Grand Prix Final Preview: Barcelona Take Two

by Melanie Hoyt | Photos by Robin Ritoss & Danielle Earl

For the second year in a row, the season’s top skaters are in Barcelona to contest the Grand Prix Final at both the junior and senior levels. After last year’s sellout in mild temperatures, the ISU awarded the event to Barcelona once again. In senior dance, half the field is making a return trip, and all six teams have realistic medal chances. In fact, five teams are past world medalists. This year’s roster is also significant, because it is the first time that three dance teams from the same country have qualified, with three entries coming from the United States.

The field is led by a trio of teams that have medaled in the past couple of World Championships. As the only team with two Grand Prix victories this season, in Canada and Russia, Kaitlyn Weaver & Andrew Poje have qualified first this year. The Canadian champions won this event last year and would love a repeat. They switched their short dance after Finlandia Trophy in October, but since then, things have progressed relatively smoothly for Weaver & Poje. Both of their Grand Prix outings earned about 173 points, and they could pick up a few points here, as scores tend to rise at this event.

Americans Madison Chock & Evan Bates qualified first for last year’s Grand Prix Final. After a runaway victory at Skate America, they appeared to be on the same track this year, but mistakes in China saw their scores dip and resulted in a silver medal behind Anna Cappellini & Luca Lanotte. Like Weaver & Poje, Chock & Bates are also using a replacement short dance that wowed the home audience at Skate America. Of all the teams competing, they have had the most time to refine their dances since their last competition. They are perhaps seeking a bit of redemption in Barcelona; last year, a fall at the end of their short dance took them out of the running for the gold medal.

Cappellini & Lanotte defeated Chock & Bates in China, but were second to Weaver & Poje in a close battle in Russia. The Italians struggled a bit last year, in the season following their world title, but most agree that they are back in the game this year. With strong performances, especially in their lovely short dance to music from “The Merry Widow,” they have a shot at the top spot. All three of Weaver & Poje, Chock & Bates, and Cappellini & Lanotte have achieved similar scores in the 173-point range at Grand Prix events this year, and all are capable of tacking on a few more points this weekend.

Maia & Alex Shibutani of the United States are back in Barcelona after a fourth-place outing last year. They, perhaps, have the most momentum of all the teams, as they are coming off of a victory at NHK Trophy two weeks ago. At NHK, the Shibutanis set a new ISU personal best score of 174.43, which is also the highest score seen on this year’s Grand Prix circuit. Their lovely free dance to music from Coldplay has been reworked since the beginning of the season, and now with a little more variety in the music and a natural build, the program really sings.

Madison Hubbell & Zachary Donohue will round out Team USA’s senior dancers, and this is their first appearance the Grand Prix Final. Hubbell & Donohue are the only dance team in Barcelona that competed at Trophée Eric Bompard, when the competition was cancelled before the free programs due to the attacks in Paris. Hubbell & Donohue had been in first place after the short dance, and it was eventually decided that their first-place ranking would count for 15 points in the Grand Prix qualification. When they went home from France, they reworked their free dance and were able to skate it two weeks later at NHK Trophy, where it was met with rave reviews. Despite only finishing third at NHK, Hubbell & Donohue earned new ISU personal bests in both segments of the competition.

Russians Ekaterina Bobrova & Dmitri Soloviev (pictured, right) are back at the Final after taking last season off. They qualified last on a tiebreaker of combined short dance scores and have a bronze medal from Skate Canada and a silver from NHK Trophy. In Canada, they finished well behind Weaver & Poje and the Shibutanis, but by NHK, they had begun to close the gap.

The junior competition at the Grand Prix Final is always interesting because the teams have so much time to polish their programs between the JGP Series and the Final.

At the top of the qualification standings are American training partners Lorraine McNamara & Quinn Carpenter and Rachel Parsons & Michael Parsons. Both teams qualified for the Final two years ago, and both missed out last year in a series of very close results at the JGP events. This year, the foursome from the Wheaton Ice Skating Academy boasts four gold medals from the JGP series and new, sky-high personal best scores. If they skate their best, it will be difficult for the other teams to touch them.

A pair of training mates from Russia is also on the roster—both Alla Loboda & Pavel Drozd and Betina Popova & Yuri Vlasenko work with Ksenia Rumiantseva and Ekaterina Volobueva in Moscow. Both teams qualified for the Final last year and finished on the podium, with Loboda & Drozd second and Popova & Vlasenko third. Both teams also experienced a bit of falloff at the end of last season. Popova & Vlasenko finished a disappointing 11th at the World Junior Championships, while Loboda & Drozd failed to qualify for the world junior team. Both teams have set new ISU personal bests this year, but they are 8-10 points below that of the Americans.

Anastasia Skoptcova & Kirill Aleshin will also represent Russia in Barcelona. They qualified for the Final in just their first year on the JGP series. They won bronze in Poland, but finished over 20 points behind McNamara & Carpenter’s winning score, and then they won silver in Croatia, 12 points behind the Parsons.

Marie-Jade Lauriault & Romain Le Gac of France (pictured, left) round out the junior roster. This is their second trip to Spain this season; their JGP victory this year occurred in Logroño. They also won a silver medal in Austria. Lauriault & Le Gac’s score of 152.72 from Logroño means that, although they are less experienced than the top two Russian teams, they are capable of challenging for the podium.

Competition begins on Thursday with the junior short dance. The junior free dance will be held Friday afternoon, with the senior short dance following in the evening. The senior free dance is set for Saturday evening.