Competitive St. Petersburg: figure skaters are expected to fight hard at the Grand Prix stage

The fifth and final stage of the Russian Grand Prix of Figure Skating will be held at the Yubileiny Palace in St. Petersburg on November 23-24. Only the main starts - the national championship and the final of the series - remain ahead. A full house is expected - and the federation has even made discounts on tickets by promo code on its website in the last few days. Strong line-ups and a decisive battle for pole position on the eve of the main start of the season - what to expect from the figure skating weekend - in Izvestia's material.

Five out of five?

Men's singles are delighted this season with crazy competition. The stage in St. Petersburg will be no exception. Of the 12 contenders, at least half are potential medalists. In addition, men's singles can conquer a very unusual achievement - five different skaters can win at five stages. This will happen if any rival of Vladislav Dikidzhi wins in St. Petersburg.

In addition to him, Peter Gumennik, who in 2024 won only at regional St. Petersburg competitions, Dmitry Aliev and Gleb Lutfullin, who has results in the neighborhood of 300 points in the new season, look strong for gold. Makar Ignatov, Andrey Mozalev and Artem Kovalev are the dark horses.

In the second half of the table there is a tough fight for qualifying for the Russian Championships (18) and the Grand Prix Final (12). Each of the five skaters not mentioned above can qualify for them. So there will be no unmotivated in Yubileyny. Both tournaments, with a favorable outcome, can become qualifiers for the first international starts in the Olympic season - if the ISU decides to bring us back.

A chance for rehabilitation

The women's competition should also finally turn out to be tight. If on the previous weekend in Moscow the difference between the winner (Adelia Petrosyan) and the pursuer (Daria Sadkova) amounted to 27 points, then here such a gap will be a surprise. Sonia Akatieva, who almost fell out of the medals in her first stage and became the third, has to rehabilitate herself. The situation is even worse for her namesake Muravyeva.

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And the stable Veronika Yametova with her 210 points and Alina Gorbacheva with quadruples will come to the shores of the Neva to their displeasure. The free program will be very unpredictable. For other competitors it is important that in St. Petersburg it is possible to get into the top five after the leaders and score a lot of points in the Grand Prix standings, which almost guarantees a ticket to the finals and even more so to the Russian Championships.

Principled rivalry

In pairs, the representation is sad again - only three duets. On the other hand, but what a great show! Finally, the first duel of the season between Boykova/Kozlovsky and Mishina/Gallyamov pairs, plus Tamara Moskvina's second (and very curious and original) duo Kadyrova/Mironov. Ilya hasn't competed at the top level for almost two years, Yasmina for about a year. And the guys immediately became third out of six pairs at the stage in Krasnoyarsk.

As for the Boikova/Kozlovsky vs Mishina/Gallyamov confrontation, it's already a classic of Russian figure skating. St. Petersburg is the fiefdom of Tamara Moskvina, so perhaps Nastya and Sasha are the favorites. But it is more interesting to see what technical and tactical moves they will exchange. For example, whether Sasha and Dima (who previously skated for Moskvina) will try to do a quadruple throw in front of their home stands.

In dance on the eve of the Russian Championships (a year before the Olympics, we remind you) there is a unique situation when several duets are equally close to victory and medals, and each of them has its own administrative resource. Stepanova/Bukin and Khavronina/Narizhny have just performed in Moscow, and it is very important for Khudaiberdieva/Bazin not to lose to them in absentia. The other pairs are probably fighting for lower places, although Kaganovskaya/Nekrasov can be expected to jump up. And there are also local and in fact the only St. Petersburg dancers Mironova/Ustenko - with their unique style and deserve to move to the elite. There are the spectacular Leontieva/Gorelkin. The top 5 will clearly be crowded.

Preliminary lineup

Women: Sofia Akatieva, Ekaterina Anisimova, Yana Bityushkova, Sofia Vazhnova, Alina Gorbacheva, Elizaveta Kiseleva, Sofia Muravyeva, Valeria Ovchinnikova, Maria Paramonova, Victoria Fedyanina, Lyudmila Fursova, Veronika Yametova.

Men: Dmitry Aliev, Petr Gumennik, Vladislav Dikidzhi, Fedor Zonov, Makar Ignatov, Artem Kovalev, Gleb Lutfullin, Alexander Melnikov, Andrey Mozalev, Vladimir Oshchepkov, Semyon Solovyev, Mikhail Ternovsky.

Couples: Alexandra Boikova/Dmitry Kozlovsky, Yasmina Kadyrova/Ilya Mironov, Anastasia Mishina/Alexander Galliamov.

Dancing: Vasilisa Kaganovskaya/Maksim Nekrasov, Elizaveta Kirillova/Ilya Karpov, Sofia Leontieva/Daniil Gorelkin, Taisiya Linchevskaya/Dmitri Shcherbakov, Ekaterina Mironova/Evgeny Ustenko, Ekaterina Rybakova/Ivan Makhnosov, Olga Fedorova/Pavel Drako, Elizaveta Khudaiberdieva/Egor Bazin, Yulia Churkina/Boris Frolov, Elizaveta Shichina/Pavel Drozd, Anna Scherbakova/Egor Goncharov.

Schedule of the 5th Stage of the Russian Grand Prix of Figure Skating

November 23, Saturday

13:30 Women. Short Program

15:15 Men. Short program

17:00 Pairs. Short program

17:50 Dance. Rhythm dance

November 24, Sunday

13:00 Women. Free program

15:00 Men. Free program

17:00 Pairs. Freestyle program

18:00 Dance. Free dance