Winter Olympics: Ice Dance favourites prevail despite potential scandal

Ice dance is, unfortunately, the least well-known of the figure skating disciplines at the Olympics, often confused with pairs as both categories have partners rather than a single athlete on the ice. However, this is a disservice to the sport – despite not having the showy jumps and throws of pairs, ice dance focuses instead on footwork sequences across the ice, lifts and the intense emotional connection between the athletes themselves, the audience, and the music. At the 2026 Milano Cortina Olympics, the technical skill and emotional musicality was on full display despite the judging scandal surrounding the event.

Ice dance is split into two events – the rhythm dance, the theme of which the ISU (International Skating Union) decides every season, and the free dance. The scores from both of these events are then combined to decide the overall winner. This season, the theme of the rhythm dance was the ‘style of the 90s’, and all the teams delivered. Team GB had two teams in the event, and the first of these to skate was Phebe Bekker and James Hernandez. The commentators praised their elegant lines and their lift, and they achieved a season’s best score, advancing to the free skate. Team GB’s great hope in this event was Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson, hailed as the ‘next Torvill and Dean’, and their incredibly entertaining skate was a homage to British culture – she wore a Union Jack-themed dress, and their music was a Spice Girls medley. Their joy on the ice was easy to see, their musicality and performance on point throughout their program, and they matched that energy with strong synchronicity and an incredible lift.

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Neither Team GB teams podiumed, however, and those that did were the favourites going in – Canada’s Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier, America’s Madison Chock and Evan Bates and France’s Laurence Fournier-Beaudry and Guillame Cizeron. All three teams featured in Netflix’s recent documentary about ice dance and are some of the most decorated ice dancers in history. They all proved why in this rhythm dance. Gilles and Poirier’s high-speed program showcased their best elements, particularly Gilles’ musicality and their energy, especially going into the perfect twizzle sequence. Fournier-Beaudry and Cizeron, who won the rhythm dance event, had a strong performance, incorporating elements such as the energetic arm movements of the dance style voguing, a style historically popularised by the LGBTQ+ community, as well as their signature technical excellence – the final lift was especially beautiful. Team USA’s Chock/Bates, the most decorated pair in US ice dance history, had a crowd-favourite clean skate to a medley of Lenny Kravitz’s music, leading to a very entertaining performance.

Going into the free dance event, Fournier-Beaudry and Cizeron were in first place, followed by Chock and Bates and Gilles and Poirier in second and third respectively. Although the rhythm dance saw them outside the podium places, Team GB’s Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson qualified fourth, which still put them into medal contention. The other GB pair of Bekker and Hernandez also qualified for the free dance, an incredible achievement for a team on their Olympic debut – their program was set to the soundtrack from Baz Luhrmann’s ‘Romeo + Juliet’, and they skated powerfully, and beautifully in sync throughout. Unfortunately, Fear and Gibson didn’t find the same success as their teammates, as Lilah Fear fell out of their twizzle sequence, a mistake with harsh consequences, putting them 9th in the free dance and entirely out of medal contention despite Team GB’s hopes.

The entire ice dance event was overshadowed by off-ice scandal

Gilles and Poirier had one of the most emotional skates of the entire event, a reworking of their ‘Starry Night’ program from a previous season, which was choreographed in memory of Piper Gilles’ mother. They skated it cleanly, with a perfect twizzle sequence and a no-handed lift which was scored highly by the judges, leading to a season’s best score. Chock and Bates also skated a clean program, although it was a completely different emotional tone, based on a fight between a matador (played by Madison Chock) and a bull (Evan Bates), playing into their strengths as performers, both dramatic and technically perfect. Their costumes added to this sense of drama; Chock skated in a flamenco-style skirt which provided both a splash of red against their mostly-black costumes and also anxiety for the audience as several times it appeared to get dangerously close to her skates or covering Bates’ eyes during lifts. The gold-medal winning performance, though, came from France’s Fournier-Beaudry and Cizeron. Cizeron, with his previous partner Gabrielle Papadakis, is a previous Olympic medal winner and regarded as one of the best ice dancers in the world, and their program certainly showed that, with the two performing like they’d been skating their whole lives together rather than under a year.

However, the entire ice dance event was overshadowed by off-ice scandal. During their free dance, many viewers noted that both Cizeron and Fournier-Beaudry made mistakes, with the commentators even noting Cizeron stepping out during their twizzle sequence. They were not penalised for this, despite other teams (such as GB’s Fear and Gibson) having harsh point deductions for similar errors, leading to accusations of rigging and cheating, despite Team USA choosing not to appeal these scores.

Despite this, the event as a whole showed some of the best of elite ice dance – technical brilliance paired with the dynamic musicality and artistry that the discipline is known for.