Advertisement

French, Canadians in Olympic ice dance

France's Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron are among favourites for the ice dance figure skating competition which opens Monday at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics,

After Yuzuru Hanyu's stunning men's win set against an explosion of quads, Olympic figure skating switches gear to the grace and elegance of ice dance on Monday. Taking centre stage are a young couple from France, Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron, who have shot to prominence following a string of stunning pre-Games exploits. Up against them are the Canadian duo Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir who won gold in Vancouver in 2010 and took silver in Sochi four years ago. To add spice to the clash, the both couples share the same coach in Montreal. Virtue, 28, and 30-year-old Moir, Canada's flagbearers at the opening ceremony, go into Monday's short programme with a gold medal already adorning the sideboard in their flat in the athletes' village after helping Canada to the team medal last week. They hold the best short programme score and by normal standards would be legitimate front runners for the title. But Papadakis, 22 and the year older Cizeron have deposed them as favourites, after a sensational season saw them become the first to smash the 200-point combined total barrier. They did that in the Cup of China in early November, going on to better their own mark no fewer than four times, the last a score of 203.16 at the European Championships in mid-January. Despite their evident gold medal claims Cizeron told AFP that they are "trying not to dwell on this idea of being favourites, we simply want to deliver the best performance we can". "We’ve been training a lot for many months so we're feeling physically and mentally ready," he added. Papadakis revealed part of their preparation included a self-imposed news blackout. "We don’t really read what they write about us, to avoid adding extra pressure." She said they were in South Korea for "a really beautiful experience". "(We're) hoping to take our skating further, to have no regrets, whatever medal we get, whether we get one or not." - 'give everything' - The French skaters take to the ice at the Gangneung Arena with a morale-boosting win over Virtue and Moir at the Grand Prix Finals in Nagoya, Japan in December after coming second to them at the worlds. "They obviously have a lot of experience of Olympic Games and of competing in general. "They’ve worked hard, they’re great athletes, we know they’ll give their all during the competition," said Papadakis. "We’ll also give everything we have -- and may the best (couple) win." For Virtue and Moir, whose best combined score is 199.86, a top three finish will make them the most decorated skaters in Olympic history with five medals. Team gold has only whetted their appetite. "We are thrilled to have won the team event, but that doesn't mean we want this any the less. We aren't going to ease up. The aim of coming back (after a two year time-out between 2014 and 2016) was to win gold for the two of us," said Moir. He added: "Our advantage is our experience compared to our rivals. We will be relying on that." If there is to be an upset it could come from Ekaterina Bobrova and Dmitri Solviev, who took third in the team ice dance on the way to winning overall silver for Olympic Athletes from Russia, or American brother and sister Maia and Alex Shibutani. They are trying to emulate Isabelle Duchesnay-Dean and Paul Duchesnay, French siblings who took silver in 1992. The top 20 couples qualify for Tuesday's free dance final.