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Canada's Dina Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps, the reigning world champions, finished sixth in the doubles event at the Grand Prix final on Friday after a shaky free skate.
The two-time Grand Prix medalists, who won bronze in the 2023 final, scored 194.36 points after falling in the free skate.
The title was won by the Japanese Riku Miura and Ryuchi Kihara (225.21), ahead of the Italians Sara Conti and Niccolo Masii (223.28) and the Germans Minerva Fabien Hase and Nikita Volodin (221.25).
“We don't know what happened, we felt ready and all that. We'll need a week to recover. We competed in four competitions in nine weeks during which we were both sick. We just need to rest and start again so we can deal with the rest of the season,” Deschamps said.
Canada's 2024 world champions Dina Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps finished last in the pairs free skate at the Grand Prix of Figure Skating Finals in Nagoya, Japan.
The event will feature the top six competitors of the Grand Prix season in each figure skating discipline.
Canadian ice dancers Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier perform their free dance on Saturday after finishing third in the rhythm dance on Thursday.
In junior ice dancing, Canada's Leila Veillon and Alexander Brandis opened sixth after Friday's rhythm dance in their first Junior Grand Prix final.
Americans Hana Maria Aboyan and Daniil Veselukhin are in the lead, followed by Ukrainians Irina Pidgaina and Artem Koval, as well as Frenchmen Ambre Perrier Janesini and Samuel Blanc Claperman.
“It's great to be here, we're very proud of ourselves. We worked hard to qualify,” said Vaillon. “Our goal was to have two good programs, but sometimes things don't go so well and you have to find a way to bounce back. We're going to look forward, focus on the future, not the past.”
In junior pairs, Winnipeg's Ava Kemp and Yokhnatan Elizarov are in third place heading into Saturday's free skate.
