Legacy on Ice Impressions, Skating Lesson Controversy, and other news
Release Date: 03/11/2025
Finlandia Trophy 2025 Recap — ISU Figure Skating Grand Prix Series
Scoreography
The final 2025 Grand Prix qualifier event provided a terrific women’s competition, more judging controversies in ice dance, plus blood, tears, and several truly memorable, beautiful performances. Chapters 0:00 — Intro 0:31 — Dance Scoring Controversy 19:47 — Errors and Incompetency 21:21 — Ice Dance Competition 47:50 — Ice Dance GPF Qualifiers 49:47 — Men's Competition 1:02:54 — Men's GPF Qualifiers 1:03:38 — Pairs Competition 1:12:21 — Pairs GPF Qualifiers 1:14:27 — Women's Competition 1:29:00 — Women's GPF Qualifiers 1:30:32 — Gold in our Hearts 1:32:04 — Warsaw...
info_outline
Skate America 2025 Recap (Figure Skating Grand Prix Series)
Scoreography
The penultimate Grand Prix Qualifier, Skate America, featured a hotly contested women’s podium, some spectacular ice dance performances, numerous disasters in pairs, and a surprisingly weak men’s event. Chapters 0:00 — Intro 1:44 — Women’s Competition 1:51 — Alysa Liu vs Rinka Watanabe 4:56 — Anastasiia Gubanova vs Lara Naki Gutman 7:06 — Starr Andrews 10:00 — Top 5 score comparisons 11:31 — Chaeyeon Kim 12:21 — Lea Serna 12:43 — Haein Lee 14:31 — Hana Yoshida 15:11 — Ekaterina Kurakova 15:49 — Wakaba Higuchi 17:47 — Josephine Lee 18:26 — Pairs Competition...
info_outline
NHK Trophy 2025 Recap
Scoreography
Kaori Sakamoto reigned supreme at her final NHK Trophy competition! The Japanese Grand Prix event gave us exciting podium wins, surprise come-ups, frightening injuries, and a disappointing debut from the returning Shib Sibs. #FigureSkating #GPfigure Chapters 0:00 — Intro 1:33 — Women's Competition 1:50 — Kaori Sakamoto 5:52 — Sofia Samodelkina 7:55 — Loena Hendrickx 10:34 — Young You 14:05 — Sarah Everhardt 16:29 — Yuna Aoki 19:23 — Anna Pezzetta 20:02 — Wakaba Higuchi 21:17 — Elyce Lin-Gracey 22:17 — Canadian Women / Ice Challenge 24:18 — Ice Dance Competition 25:25...
info_outline
Skate Canada 2025 Recap
Scoreography
The third stop on the Grand Prix series gave us a bombastic new world record from Ilia Malinin, a shaky win from Gilles and Poirier, some pleasant surprises in pairs, and a charming trio of medal-winners in the women’s event. Plus more frustrating judging, and potentially racist kiss ’n cry fan gifts. Chapters 0:00 — Intro 1:57 — Men's Competition 21:39 — Ice Dance Competition 52:34 — Women's Competition 1:10:06 — Pairs Competition 1:18:20 — Racist Kiss 'n Cry fan gifts? 1:23:22 — Gold in our Hearts 1:24:53 — NHK Trophy Preview 1:29:13 — Wrap-Up
info_outline
Cup of China 2025 Recap (Figure Skating Grand Prix Series)
Scoreography
The second Grand Prix event of 2025 featured the return of Olympic champions Sui & Han, exciting wins from Amber Glenn and Shun Sato, and a nervous victory for Chock & Bates. Plus more questionable judging, and a kiss ’n cry controversy. Chapters 1:37 — Women's Competition 24:10 — Pairs Competition 39:16 — Men's Competition 57:21 — Ice Dance Competition 1:21:45 — Final thoughts on Cup of China 1:22:25 — Gold in our Hearts 1:23:42 — Skate Canada Preview 1:26:23 — Wrap-Up #figureskating #gpfigure #cupofchina #figureskatingpodcast
info_outline
Grand Prix de France 2025 Recap
Scoreography
The first 2025 Grand Prix event featured extraordinary upsets (Ami Nakai, Fournier-Beaudry and Cizeron), expected dominant wins (Ilia Malinin, Miura and Kihara), and controversial Ice Dance scoring (Guignard and Fabbri) sure to spark heated debate for some time… We dig into the incredible highs, and truly WTF moments, from Grand Prix de France. Adron savors his perfect podium prediction for the Women’s competition. The wild ice dance judging ties us in knots. If this is the sign of things to come, this season is gonna be a roller coaster… Chapters 0:00 — Intro 2:44 — Ice Dance...
info_outline
Trialeti Trophy 2025 Recap and Grand Prix Preview
Scoreography
We discuss Georgia’s first ever Challenger event, the Trialeti Trophy, where Georgian skaters (rightfully) swept the golds. We also preview and give predictions for the Grand Prix de France, which kicks off the GP season. And we talk about the unsettling Shibutani Siblings rink video. Chapters 0:00 — Intro 2:07 — Trialeti Pairs Competition 14:52 — Trialeti Men's Competition 24:57 — Trialeti Ice Dance Competition 35:32 — Trialeti Women's Competition 45:04 — Grand Prix de France Preview 46:46 — GP France Men's Preview 52:05 — GP France Dance Preview 57:18 — GP France Women's...
info_outline
Denis Ten Memorial Challenge 2025 Recap
Scoreography
The Denis Ten Memorial Challenge gave us our first look at Mikhail Shaidorov’s new programs, a terrific showing and win from Haein Lee, and solid first outing from Davis & Smolkin. We also talk about Rika Kihara’s move to ice dance, Bradie Tennell’s successful program switch, and more. Chapters 0:00 — Intro 0:54 — Men’s Competition 23:21 — Dance Competition 39:38 — Women’s Competition 49:35 — Adam Siao Him Fa improvements 52:20 — Rika Kihara and Shingo Nishiyama ice dance pairing 57:49 — Bradie Tennell changes short, scores big 1:03:06 — Gold in our Hearts 1:05:01...
info_outline
Nebelhorn Trophy and Nepela Memorial 2025 Recaps
Scoreography
We recount a long, LONG weekend of skating with two major Challenger Series competitions: Nebelhorn Trophy and Nepela Memorial. The highlight reel includes big wins from Amber Glenn, Lara Naki Gutmann, Hase & Volodin, and Smart & Dieck. But, wow, were there some sloppy skates in there too… Chapters 0:00 — Intro 2:13 — Nebelhorn Women’s Competition 14:31 — Nebelhorn Pairs Competition 24:06 — Nebelhorn Men’s Competition 31:20 — Nebelhorn Ice Dance Competition 41:28 — Nepela Women’s Competition 1:01:50 — Nepela Men’s Competition 1:09:38 — Nepela Ice Dance...
info_outline
Skate to Milano Cortina Olympic Qualifier Event Recap
Scoreography
The final Olympic spots have officially been decided, the Russians have (sort of) returned, some of our favs punched their tickets, and the judges pulled some funny business at the Skate to Milano Cortina — aka Chinese Nebelhorn. Chapters 0:00 — Intro 1:26 — Women's Competition 25:01 — Ice Dance Competition 39:24 — Men's Competition 53:03 — Pairs Competition 59:52 — Gold in our Hearts 1:01:05 — Outro The (officially unaffiliated) return of the Russians. Many sighs of relief as some favorites lock their spots. And what’s an official Olympic-related event without some...
info_outlineWe give our impressions of the Legacy on Ice event, performed in honor of the skating community lives lost on Flight 5342, and fundraising for their families and communities. We also discuss the Skating Lesson controversy attached to the event, plus other competition news.
Chapters
0:00 — Intro
1:10 — Legacy on Ice Impressions
22:13 — Skating Lesson Controversy
31:30 — Sonja Henie Trophy
34:03 — Maria Olszewska Memorial
37:59 — Gold in our Hearts
39:08 — Wrap-Up
Legacy On Ice tribute benefit reactions, Skating Lesson controversy, and competition news
This week, we take a close look at the emotional benefit event for the victims of Flight 5342, Legacy on Ice. With a lineup of US skaters past and present like no other, this sold out show in Washington, D.C., brought together the skating community to process its grief, help those who need it, and hopefully find a bit of comfort and peace. We also take a quick look at a few small skating competitions that are leading towards Worlds in a few short weeks that saw both Adam Siao Him Fa and Bradie Tennell grab titles.
Legacy on Ice
From Amber Glenn to Nancy Kerrigan. Paul Wylie to Ilia Malinin. The list of skaters who came together to support the families and communities of the victims of American Airlines Flight 5342, as well as first responders who were on the ground at the tragedy was genuinely astounding.
Hosted by Olympic Champions Brian Boitano and Kristi Yamaguchi, this event had some of the most emotional skates we have ever seen. In particular, the tribute to his parents, Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, performed by Maxim Naumov was a moment of true strength like we’ve never seen in this sport. A gorgeous, powerful program followed by a group performance with fellow Skating Club of Boston members, Jimmy Ma, Alisa Efimova, and Misha Mitrofanov, this was just one of many moments honoring those who were so tragically lost that we will never forget.
A list of where you can still donate to help those most impacted by the crash can be found below. Legacy on Ice will be rebroadcasted at 1pm ET on March 30th on NBC in the United States.
Pre-Worlds Competitions
We are only a few weeks away from the World Championships in Boston, but there were a couple of smaller events leading up to this past week.
The Sonja Henie Trophy saw a strong warm up outing for last year’s World bronze medalist, Adam Siao Him Fa from France. With strong short program and a few mistakes in his free skate, he earned a total score of 281.99 — which keeps him very much in the conversation for the World podium. On the Women’s side, Lara Naki Gutmann took the title after being second in the short.
At another smaller competition, the Maria Olszewska Memorial, Bradie Tennell delivered excellent skates to take the title with a whopping score of 220.29. Another American competing, Alexa Gasparatto, made history here by becoming the first black woman ever internationally to land a triple axel. Congratulations, Alexa!
Legacy on Ice links:
- Legacy on Ice Donation link
- Legacy on Ice Online auction open through April 3
- U.S. Figure Skating Family Support Fund
- Kendra Scott Skate Necklace – Proceeds benefit U.S. Figure Skating Family Support Fund