🥇 Chasing Gold: Figure skating nationals take center stage in Nashville

With the start of the 2022 Winter Olympics now less than a month away, dozens of spots on Team USA still remain up for grabs.

Sixteen of those yet-to-be-punched tickets are in figure skating, where this week's national championships will help decide who represents the U.S. in Beijing.

Rather than holding a traditional Olympic trials event, U.S. Figure Skating selects its team based on athletes' performances over a two-year period. A skater's result at nationals, which begin Thursday afternoon in Nashville, Tenn. and conclude Sunday, will not be the sole determining factor in whether they make the team – though it is a key consideration.

The national championships, which will be televised on NBC and USA Network, will feature several Olympic medal hopefuls, including Nathan Chen and the ice dance team of Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue. But they will also have a notable absence; Alexa Knierim and Brandon Frazier, who were favored to win the pairs event, had to withdraw Wednesday after Frazier tested positive for COVID-19.

Here's all the other Olympic headlines you might have missed, as we get closer to the Beijing Games.