(Editor’s Note: This story has been updated with reaction from Alysa Liu)
16-year-old Alysa Liu won a bronze medal at the World Figure Skating Championships in Montpellier, France, reported NBC.
It was a nice bounce-back performance for the two-time national champion. She placed 7th at the Olympics after being forced to sit out the 2021 National Championships due to COVID.
“I didn’t think I could do better than the Olympics,” Liu said. “It’s going to be hard to do it at worlds so soon after. It’s crazy. I’m so happy. … I still can’t believe it. What just happened?” Team USA quoted her as saying.
She finished her free skate with 139.28 points rising from fifth to third place with a total score of 211.19 points.
“I am very speechless,” Liu said, reported Fan Zone. “I came into this competition not thinking about medals, even during the competition. I just wanted to do good programs for myself. So when I saw that I medaled, I was like, ‘What?!’ I didn’t believe it. I’m still in shock.”
At such a nice age, one might expect her to return to compete at the Olympics in Paris in 2024. Normally there is a four-year gap between the summer games, but the 2020 games had to be delayed until the following year because of the Pandemic.
Fellow Americans Karen Chen finished eights and Mariah Bell just missed the podium with a fourth-place finish.
Kaori Sakamoto of Japan took the Gold and Loena Hendrickx of Belgium took the silver. 
The Men’s Olympic champion Nathan Chen is not competing at World’s due to an injury. Vincent Zhou who sat out the men’s competition at the Olympics after testing positive for COVID is currently in sixth place after the short program.
In the rhythm dance competition, Madison Chock and Evan Bates are currently in third right behind fellow Americans Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue.
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