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...
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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...
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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...
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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
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Cup of China 2025 Recap (Figure Skating Grand Prix Series)
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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
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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...
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Trialeti Trophy 2025 Recap and Grand Prix Preview
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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 check out the French Masters event, featuring the debut of ice dance team Fournier-Beaudry and Cizeron, and a fantastic performance from Kevin Aymoz. We also look at the Junior Grand Prix, including a controversy in Pairs, and a breakout gold in women’s.
French Masters 2025 — Fournier-Beaudry & Cizeron Debut, Aymoz Dazzles
In this week’s episode of Scoreography, we dig into the French Masters competition where Laurence Fournier-Beaudry & Guillaume Cizeron made their much-awaited competitive debut. With two very refined programs — including an especially memorable free dance — they came out on top over country-mates Lopareva & Brissaud and Demougeot & LeMercier. This sets up what will be an interesting few months leading to the Olympic team selections.
In the men’s event, Kevin Aymoz reminded us why his Bolero is so iconic, winning the event in style. Adam Siao Him Fa had some unfortunate skates to start his season, but no one outside the arena will ever see them since he requested they not be streamed.
Junior Grand Prix — Quad Twist Controversy and Breakout Performances
Also, after quite a few requests from listeners to cover more Juniors, we take advantage of less happening on the senior circuit to look at a bit of what’s happened at the first two junior Grand Prix events.
Of particular note, the new-to-juniors pairs team from China, Guo & Zheng, threw a rarely-seen quad twist — the first since Sui & Han did one in Beijing in 2022! Unfortunately, the judges mis-called it and only a triple was counted. While this was disappointing, there was a lot to be excited about for them as well as the Canadian team Kemp & Elizarov, who earned gold.
We were also impressed with the evolution of both Minkyu Seo and Rio Nakata — who are already setting up the men’s events this season to be strong and exciting. Both scored new personal bests in their respective wins in the Grand Prix of Riga (Nakata) and Grand Prix Ankara (Seo.)
The Junior international debut of Japan’s Mayuko Oka delighted us, as did Yujae Kim’s strongest performance to date and an emotional short program from Sophie Joline Von Felten.
Upcoming Event Previews
Last but not least, we begin previewing what feels like the “real” start to the Olympic season with 2 events — the John Nick’s Pairs Challenge and the Kinoshita Cup — happening the first week of September.
Chapters
0:00 — Intro
0:40 — French Masters Ice Dance
17:39 — French Masters Men’s Competition
23:13 — French Masters Women and Pairs
24:25 — JGP Quad Twist Controversy
29:36 — Kemp and Elizarov pairs victory
31:28 — JGP Men: Nakata vs Seo
34:57 — JGP Women: Oka, Kim, and Von Felton
44:18 — Williams and Lewer JGP Medal
45:36 — John Nicks Pairs Challenge Preview
48:40 — Kinoshita Cup preview
57:18 — Look ahead to Lombardia and Olympic Qualifiers
59:16 — Wrap-Up