Olympic champ Nathan Chen confirms Worlds participation in quest for fourth title

Nathan Chen would like to add another gold medal to his glistening collection.

Fresh from his triumph at the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022, the 22-year-old American will head to the World Figure Skating Championships later this month in Montpellier, France.

Chen confirmed his participation to Olympics.com independently. While he remained on the U.S. Figure Skating list of worlds participants, the skater had been non-committal in interviews previously about whether or not he would go.

He did not offer further comment.

Last month, Chen won the Olympic title ahead of Japan's Kagiyama Yuma (silver) and Uno Shoma (bronze). Two-time Olympic champion Hanyu Yuzuru finished in fourth place.

He became just the sixth American man to win Olympic gold in figure skating, and first since Evan Lysacek at Vancouver 2010.

Chen is attempting to join only Hanyu (2014), Alexei Yagudin (2002) and Viktor Petrenko (1992) as Olympic champions who went on to win a world title in the same year in the last three decades.

Chen is the three-time and reigning world champion, having won the title in 2018, 2019 and 2021. The event was cancelled in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Only Scott Hamilton (1981-84), Kurt Browning (1989-93) an Yagudin (1998-2002) have won four world titles in the last 40 years, with eight men completing the feat in history. Ulrich Salchow has the most-ever world titles: 10, between 1901 and 1911.