By the numbers, Russia's Petrosian looks golden at 2026 Olympics. Will pressure and her coach's past factor in?

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By the numbers, Russia's Petrosian looks golden at 2026 Olympics. Will pressure and her coach's past factor in?

Figure skating has become more and more of a math exercise since the sport began using its new scoring and judging system in the 2004-05 season.

If it were only a numbers game, you could securely place a bet on 17-year-old Russian Adeliia Petrosian becoming Olympic women’s singles champion next February because she has mastered high-scoring jumps none of the other contenders are likely to try.

But human behavior factors into the final score, so placing that bet involves more of a gamble than it might seem.

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Audrey Shin, Balazs Nagy forge unique pairs’ figure skating partnership

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Audrey Shin, Balazs Nagy forge unique pairs’ figure skating partnership

Over the three seasons after what seemed like a breakthrough bronze medal performance at Skate America in 2020, Audrey Shin had slowly lost both her confidence in the skills needed to be successful in singles and her motivation to keep doing it.

At the end of last season, his first in what seemed a promising partnership with Chelsea Liu, veteran pairs’ skater Balázs Nagy lost Liu when she announced on Instagram in late March she had ended the partnership to prioritize her mental health.

Because of those losses, Shin and Nagy found each other and a new career path in the sport.

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Deanna Stellato-Dudek with a victory, and journey, for the ages (and aged) at figure skating worlds

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Deanna Stellato-Dudek with a victory, and journey, for the ages (and aged) at figure skating worlds

MONTREAL – Deanna Stellato-Dudek is now one for the ages.

And for the aged — at least by the actuarial tables for figure skating careers.

And maybe even for a film script. After all, she has already written two acts, one as a U.S. singles skater from suburban Chicago, the other who returned to the sport after a 16-year absence as a pairs’ skater now representing Canada.

“It’s a dream come true,” Stellato-Dudek said in English after opening by speaking French to the crowd in partner Maxime Deschamps’ native Quebec.

At age 40, Stellato-Dudek became the oldest woman to win a world title in any figure skating discipline when she and Deschamps took gold Thursday night at the Bell Centre.

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A dazzling skate by Deanna Stellato-Dudek. a lady of a certain age. . .(and her partner, Maxime Deschamps)

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A dazzling skate by Deanna Stellato-Dudek. a lady of a certain age. . .(and her partner, Maxime Deschamps)

MONTREAL – Pairs’ skater Deanna Stellato-Dudek is the grande dame of competitive figure skating, trying to become, at age 40, the oldest skater to win a world title in any discipline in decades.

“You know,” she said, “there’s no points in figure skating for being older.”

She and her 32-year-old partner, Maxime Deschamps, got plenty of them Wednesday with the best short program performance of their three international competition seasons together.

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Numbers show regressive impact of Russian ban in skating. Is the decline good or bad?

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Numbers show regressive impact of Russian ban in skating. Is the decline good or bad?

So here we are, hard upon a second straight figure skating Grand Prix Final without Russian entrants as justifiable punishment for their country’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, still waiting on a decision in the soap operatic Kamila Valieva doping case almost two years after the Russian phenom tested positive six weeks before the 2022 Winter Olympics.

The Valieva decision, which has delayed awarding the 2022 team event medals, is expected by mid-February.  That presumably is mid-February 2024, but who knows?  Anyway, it can go on the back burner for today’s discussion, which is about the state of the sport without the beleaguered Valieva and her compatriots as the Grand Prix Final begins Thursday in Beijing.

There is no doubt that the absence of the Russian women, who had utterly dominated the sport since 2014, has had a dramatic effect on jumping.

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