It didn’t come as easily as they might have wanted, but Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier debuted their ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating season with gold medals hanging around their necks in Saskatoon on Sunday afternoon.
For a record sixth year in a row, the Canadian pair captured gold in ice dance at the 2025 Skate Canada International, much to the delight of fans circling the lower bowl of SaskTel Centre.
“Nobody gets to see all the things that happen in the background,” Poirier said. “All the hours and hours, the weeks, and weeks, and weeks of work that come into these kinds of accomplishments. I think we can just take this as a celebration of what we’ve been able to accomplish through our work collectively as a team.”
Gilles and Poirier entered Sunday’s skate with a nearly five-point lead on the duo of Allison Reed and Saulius Ambrulevicius from Lithuania following the rhythm dance on Saturday, making their first appearance on the international circuit this fall.
A missed lift midway through their free skate closed the gap between them and the Lithuanians; however, the four-time Canadian champions were able to finish the rest of their routine cleanly and captured gold with a total score of 202.89 points.
“We know we’re champions,” Gilles said. “With a mistake like that, I think in our heads we knew we could still win if we kept it together. That comes with the years that we have together and the confidence that we know we can put down great programs. It comes to us because we’re veterans and it gives us confidence going into the next part of the season, knowing that we can kind of overcome anything.”
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The path to the 2026 Milan Olympics has kicked up a notch for the longtime pair, with the ISU Grand Prix Finals and Skate Canada National Championships just weeks away before they compete at their third Olympic Games.
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According to Poirier, their season opener in Saskatchewan gives them many areas to tighten up but is a weekend they can build upon nearing the end of the Olympic cycle.
“I think we have some really great memories from this event here in Saskatoon,” Poirier said. “As much as it didn’t go exactly the way that we wanted, we can take this as a stepping stone, a learning experience and just memories that we can take with us.”
It was a double-podium performance for Canada in ice dance on Sunday, as the duo of Marjorie Lajoie and Zachary Lagha moved up one place in the free dance to capture bronze with a score of 192.41.
Earlier in the day, spectators in the stands were witnesses to history following a nearly perfect performance by American skating star Ilia Malinin in the men’s free skate.
Already holding a 12-point lead following Saturday’s short program, the two-time defending world champion executed his skate with precision to win gold with a jaw-dropping score of 333.81 points.
That included a score of 228.97 in the free skate, breaking his own world record in the process.
“Overall, I was really happy and satisfied with my performance, being able to go out there, one element after another, and just nail it,” Malinin said. “I’m just so glad I was able to beat my own personal best, as well as set a record for the long program.”
The 20-year-old, also known as ‘Quad God’ for being the only skater to ever land a quadruple axel, is an early favourite to contend for the Olympic gold medal in Milan as he stretched his undefeated streak to 13 straight gold medals in international competition.
He added that the records serve as a benchmark for him to strive for in the coming months, though it’s his love of skating that is pushing him towards greatness.
“That always gives me a sense of confidence and motivation to not only push myself further and further, but to also try to show all the world how much I really enjoy the passion of figure skating,” Malinin said. “I don’t think without that passion I would be able to set these records and to always keep breaking them every time.”
Canada’s top finisher in the men’s program was two-time national champion Roman Sadovsky, who leapt over countryman Stephen Gogolev into a seventh-place finish with 236.73 points.
While he wasn’t able to crack the Skate Canada International podium, he called it the most consistent skate of his career in the national event.
“I’ve lost count how many Skate Canada (Internationals) I’ve done and it’s always been not my greatest competition of the season,” Sadovsky said. “This has by far been the best Skate Canada I’ve had, especially with injuries over the past few years. I’ve made a joke that two years ago I didn’t get to do it, then last year I did half of it.
“This time my body actually held out and I did the whole thing, so a lot of things to look forward to and a lot of things to build on this.”
On Saturday, the Canadian team of Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps claimed gold in the pairs event for the third consecutive year with a score of 213.40 to edge out the German duo of Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin, qualifying for the ISU Grand Prix Final in Japan.
The women’s event, meanwhile, was captured by Japan’s Mone Chiba with 217.23 points, with Madeline Schizas serving as the top-finishing Canadian in ninth place with 166.64 points.
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