Figure skating’s Grand Prix Final will reveal Olympic favourites

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Figure skating's biggest event ahead of the Olympics begins Thursday with the Grand Prix Final in Nagoya, Japan. This is the last time all the world's best skaters will gather before the Winter Games in northern Italy.

Here's what you need to know:

This is the best of the best.

The regular season of the Grand Prix of Figure Skating consists of six competitions held around the world in October and November. Skaters can compete in a maximum of two of them. They earn points based on where they finish, and these points decide who will compete in the final. Only the top six in each discipline are invited – among men, women, pairs and ice dancing.

Since skaters (and/or their coaches) can choose which two regular Grand Prix events they compete in, we don't always get the best matches throughout the season. But with the best of the best competing in Japan this week, the final should give us a pretty good idea of ​​who the top medal contenders will be at the Olympics this February.

Canada received two applications.

For the sixth time in a row, no Canadian singles skater made it to the finals. It wasn't particularly close either: Steven Gogolev, who two weeks ago won Canada's only individual medal of the season (and the first of his career) with bronze in Finland, finished 13th in the men's event. Madeline Schizas placed 21st among women. They will compete for Canada's only entry into each individual Olympic event at the national championships next month, but whoever emerges will have little hope of a medal in Italy.

However, Canada has two strong opponents in the partnership competition and they both qualified for the Grand Prix Final. Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier finished fourth in ice dance and Dina Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps finished fifth in doubles after each won gold and silver on tour this season.

Stellato-Dudek and Deschamps won bronze in the final two years ago before making their mark at the 2024 World Championships in their hometown of Montreal, where they captured Canada's first world figure skating title in six years. Their momentum continued into the 2024-25 season, when they won both of their regular Grand Prix starts and qualified to compete for Canada at the Olympics when Chicago native Stellato-Dudek received Canadian citizenship.

But health problems and inconsistent performances dogged the duo during last season's championship run. Deschamps' illness forced them out of the Grand Prix Final, and Stellato-Dudek's heavy fall during practice set them back ahead of the World Championships in Boston, where the defending champions finished a disappointing fifth.

Age is a concern for the pair as Stellato-Dudek, the oldest woman ever to win a world figure skating title, is now 42 and Deschamps turns 34 this month. But they showed they were still among the elite, taking silver at the opening Grand Prix in France and moving on to gold in Saskatoon a couple of weeks later.

The favorites for gold in the Grand Prix doubles final are the Japanese Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara. They have won two of the last three world titles and won both of their Grand Prix assignments, including victories over Stellato-Dudek and Deschamps in Finland.

Gilles and Poirier are going there too. They will both be 34 years old by the time the Olympics begin, and they have made it clear that this could be their last season together. But they have shown no major signs of decline, finishing on the podium at four of the last five world championships, including silver in 2024 and 2025. On the Grand Prix Tour, they won gold at Skate Canada and silver in Finland for the second year in a row.

Gilles and Poirier won the final in 2022 and took bronze in '23 before their medal run ended in fifth place last year after Poirier tripped on the board during the short program. They have fallen out of contention in their two Olympic appearances to date, finishing eighth in 2018 and seventh in 2022, but they have upped their game since then.

The dance team to beat is US married couple Madison Chock and Evan Bates. After finishing fourth at the 2022 Beijing Games, they have won the last three world titles and two Grand Prix Finals in a row.

There's another Canadian to keep an eye on.

Chock and Bates weren't the only team to go undefeated at the Grand Prix this season. France's top dance duo of Laurence Fournier-Baudry and Guillaume Cizeron also won both of their assignments, including defeating Gilles and Poirier in the regular season final in Finland.

If these names sound familiar but may not be paired, here's why:

Montreal-born Fournier-Baudry competed for Canada until 2024, when her skating partner Nikolai Sørensen was banned for six years for “sexual treatment” of an American coach and former skater a dozen years ago. The ban was overturned by an arbitrator in June this year. But by then Fournier-Baudry had teamed up with Cizeron, the Frenchman who had won five world titles and a 2022 Olympic gold during his electric partnership with Gabriella Papadakis. At the 2018 Games in South Korea, Pap and Cease were the main rivals of Canadian greats Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, who beat the French duo by less than one point to claim their second and final Olympic title.

By coming out of retirement and joining Fournier Baudry, Papadakis has a chance to become the first person to win Olympic gold in ice dancing with two different partners. They are eligible to compete for France after Fournier Baudry received French citizenship last month.

Ilya Malinin cannot lose (we think).

In the men's competition, all eyes will be on American superstar Ilya Malinin, who has not lost a competition in over two years. The quad-bog has won back-to-back world titles and has a strong chance of adding a third straight Grand Prix Final title after victories in France and Canada. In Saskatoon, he broke his own world record in the free skate without even landing his signature quad Axel, a jump that no other athlete had attempted in competition.

Malinin, who turned 21 this week, plans to make up for lost time in the final by attempting a quadruple axel both his short and free programs. This will give us an idea of ​​what to expect from his Olympic debut this February.

Japan's skaters were able to dominate the women's competition on home ice after Monet Chiba won both Grand Prix starts and Kaori Sakamoto finished second with gold and silver. But the US has reigning Grand Prix champion Amber Glenn and reigning world champion Alisa Liu, whose surprising victory in Boston prevented Sakamoto from winning his fourth straight world title.

Also look out for 17-year-old Japanese Ami Maki, who upset Sakamoto by winning the opening Grand Prix in France and then finishing third behind Chiba in Canada.

How to watch:

CBC Sports has live coverage of every skating event at the Grand Prix Final. The action begins with the boys competition on Thursday at 1:30 a.m. ET. Senior competition begins with a short pairs program at 5 a.m. ET and continues through Saturday. Here's the full broadcast schedule And here's where to check the results.

For more information on the top medal contenders, see: watch this video where CBC Sports analysts Asher Hill and Kaitlyn Osmond pick the runway.