The “Quad King” has a new arena. Nathan Chen is officially stepping into medicine, with Harvard giving him a special welcome.
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The U.S. Olympic champion recently attended his White Coat Ceremony at Harvard Medical School, officially beginning the next chapter of a career that has already taken him from the ice to the top of the world.
But Chen’s welcome came with a familiar face.
Standing beside him was Tenley Albright, the first American woman to win Olympic gold in figure skating. Albright graduated from Harvard Medical School in 1961, making the moment feel almost like a passing of the torch between two generations of American skating champions. “From one Olympic figure skating champion to another,” Harvard Medical School wrote in the caption while sharing the moment.
Albright won her Olympic title at the 1956 Cortina Games before embarking on a medical career. More than six decades later, Chen is following a remarkably similar path, although his own Olympic story is still fresh.
Chen won individual gold at the 2022 Beijing Olympics before helping Team USA claim another gold in the team event. The three-time world champion hasn’t competed since those Games, but he has never formally called time on his skating career.
U.S. Figure Skating’s official page dropped a comment under that post, “We love to see it! 🩺👏”
For now, Chen’s full attention has been shifted to medicine. “Medicine is something that I’m very passionate about and looking forward to pursuing,” he previously said. “I’m seeing where else life takes me.”
That decision also led to a conclusion last year, when he eventually announced that he won’t be defending his Olympic title at Milano Cortina 2026. For a skater nicknamed the ‘Quad King,’ walking away from competition at just 26 (now 27) might seem surprising. But Chen believes he has earned the freedom to explore something beyond the rink.
“I’ve already accomplished enough in skating that I’m quite satisfied with my career,” he told the Los Angeles Times.
His journey to Harvard follows years of balancing elite skating with academics. Chen graduated from Yale with a degree in statistics before turning his attention toward medical school. He has also been involved with Your True Step, a nonprofit initiative through which he continues to connect with young skaters.
That work helped reveal something he felt was missing during his competitive career. “The basis of being a doctor, I think, is to help people,” Chen said. “I think that’s something that I didn’t necessarily feel as an athlete, that I felt was a little bit lacking.”
Now, he hopes medicine can fill that space. Cardiology and oncology are among the areas that have caught his interest, with cardiothoracic surgery also on his radar.
And remarkably, Chen admitted that getting to this point came with a different kind of pressure. Taking the MCAT, he said, was more nerve-racking than competing at the Olympics.
That says something about how seriously he is taking this next challenge. Still, skating hasn’t disappeared from Chen’s life. It remains, as he once put it, his “core identity.” Even away from competition, he continues to support the sport through Your True Step and other skating projects.
“Skating is my life and my true core identity,” Chen explained. “No matter what I do outside of skating, my life will still revolve around skating to some degree.”
Harvard’s special welcome perhaps captured that perfectly. Chen may be trading his skates for a white coat, but the Olympic champion hasn’t left his old world behind. He is simply stepping onto a different kind of ice.