Stellato-Dudek and Deschamps defend Skate Canda title
2024 Skate Canada | Pairs
Canadian headliners Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps dominated the Pairs discipline, defending their Skate Canada title in Halifax, N.S. on Saturday. Newcomers, Ekaterina Geynish and Dmitrii Chigirev, who represent Uzbekistan, rose from fourth to claim the silver in their Grand Prix debut, while Anastasia Golubeva and Hektor Giotopoulos Moore earned the bronze—the first Grand Prix medal for an Australian pairs team.
Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps
Skating to “Crazy in Love” by Beyoncé in the short, the 2024 World Champions produced an excellent level-four twist to start. Deschamps fought for his landing on the side-by-side triple toes and Stellato-Dudek touched down with her foot on the throw triple loop. However, the team showed a very good level four lift, combination spin, and footwork. The scored 73.23 points, easily separating themselves from the rest of the group by over eight points for first place.
“We love to skate in front of our home crowd. That was great!” said Deschamps. “It was fun! We did a lot of stuff that we improved since the last time that we’re happy with.”
“Unfortunately, we had technical mistakes this time,” noted Stellato-Dudek.
She added that coming in as world champions, she definitely feels pressure.
“But pressure really comes from yourself, so I put pressure on myself,” she admitted. “But I do feel it more this year, and I’m trying to work on that actually. It’s very hard because of the world championships. My age gets so much attention, which is understandable, but this is a very mature song. This is Beyonce’s original song that she remade specifically for Fifty Shades of Grey which was obviously a very sexy, slinky kind of movie. So, you know, I chose to really lean into what we already get attention for anyways as a way to use it as our strength.”
The 2024 Four Continents champions took the audience under the sea during their oceanic-themed free skate set to “Siren’s Song” and selections from Blue Planet II. It was a choppy ride with several mistakes including a fall by Max on the triple toe. Stellato-Dudek doubled her triple Salchow, put her hand down on the throw triple Lutz, and stepped out of a throw triple loop. However, the lifts, spin and death spiral were all graded a level four. The triple twist was also graded a level four and received high grades of execution (GOE). They finished second in this segment, but with a total score of 197.33, easily maintained first place overall.
“I’m not really sure what happened,” said Stellato-Dudek. “I’ve done so many clean runs of this program at home, so I really have no idea why that happened tonight. I think his fall shocked me a little bit, because it’s not normal. And usually at home, when everything’s going well, it’s very easy to continue for it to go well, versus when things are going wrong, and you want to stop them from going wrong. It’s a different mentality, so I think maybe that shocked me a little bit.”
“It was going well at home, but it’s going to happen sometimes, and we just have to learn from it and move forward and forget about it,” said Deschamps of the mistakes. “We just need to reset what happened and move forward.”
“We added a lot of little choreographic changes and additions, even like arms and the lifts and things like that,” his partner added. “And we were still able to do those. Just the obvious mistakes, the jumps and throws, that didn’t go well.”
They will compete next at Finlandia Trophy.
Ekaterina Geynish and Dmitrii Chigirev
Geynish and Chigirev showed good effort in their short program in their Grand Prix debut. The team, coached by Nina Mozer in Moscow, placed a close fourth with 63.53 points. Geynish put a hand down on the triple toes, but the team earned a level four on the triple twist, lift and combination spin, and they landed a throw triple flip.
“We really like to skate in Canada. It’s very good!” said Chigirev. “Very great city, very good ice. We like it so much. We do not feel too bad about the jumps. Hopefully (we will be) better the next competition.”
He went on to add that the music, “The Deal Between Tsubaki and Lingba” by Kiyoshi Yoshida, is from a Chinese cartoon. “We skated try to show two flames flickering from candles,” he explained.
The 2024 CS John Nicks International Pairs bronze medalists delivered an exceptional free skate to “Teatro” by Buika & Jacob Sureda, picking up a new personal best of 126.12. The team put out a level three triple twist, side-by-side triple toe-double Axels and triple loops and a throw triple flip. The only mistake came when Geynish two-footed the landing of the throw triple loop. All lifts were graded a level four and the team placed second in the free skate and overall with a total score of 189.65.
“It was quite difficult today,” said Chigirev. “We had some situations before the competition, like injuries and moving from places to places. So yeah, it was challenging today. It looks like we have accomplished everything we wanted to today.”
“In France, we want to skate better,” added Geynish of their next Grand Prix event. “It depends on how it’s possible. But we’ll try to improve ourselves to do what we used to do during in the training sessions and events before.”
The team shared that their coaches selected the music and tried to create two different characters for them.
“Different to each other, completely different to each other, opposite to each other,” explained Chigirev. “That’s how we live our lives sometimes. So, that’s what we show as well here.”
Anastasia Golubeva and Hektor Giotopoulos Moore
Golubeva and Giotopoulos Moore scored a new personal best (64.81) for third place after a strong short program to “Exogenesis: Symphony” and “Won’t Stand Down” by Muse. The two-time World Junior champions had a sub-par catch on the triple twist, which was graded a level two, but the rest of the program was solid. They produced side-by-side triple toes, a throw triple loop, and a level three lift. They were also awarded a level four for their quality footwork and combination spin.
“I was waiting for a good performance,” said Giotopoulos Moore. “I didn’t have many nerves, I felt like, ‘let’s go, let’s get it done!’ This being our fourth season competing, we know more of the competitors. We are all quite close. I think we still have a lot more to show. This program has a lot more potential to get out of it. We made some little mistakes.”
“I think we did a good job interpreting the program,” added Golubeva.
The 2022-23 Junior Grand Prix Final Champions struggled on jumps in the free skate. Giotopoulos Moore put a foot down on the side-by-side triple toe-double Axel-double Axels and turned out the triple Salchows, while Golubeva fell on the throw triple loop. Only the throw triple Salchow was clean, but they earned a level four on two lifts in their otherwise convincing routine to The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. They finished first (121.33) in the free skate and rose from fourth to second place overall (186.14).
“I was ready for this throw, but I fell, and I am a little bit disappointed in myself,” said Golubeva. “I will do it more on the practice and I will land this 100 times in practice.”
“But it’s the first competition and we are ready to improve it and not make the same mistakes next time,” added Giotopoulos Moore. “We knew the music and thought it could work and once we started working with it, we loved it.”
“I love this music and the movie!” agreed his partner. “I imagine I am Geneviève falling in love.”
They will compete next at Finlandia Trophy.
Annika Hocke and Robert Kunkel
Germany’s Annika Hocke and Robert Kunkel engaged the crowd with their short to “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll” and “Black Betty.” The 2023 European bronze medalists were mostly clean with the exception of a foot down by Hocke on the throw triple loop. The triple twist earned a level three, as did the footwork and death spiral, but the lift and combination spin were graded a level four. They picked up 64.82 points for second place.
“There were some small mistakes, especially on the throw, that we usually don’t do,” Hocke acknowledged. “So, it was a shame, because we love throws. Throws are like, also our thing. So, it was the first time that I landed a throw on two feet.”
“It was a lot of fun!” Kunkel added. “Very nice to be here; the last time we were in Canada, where, for words, the crowd was really amazing. So, we kept the short program, which is also meant to be like very entertaining.”
Skating to selections by Falco, the two-time Grand Prix medalists opened with a level-three triple twist, but then Hocke doubled the triple Salchows. Kunkle then took a fall on the double Axe-double Axel sequence, while Hocke put a foot down on a throw triple flip. The throw triple loop was very good, and the team received a level four on two lifts and the pair spin. They placed fourth in the free skate with 119.48 points and slipped off the podium to fourth overall (184.30).
“It’s a little bit frustrating, because we trained so hard; like, harder than last year,” shared Kunkel. “I mean, it was better than in the first competition, but it’s still not our level where we are at this moment. She caught a little bit of a flu on the way here, but at the end, nobody cares, and you just have to do it. So, yeah, we’re not super satisfied because we did mistakes. We could have easily gotten second place, and we are fourth.”
“I caught a little bit of a cold,” confirmed Hocke. “I got it exactly on the day that we were supposed to leave. And of course, everybody knows, flying with a blocked nose is always a little bit shitty. But, of course, it made it a lot harder. Still, I’m really unsatisfied with what I did today, and I wished for a better outcome.”
“I mean, now the pressure is a little bit off because we got fourth and the goal was to make the Grand Prix Final,” she continued. “Never say never. It’s not over, but it’s definitely nothing that we have on our minds now anymore. Now it’s just about getting a good competition. And honestly, we were really well prepared. So, the next week is more for regrouping and not really for practicing more programs, just to kind of get the head a little clearer and then go ahead for NHK Trophy.”
USA’s Emily Chan and Spencer Akira Howe placed fifth overall (184.30), followed by Ioulia Chtchetinina and Michal Wozniak of Poland (173.84), Daria Danilova and Michel Tsiba of the Netherlands (171.02), and Kelly Ann Laurin and Loucas Ethier of Canada (171.02).
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