The Dance Hall 13: When You Dance on the Ice and Your Feet Twizzle Twice, That's Amore

[Andrea82]

France and Italy here we come

If we can recover all the videos, we should a most hegregious overscoring for the Nationals season

Scores so far:

Laurence FOURNIER BEAUDRY / Guillaume CIZERON 233.7
Charlene Edith Magali GUIGNARD / Marco FABBRI 213.41

Lilah FEAR / Lewis GIBSON GBR 211.10

Olivia Sophie SMART / Tim Frederik DIECK 207.89

Evgeniia LOPAREVA / Geoffrey BRISSAUD 203.8

Juulia TURKKILA / Matthias VERSLUIS 200.45

Katerina MRAZKOVA / Daniel MRAZEK CZE 196.70

Jennifer JANSE van RENSBURG / Benjamin STEFFAN 196.57

Phebe BEKKER / James HERNANDEZ GBR 195.56

Loicia DEMOUGEOT / Theo le MERCIER. 194.07

Yuka ORIHARA / Juho PIRINEN 191.23

Sofía VAL / Asaf KAZIMOV 190.17

Natalie TASCHLEROVA / Filip TASCHLER CZE 186.03

Milla RUUD REITAN / Nikolaj MAJOROV 184.57

Shira ICHILOV / Michael NOSOVITSKY 183.67

Victoria MANNI / Carlo Antonio Guido ROTHLISBERGER 180.04

Mariia IGNATEVA / Danijil Leonyidovics SZEMKO HUN 179.77

Natacha LAGOUGE / Arnaud CAFFA 178.74
Noemi Maria TALI / Noah Elias LAFORNARA 176.63
Giulia Isabella PAOLINO / Andrea TUBA 175.34

Charise MATTHAEI / Max LIEBERS 172.71

Marie DUPAYAGE / Thomas NABAIS 172.17

Anita STRAUB / Andreas STRAUB AUT 165.44

And last but not least

Barbara is out of hospital and she was at Italian Nationals. She was back working last week after a stop of one month for health issues.
The the post-competition interviews broadcast of Nationals, Guignard had her chance to complain again about the scores from the French Grand Prix. And this gave the opportunity to the journalist to prompt Barbara to comment on them too.
ISU judge Michela Cesaro was as the technical commentator during the Ice Dance broadcast. When the co-commentator mentioned the complaints about the scores and “especially those at the French GP”, she exclaimed “I was there!” The other commentator then asked her about the scoring in France, to which she replied “it was interesting.” [edit: this part is in the video of the FD performance]
Another gem was in the post–free dance interview, when the journalist reminded Fabbri how many times they had won the European Championships, and he responded that they would not win this year because “the Olympic champion has returned with a new girl.”
Ah, Barbara is not impressed by Chock/Bates: “the Americans don’t drive me crazy” (it is a common Italian expression, probably does not translate perfectly well into English).

 

[Karen-W]

Ah, Barbara is not impressed by Chock/Bates: “the Americans don’t drive me crazy” (it is a common Italian expression, probably does not translate perfectly well into English).

Maybe something along the lines of "I don't go nuts for the Americans?" or "they're nothing to get hyped over"?

 

[angi]

Barbara is out of hospital and she was at Italian Nationals. She was back working last week after a stop of one month for health issues.
The the post-competition interviews broadcast of Nationals, Guignard had her chance to complain again about the scores from the French Grand Prix. And this gave the opportunity to the journalist to prompt Barbara to comment on them too.
ISU judge Michela Cesaro was as the technical commentator during the Ice Dance broadcast. When the co-commentator mentioned the complaints about the scores and “especially those at the French GP”, she exclaimed “I was there!” The other commentator then asked her about the scoring in France, to which she replied “it was interesting.”
Another gem was in the post–free dance interview, when the journalist reminded Fabbri how many times they had won the European Championships, and he responded that they would not win this year because “the Olympic champion has returned with a new girl.”
Ah, Barbara is not impressed by Chock/Bates: “the Americans don’t drive me crazy” (it is a common Italian expression, probably does not translate perfectly well into English).

I think it will serve G/F and G/P well to go and listen to the last 20 minutes of the Runthrough podcast's episode about GPF. Ashley, in particular, made some great comments from her perspective as someone who took the road of badmouthing the judges and how they came up to her and voiced their opinions about it. Essentially, the judges will never hear that sort of criticism and view it in an internal retrospective way, they view it as unappreciative and disrespectful for their hard work and what they perceive as them supporting skaters throughout their careers.
Another good point they made is how G/P were getting a lot of sympathy after the GPF results (similar to what G/F got after GP France), but once you start demanding sympathy, you tend to lose the crowd's sympathy, and the FSU response to the results and then to Piper's social media behavior is a good example of that.

And lastly, watching G/F's programs at nationals showed that aside from changing the music for their RD after the first event, they made no changes whatsoever to both programs, even when the reactions and scoring they've been getting (even at the nationals stage as seen in the RD) are lukewarm at best. Until they start being receptive to the feedback they get, they have no one to blame but themselves for all the ground they've been losing. And I also find it laughable that G/F seem to aim a lot of their criticism towards FB/C (they also did it at GP France). Regardless of what we think about FB/C as people, they are currently outskating the rest of the field by miles when it comes to skating skills, it's not even close.

 

[Andrea82]

Maybe something along the lines of "I don't go nuts for the Americans?" or "they're nothing to get hyped over"?

Thanks!
Yes, it is the former.

And I also find it laughable that G/F seem to aim a lot of their criticism towards FB/C (they also did it at GP France). Regardless of what we think about FB/C as people, they are currently outskating the rest of the field by miles when it comes to skating skills, it's not even close.

to be honest, I didn't get the impression it was a particular criticism towards them (today's interview).

 

[kwanfan1818]

I was thinking it might mean, "They just don't do it for me."

 

[Vagabond]

Without hearing the original or a transcription in Italian, I suspect that "I'm not crazy about them" or "I'm not wild about them" would fit.

 

[Andrea82]

Without hearing the original or a transcription in Italian, I suspect that "I'm not crazy about them" or "I'm not wild about them" would fit.

Non mi fanno impazzire

 

[kwanfan1818]

Suddenly, I can't get Jose Feliciano singing, "Come on, baby, light my fire" out of my head.

It sounds so much better in Italian

 

[Bigbird]

Liza and Cirazano, the third-place finishers, were my favourites of the Russian Ice Dancers. Krylova needs help with choreographing for them. I find Step and Bukin bland and irksome to watch. Stepanova sticks her butt in the air and struggles to maintain a decent posture and skate well. Vasilisa and Maxim grab me in moments, but their FD is rather underwhelming, lots of tricks, but not a lot of soul.

 

[coralline]

Vasilisa and Maxim grab me in moments, but their FD is rather underwhelming, lots of tricks, but not a lot of soul.

I don't think Benoit program suits them...

 

[layman]

Announced by Rika on her Instagram (Sept. 28, 2025):

Kihira/Nishiyama will make their Nationals debut tomorrow! Ditto for Koshiro Shimada who formed a partnership with Ikura Kushida (also competing in Senior Women's event as a result of being one of the top Juniors) earlier this season.

ETA:

Junior RD starting order (4 teams): Ayumi Shibayama/Tomoki Kimura, Mizuho Sugimoto/Eisuke Kumano, Kaho Yamashita/Yuto Nagata, Sumire Yoshida/Ibuki Ogahara (he competed in Senior Men SP for the first time but did not reach the FS)

Senior RD starting order (5 teams): Chisato Uramatsu/Atsuhiko Tamura, Rika Kihira/Shingo Nishiyama, Ayano Sasaki/Yoshimitsu Ikeda, Utana Yoshida/Masaya Morita, Ikura Kushida/Koshiro Shimada

The newly formed Senior Dance team of Rika Kihira/Shingo Nishiyama won the Bronze Medal at Japanese Nationals!

 

[Sylvia]

The newly formed Senior Dance team of Rika Kihira/Shingo Nishiyama won the Bronze Medal at Japanese Nationals!

They finished 4th overall (3rd in RD):

1 Utana Yoshida / Masaya Morita Kinoshita Academy/Kinoshita Academy 172.29 1 1
2 Ikura Kushida / Koshiro Shimada Kinoshita Academy/Kinoshita Group 165.75 2 2
3 Ayano Sasaki / Yoshimitsu Ikeda Seibu Higashifushimi FSC/Seibu Higashifushimi FSC 146.22 4 3
4 Rika Kihira / Shingo Nishiyama Toyota Motor Corporation/Oriental Bio 144.41 3 4
5 Chisato Uramatsu / Atsuhiko Tamura Chukyo University/Seibu Higashifushimi FSC 131.55 5 5