South Korea at age 11 in 2016.

She is also the first Korean woman to successfully land a triple Axel in an international competition and the first Asian woman to win the gold medal in Figure skating at the Winter Youth Olympics.

In January 2016, You Young won the gold medal at the 2016 South Korean Figure Skating Championships, becoming the youngest-ever national champion of South Korea at age 11, surpassing the previous record set by Yuna Kim who won at age 12 in 2003.

In March, You won the gold medal at the novice level of the Cup of Tyrol.

In November 2016, You won the silver medal at the novice level of the Tallinn Trophy behind Alena Kanysheva of Russia.

In January 2017, she finished fifth at the 2017 South Korean Figure Skating Championships mainly because of a fall in the short program.

You debuted on the Junior Grand Prix (JGP) series in September 2018, placing fourth at JGP Croatia in Zagreb.

In October, she placed fifth at JGP Italy in Egna.

In January 2018, she won the gold medal at the 2018 South Korean Figure Skating Championships, earning her second national title.

In March, You finished ninth at the 2018 World Junior Championships.

In August 2018, You began competing on the JGP series, winning the bronze medal at JGP Slovakia in Bratislava, behind Russians Anna Shcherbakova and Anna Tarusina.

It is currently her first and only JGP medal.

She then placed fourth at JGP Canada in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada.

She currently holds the fourth highest technical element score in the short program (45.54 at the 2019 Skate Canada) and the ninth highest technical element score in the free skate (79.94 at the 2020 Four Continents).

She remains the first and only female skater to have landed the triple Axel at the Youth Olympics.

Competing in the 2022 Beijing Olympics, You placed 5th overall.

As of April 17, 2022, You is the 4th highest ranked women's singles skater in world by the International Skating Union.

You Young is the third child and only daughter of her father, You Il-jin, who ran a business in Indonesia, and mother, Lee Sook-hee.

She moved to Indonesia at age two because of her father's business and spent her youth in Singapore.

She enrolled in Bukit Timah primary school and attended school for a year before she returned to South Korea.

You's father passed away in February of 2022.

After earning her third national title, You was assigned to the 2019 World Junior Championships.

In February 2019, she won gold at the 2019 Bavarian Open and the 2019 Winter Children of Asia ISG.

After a poor short program at Junior Worlds that left her in eleventh place, You rose to sixth place overall with a stronger free skate.

You opened her season at the 2019 Philadelphia Summer International, where she won the gold medal.

You debuted on the Challenger series, winning the bronze medal at the 2019 CS Lombardia Trophy behind Russians Anna Shcherbakova and Elizaveta Tuktamysheva after she placed second in the short program and third in the free program.

At this competition, she scored over 70 points in the short program, 130 points in the free skate, and 200 points overall for the first time in an ISU-sanctioned competition.

One week later, You won the silver medal at another Challenger, the 2019 CS U.S. Classic, winning the free skate by scoring over 140 points for the first time.

During this period, it was reported that You made a coaching change, with Mie Hamada becoming her primary coach along with Tammy Gambill.

Making her senior Grand Prix debut at the 2019 Skate Canada International, You successfully landed a ratified triple Axel in the short program to place second behind new training mate Rika Kihira of Japan with a new personal best score (78.22).

She noted that this was a moment she had been working toward for three years.

She is the 2020 Four Continents silver medalist, a four-time Grand Prix bronze medalist, a four-time Challenger series medalist, and a five-time South Korean national champion (2016, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2022.)

On the junior level, she is the 2020 Youth Olympic champion, the 2018 JGP Slovakia bronze medalist, and the 2019 Winter Children of Asia International Sports Games champion.