Ilia Malinin started skating at age six, around 2010–2011.

Quick Scoop

  • Ilia Malinin was born on December 2, 2004, in Fairfax, Virginia.
  • He first got on the ice at about six years old, training under his parents, both former Olympic skaters.
  • That puts the start of his skating journey around 2010–2011.

A Tiny Origin Story

Ilia grew up in a skating family: his mother, Tatiana Malinina, and his father, Roman Skorniakov, both competed at the Olympic level for Uzbekistan. As a kid, he reportedly preferred playing soccer to spending time in a cold rink, but his grandfather—also a skating coach—encouraged patience, predicting that once Ilia learned his big jumps, he would be impossible to pull off the ice.

That prediction aged well: starting from those first steps on the ice around age six, he rose through U.S. age‑group events, then into junior internationals by 2019, and eventually into becoming one of the sport’s top technical skaters.

TL;DR: Ilia Malinin began skating at about six years old, which is around 2010–2011.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.