You Young hopes to join quad race next season

The quad race in women's figure skating is heating up, and You Young wants to be a part of it.

South Korea's top finisher in the recent women's singles competition at the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 indicated this weekend following a domestic competition that she will work to add quadruple jumps to her free skating routines from next season.

Only three women's skaters – ROC's Anna Shcherbakova, Alexandra Trusova, and Kamila Valieva – attempted quadruple jumps at Beijing 2022. The American Alysa Liu, who has performed quad jumps in international competition, opted not to attempt any in Beijing.

"I used to work on quadruple Salchow and Lutz in the past, but not before the Olympics this year," You said in quotes reported by Yonhap News Agency.

"After the end of this season, I will start practising them again for future competitions."

You Young: Top South Korean women's figure skating Olympian since Yuna Kim

The 17-year-old You – who won gold at the Lausanne 2020 Winter Youth Olympic Games – finished sixth in the women's competition in Beijing, which was won by Shcherbakova. The full results of the team event and women's singles competitions at Beijing 2022 are provisional.

That made her the best-placed South Korean finisher in an Olympic women's figure skating competition since the legendary Yuna Kim, who won gold at Vancouver 2010 and silver at Sochi 2014.

Following in Kim's footsteps may not be easy, but just as You was inspired by her idol, she too has the chance to set the stage for the next generation.

The Republic of Korea hosts the next Winter Youth Olympic Games in Gangwon in 2024, a Games for which Kim has been named an ambassador.

That also means You's successor as the Youth Olympic champion will be crowned at a Games in her home country – and at the Gangneung Ice Arena, which also hosted figure skating competition at PyeongChang 2018, is set to be the venue.

WATCH: In the video below from the Lausanne 2020 Winter Youth Olympic Games, You Young reveals how she feels "shy" around Yuna Kim.

You Young's triple Axel and quadruple wishes

Since Yuna Kim's peak, women's figure skating has gradually moved away from artistry and performance into the pure power of technical jumps like quadruples and the triple Axel, a jump You Young has in her arsenal.

Indeed, Kim recently told Olympics.com: "In my days, we didn’t even dare to imagine such techniques, but now it’s happening. The fact that sports is evolving as the time goes by is fascinating to me."

You landed her first ratified triple Axel on her senior international debut on the Grand Prix circuit at Skate Canada in 2019, and also landed it in the free skate at Lausanne 2020, becoming the first woman to do so at the Youth Olympic Games.

She attempted the triple Axel in both her short and free programs in Beijing, but had her first attempt downgraded and her second called under-rotated.

The South Korean has yet to attempt a quadruple jump in international competition. The quad toe loop is the quad jump with the lowest base value on the International Skating Union's current judging system, worth 9.50 points.

If You masters the quadruple Salchow and quadruple Lutz, the two quad jumps she has spoken of working on, they will be worth 9.70 and 11.50 points respectively – some 1.7 and 3.5 points more than that of a triple Axel's base value.

That could help her close the gap to the top tranche of women's skaters. In Beijing, You finished more than 40 points off Shcherbakova, who landed two clean quadruple flips in her free skate.

Where has You Young competed since Beijing 2022?

After her Beijing 2022 competition, You returned to South Korea with teammate Kim Ye-lim, who placed ninth in the Chinese capital.

Both women then competed in the National Winter Sports Festival in Uijeongbu, near Seoul – each winning their respective divisions in women's figure skating (high school for You and college for Kim).

You and Kim are both set to represent South Korea at the World Figure Skating Championships scheduled for the end of March in Montpellier, France.

While the quadruple is not an immediate goal for You, she does want to end the 2021/22 season on a high.

"I'd love to set a new personal best at the Worlds," Yonhap quoted her as saying.