Upcoming Reddit AskMeAnything with Robert Samuels on 2-18-22 at 1 pm EST.
And with Les Carpenter too.
In r/Olympics. u/WashingtonPost.
Copying out the Q&A (Olympics-related & figure skating parts) below:
Q: Mr. Samuels: I thought His Name Is George Floyd was a tremendous book.
Anything you can share about your personal experiences/reception as a black journalist covering the Winter Olympics in Milan? // Also, who was your first favorite figure skater?
My first favorite figure skater: Kristi Yamaguchi! It is amazing to think that her 1992 programs could still be competitive to this day. I also loved a Russian pairs team, Mishketunok and Dmitriev, and I used to pretend to be them and practice doing their moves with a pillow. I can still toss a pillow the exact right velocity to have it rotate three times and land vertically, as if it were standing. Quads are harder.
Thank you for reading “His Name is George Floyd.” Over the past few hours, I’ve been thinking about its last chapter because it so prominently features our now departed, Rev. Jesse Jackson, in one of his last big interviews. Before writing that book, I was already in the early stages of putting together a book about figure skating! So hopefully I’ll finish it, one day.
Because of my previous work covering the sport for that book project, many skaters and officials were already familiar with my passion for the sport before I got to Milan.
There are a handful of other journalists from the diaspora here, too. This is the first time since 2002 that there is no Black figure skater competing at the Olympics, so there are more of us off the ice than on the ice.
Maybe it is a defense mechanism, but I tend not to give much thought to my race while I’m reporting. I know it must be affecting something, but my job is to really lose myself in my journalism and take on the feelings, motivations and experiences of the people who are entrusting me to write about them. For me, my curiosity and rigor have mattered more than my race. So it is with writing about politics, so it is with writing about race, so it is with sports.
If I were to really, really think about this question, I do wonder if people would have the same amount of skepticism, then surprise, about my skating knowledge if I were a White person. I’ve also been told that being Black is probably helpful when I try to interview athletes from other countries because they are eager to meet a Black person. I’ve also been told that some athletes, particularly from countries and ethnic groups that have felt oppressed, feel a sense of kinship with Black Americans because of what their people have experienced. I don’t really ask about these things, though. I really try not to make it about me. - Robert
Q: Aside from the events themselves, what are your favorite parts of being at the Games?
Milan has been a fun city to tour around. The trams are fast! Also, I’m usually pretty nervous about cutting my hair when traveling internationally because it’s so hard to find barbers who are good with Black hair. But I found a wonderful Black barbershop - there are actually several here - and it was fun to see so many of the tropes familiar to Black barbershops in America - the arguments over music choices, the causal approach to cutting hair quickly, the perfectionism - were also true of Black barbers in Italy. - Robert
Q: Would you recommend attending the Olympics for a casual viewer?
Yes! How often do you get to be in a place where there are people from all parts of the world gathered together in the name of unity and friendly competition? I joked at the beginning that these Winter Olympics felt like neither winter (it’s been around 50-55 degrees in Milan) nor the Olympics (everything is so spread out that I only really have access to speed skating, short track, figure skating and hockey), but, as the time has gone on, you really feel a sense that there is something special happening all around you. Like, did you know Kazakhstan is the 9th largest country by land area on earth? I did not know if I had learned that if I were not here. But these are the things you casually learn when you become a part of a global society, at least for two or three weeks. - Robert
Q: Which sport is even better in person?
Ice dance, hands down. Because of how cameras work, they cannot fully capture the speed or the mania of their footwork on the ice. I remember being confused about why one team is better than another. But when you watch them all, it becomes a lot clearer.
Also, short track is wild. Roller derby on ice! - Robert
Great question. For me, all of the extreme ski-snowboard sports are great fun to watch. Nothing beats standing at the bottom of a halfpipe and seeing just how high the skiers and snowboarders get into the air. It actually makes me uncomfortable sometimes. Snowboard cross is another favorite of mine. I remember the first time I saw it in person, back at the 2006 Turin Olympics, and I was stunned at how high and fast everyone was going. It looked more like a giant video game right in front of me, Robert is right, ice dance is way better in person than on television. – Les
Q: how's the pin collecting going? also any favorite skating routines so far? watching riku/ryuichi's routine yesterday was incredible from my TV, i can't even begin to imagine getting to see it in person with the crowd.
Hi! I have to admit: I’ve been very hesitant to ask for pins because we don’t have any to trade! The Post didn’t create a pin, and given all of the changes happening at the news organization, I did not push this issue. But some have taken pity on me and given me a pin, including Amber Glenn, whose pin says “Breathe and Believe.”
Miura and Kihara were amazing. I’ve seen them a few times this season and marvel at their speed and their lifts (the pairs short program aside). Other programs that stood out are both Chock and Bates free dances, which unleashed an intensity that we had not seen from them in a while. Gilles and Poirier’s free dance, and Kaori Sakamoto’s short program in the team event both made me tear up. -Robert
Q: Has the culture of figure staking improved? Are they now more friends with each other instead of petty bitches?
If being concerned with people who are threatening to take away the thing you’ve wanted since childhood makes someone a “petty bitch,” then corporate America and every major sport I know is filled with them. But there is definitely a shift in skating culture towards camaraderie and support, both within nations and in between nations. I’m trying to figure out what led to the change: But I think the biggest factor might be that many skaters train together now, no matter what country they are from, so there’s less nationalism than there was in the 80s. Also rules have changed so that Olympic eligible athletes can tour and make money while competing and you can become a star without being the best in the world (see: Adam Rippon, Johnny Weir), which means there’s less pressure to be a gold medalist - you can find different ways to make a living through skating now. So skaters do like each other more. In the words of Isabeau Levito, “it’s not that deep.” - Robert
Q: How come you guys seem to be laser focussed on Ilia these Olympics?
Ilia Malinin is transformative person in the Olympics most popular sport and he is also a DC-area native, so it’s appropriate that we are interested in him. I don’t think that he’s received excessive attention, though. In fact, we wrote that he might not even be the most popular figure skater at the Games, given Japan’s love for Kaori Sakamoto. -Robert
Q: Of all of the athletes you’ve gotten to see and meet with this year, who was your favorite to watch? And who was your favorite to meet or talk with?
This is not a total answer, but I can tell you the ones that seem different from than what you would expect: The unexpected Olympic champion, Mikhail Shaidorov of Kazakhstan, was a hoot and I’m working on a profile of him. France’s Adam Siao Him Fa has a very deep, sonorous voice. And Isabeau Levito has a biting wit. - Robert
I have several. Over the years I’ve come to know and appreciate Ilia Malinin, Amber Glenn and Kallie Humphries and enjoy speaking to them for different reasons. It’s been fun to watch Malinin grow from a teenager to an adult. Glenn is an open book and will talk honestly about anything. Humphries is one of the most intense athletes I’ve ever been around. But Alysa Liu fascinates me more than any of them. She has such a carefree personality and acts as if she doesn’t care but she’s also a fierce competitor. – Les
Q: What is your favorite winter Olympic sport? What is your favorite Olympic moment so far?
This is my first Olympics. But it has been my dream to write about figure skating since I was a little boy; I was so impressed with the knowledge Scott Hamilton and Dick Button seemed to have and I wanted to be like them. The people in my life have had to deal with the residual effects about me being both easily excitable and hypercritical, but I hope readers and viewers how are following me on instagram (i’m @/newsbysamuels) and tiktok (i’m videosbysamuels) get to benefit from the mix of wonder and mania.
As corny as it is, my favorite moment might have been when a police officer stopped me while I was filming a video. He said something to me in Italian, which I unfortunately do not speak, and then gestured to me to look up. A man carrying the Olympic torch in its final moments was running right in front of me! It felt so iconic and was such a reminder of the many amazing things we might miss if we don’t look up at the world every once in a while. - Robert
Q: Les: I enjoyed your Alysa Liu article very much - did you interview her in person besides July 2025 in Oakland and at the December show in Philly?
Thank you for your words about the story on Alysa Liu. As I’ve said in another answer here I find her to be one of the most fascinating athletes I’ve ever been around – in any sport. I spoke with her a couple of other times during the fall (once at USOPC media event in New York back in October) and also at the nationals in St. Louis, which was right before I sat down to write the story. – Les
Q: Robert: I've been really enjoying your Instagram reels so far - please keep doing them! Who are your women's picks to medal tomorrow?
This is my first time doing reels; they make me a little uncomfortable because I’m a behind the scenes guy and like for the work to speak for itself. I hope you read the stories, too.
I don’t like doing medal picks, but I can share some of what I saw in practices and what I heard behind the scenes: Kaori Sakamoto has been looking really strong and training her big money combination - double axel, triple toe, double - big time, to varying degrees of success. If Ami Nakai skates well, she needs that combination because she missed it in the short program.
Isabeau Levito looked strong and Amber Glenn had an on-and-off practice. I saw her training the triple flip a lot today and it made me wonder if she was trying to get her mind off training the triple loop, the jump she doubled in the short program (For the unitiatied: The triple flip is a jump in which she uses her blade to launch the jump; she does not dig into the ice on a triple loop. It [loop] is also one of her more inconsistent jumps)
Alysa Liu continues to skate strongly, unbothered by it all. And Adeliia Petrossian fell on several quadruple toe loop attempts - to the point where some in the arena told me she was near tears. (I could not see them from my press position on the other side). What this tells me is that we will be in for a show! But if everyone skates cleanly - and I hope they will - the gold medal is a battle between Sakamoto and Liu. Liu could do it, but this judging panel heavily favors Sakamoto. - Robert
Q: Favorite Olympics 2026 memory/ moment?
The tension in the final moments in the team event for figure skating, with a narrow victory from the United States was really invigorating.
Also, getting to know some of the other media people here has been fun. And then, there’s the moment I discovered that I had Chistopher Columbus-ed discovering chocolate muffins. There are so many! I’ll need to sit down and reflect! It’s all been such a great opportunity! - Robert
That’s all the time we have for today! Les is running to an A.C. Milan match, and I have some stories to finish up on this Friday (what do you mean its Wednesday?!). You can always email me at
[email protected], or hit me up on the socials, @/newsbysamuels on insta and @/videosbysamuels on reels if you have anymore!
===
Note: For anyone interested in the political parts of the Q&A, I've posted them in this Politically Incorrect subforum thread:
https://www.fsuniverse.net/forum/threads/the-not-so-free-press.112675/page-5#post-6901557
www.instagram.com
