American figure skater Maxim Naumov is officially headed to the 2026 Winter Olympics — a milestone that comes just one year after the tragic death of his parents, both former Olympians, in a plane crash.

Naumov, 24, finished third at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in St. Louis, earning a coveted spot on Team USA for next month’s Winter Games in Milan. As he waited for his score, Naumov held up a photo of his parents and kissed it during an emotional moment on the ice.

“We did it,” he said after his Olympic qualification was confirmed, according to the Los Angeles Times. “We absolutely did it.”

Naumov was born into figure skating. His parents, Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, were two-time Olympians and World Champions in pairs skating in 1994. They were also beloved coaches in the skating community and had spent recent years training young athletes at the Skating Club of Boston.

In January 2025, his parents were among 67 people killed when an American Airlines plane collided with a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter over the Potomac River near Washington, D.C. Twenty-eight of the victims had ties to figure skating and were traveling home from a championship and development camp in Nashville.

Naumov had competed at the same event and returned home on an earlier flight after finishing fourth. One of his last conversations with his parents, according to the Associated Press, was about trying to qualify for the 2026 Olympic team — a dream he can now say he fulfilled.

In the months after the tragedy, Naumov leaned into skating as both a tribute and a coping mechanism. In March, he gave a powerful performance at a charity event honoring crash victims and dropped to his knees in tears afterward.

He also opened up about the loss on the Today show, recalling how his parents were “beautiful people” who were “so incredibly kind,” and how they had asked him to pick them up from the airport before the crash. “The only way out is through,” he said during the segment. “There are no options but to keep going.”

Naumov shared that he now skates not just for himself, but for his family: “I don’t have the strength or the passion or the drive, or the dedication of one person anymore. It’s three people.”

As he prepared for nationals, Naumov said resilience had become his guiding mindset. “It’s all about being resilient,” he told the AP. “What if, despite everything that happened to me, I can go out and do it? And that is where you find strength, and that’s where you grow as a person.”

Next month in Milan, Naumov will compete alongside Ilia Malinin and Andrew Torgashev — his first Olympic appearance and a moment many believe his parents would have been proud to witness.