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Canadian ice dance duo Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier finish third after their rhythm dance at the Grand Prix of Figure Skating finals on Thursday in Nagoya, Japan.
The event will feature the top six competitors of the Grand Prix season in each figure skating discipline.
Gilles and Poirier scored 82.89 points, Americans Madison Chalk and Evan Bates lead with 88.74, and Montreal's Laurence Fournier Baudry, now representing France, and his partner Guillaume Cizeron are second with 87.56. The Canadians won the Grand Prix Final in 2022, took bronze in 2023 and finished fifth last year.
“We're very happy with our performance. We wanted to skate with a lot of confidence and joy, and we did that. We felt in control and believed in ourselves,” Poirier said.
Free dance on Saturday.
Dancers Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier place third with 82.89 points in rhythm dance at the Grand Prix Figure Skating Finals in Nagoya, Japan.
Chock and Bates, three-time reigning world champions, won a record sixth ice dance title at Skate America in November. They also won the Cup of China. They won the Grand Prix Final in 2023 and 2024.
American ice dance duo Madison Chock and Evan Bates lead the rhythm dance routine at the ISU Grand Prix Figure Skating Finals in Nagoya, Japan.
In pairs, Dina Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps are sixth after the short program with 71.07 points. The Canadian duo won bronze at the 2023 Grand Prix Final and qualified again in 2024, but withdrew before the event due to Deschamps' illness.
Japan's Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara lead the pairs competition with 77.32 points, followed by Italy's Sara Conti and Niccolo Masii with 77.22 and Georgians Anastasia Metelkina and Luka Berulava with 75.04.
Canada's 2024 world champions Dina Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps are sixth after their pairs short program at the Grand Prix of Figure Skating Finals in Nagoya, Japan.
Japan's Yuma Kagiyama unexpectedly took the lead after the men's short program. World champion Ilya Malinin of the United States dropped to third after an early error, with Japan's Shun Sato in second.
Malinin has not lost a competition in more than two years and is the favorite for the gold medal at the Cortina Olympics in Milan, but came out of his first jump, a quad Axel-triple toe loop combination, to finish third behind Kagiyama and his Japanese compatriot Shun Sato.
Malinin was unfazed by the mistake in the quadruple axel, calling it an experiment that he most likely would not attempt at the Olympics.
“I just wanted to try this combination,” Malinin said. “It was my first time doing the competition and it didn’t work out, so I had to just continue with the program.”
Yuma Kagiyama scored a personal best of 108.77 points to win the men's short program at the ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating Finals in Nagoya, Japan.
Malinin also lost points for his quadruple lutz-triple toe loop combination and finished third with 94.05 points, more than 14 behind Kagiyama.
The American said he was not worried whether the shaky start to the Grand Prix final would affect his confidence at the Olympics in February.
“I don't think it will really affect my confidence,” said Malinin, who has won the last two Grand Prix Finals. “It's just a place where I can try new things. I didn't really come here to win a Grand Prix Final again, I'm mainly here to try something new and see if maybe I make a different decision in what I want to do at the Olympics.”
Skating to Stevie Wonder IfKagiyama performed the exercise at a fast pace, which gave his best result of the season – 108.77.
The Japanese figure skater performed a combination of quadruple toe loop, triple toe loop, quadruple Salchow and triple Axel.
“I came to the conclusion that I was the best, and that really helped,” Kagiyama said. “It was like the Beijing Olympics[wherehewonthesilvermedal”[wherehewonthesilvermedal”[гдеонвыигралсеребрянуюмедаль»[wherehewonthesilvermedal”
Sato performed two quadruple jumps and a triple axel, scoring 98.06 points.
Canadians Eva Kemp and Yokhnatan Elizarov take third place in the short program of junior pairs at the Grand Prix of Figure Skating finals in Nagoya (Japan).
The Grand Prix Final features the top six skaters in each discipline – men's, women's, pairs, ice dance – and is a gathering of the world's best skaters ahead of the Winter Olympics.
Friday's competition includes the pairs free program and women's short program, featuring Americans Alice Liu, the world champion, and Amber Glenn, who won last year's Grand Prix Final in Grenoble, France.
The competition concludes on Saturday with the men's and women's free skate.
CBC Sports has live coverage of every skating event at the Grand Prix Final. Here's the full broadcast schedule And here's where to check the results.
The 2025 ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating is approaching and Asher Hill and Kaitlyn Osmond are here to give their educated guesses on who they think will top the podium. Watch the Grand Prix Final live on CBC Gem December 4-7, 2025.
