As 2025 comes to a close, we catch up on a bunch of last minute figure skating news: citizenships, announcements, Olympic teams, a combined ISU Worlds event (?), and much more. We also recap our top Gold in Our Hearts moments for the year. And we share our appreciation for our listeners and community, including a particularly touching Christmas Eve message from an audience member.

Chapters

00:00:00 Intro 00:01:49 We'll be at US Nationals! 00:04:37 Skating News 00:20:50 ISU Combined Worlds Events 00:32:01 Four Continents announcements 00:43:30 Listener support and Poetry! 00:48:22 2025 Gold in our Hearts Moments 00:56:54 Wrap-Up

All-Japan Championships 2025 gave us an Olympics-worthy collection of amazing performances — including final competitive skates from several of our favorite athletes. Kaori Sakamoto and Yuma Kagiyama clinched their Olympic spots, and Yuna Aoki gave two of the finest programs of any skater this season. We also talk about the results of the French and Italian nationals events, including their locks for Olympic teams.

Chapters

00:00:00 Intro 00:02:10 Women's Event 00:33:07 Men's Compeititon 00:44:32 Pairs Compeition 00:47:14 Ice Dance Competition 00:52:09 French Nationals 00:58:44 Italian Nationals 01:08:21 Gold in our Hearts 01:09:38 Wrap-Up

We preview the All-Japan Figure Skating Championships (Japanese Nationals) and its hotly contested Olympic team outcomes. We also look back at the Junior Grand Prix Final, particularly the very exciting junior women's event. Golden Spin 2025 receives a recap as well, along with a number of other smaller federation national championships.

As mentioned in the episode, here is Rocker Skating's resource for how each federation selects its Olympic teams.

Chapters

00:00:00 Intro 00:01:06 J-Nats Women's Competition 00:11:59 J-Nats Men's Competition 00:16:16 J-Nats Pairs Competition 00:17:34 J-Nats Ice Dance Competition 00:20:19 French Nationals 00:24:21 Italian Nationals Preview 00:30:57 German Nationals 00:32:08 Four Nationals 00:34:51 Estonian Nationals 00:36:18 Finnish Nationals 00:38:59 Junior Grand Prix Final Recap 00:39:18 JGPF Women's Competition 00:50:26 JGPF Men's Competition 00:55:13 JGPF Pairs — Guo and Zhang 00:56:13 JGPF Ice Dance — Abonian and Veselukhin 00:58:15 Golden Spin recap 01:09:17 Wrap-Up

The Grand Prix Final in Japan took us on a rollercoaster of emotions. Ilia Malinin shattered his own world record. Alysa Liu is golden once again. The pairs competition was outstanding. And ice dance somehow managed to generate even more controversy, outcry, and shocking twists.

Chapters

0:00 — Intro 03:34 — Pairs Competition 04:22 — Miura and Kihara 08:17 — Conti and Macii 12:41 — Hase and Volodin 15:32 — Metelkina and Berulava 18:50 — Pavlova and Svietchenko 20:10 — Stellato-Dudek and Deschamps 23:45 — Women's Competition 24:36 — Alysa Liu 29:24 — Ami Nakai 33:41 — Kaori Sakamoto 36:14 — Amber Glenn 38:53 — Mone Chiba 45:00 — Rinka Watanabe 52:15 — Ice Dance Competition 54:34 — Chock and Bates 1:00:25 — Fournier-Beaudry and Cizerone 1:07:52 — FB/C vs F/G vs G/P scoring 1:11:00 — Fear and Gibson vs Gilles and Poirier Scoring Controversy 1:18:09 — Social Media Backlash 1:19:54 — Reed and Ambrulevicius, Zingas and Kolesnik 1:25:41 — Men's Competition 1:30:05 — Yuma Kagiyama 1:34:16 — Shun Sato 1:36:28 — Daniel Grassl 1:42:25 — Adam Siao Him Fa 1:45:15 — Mikhail Shaidorov 1:50:47 — Gold in our Hearts 1:53:15 — Wrap-Up

We get ready for the 2025 Grand Prix Final with a rundown of all the competitors across the 4 disciplines, comparing their scores and performances so far this season, and making our (highly dubious) podium predictions.

Chapters

0:00 — Intro 1:58 — Men's Competition 19:09 — Men's Podium Predictions 20:47 — Pairs Competition 34:09 — Pairs Podium Predictions 35:39 — Women's Competition 52:57 — Women's Podium Predictions 56:16 — Ice Dance Competition 1:21:20 — Ice Dance Podium Predictions 1:22:59 — Other Skating News 1:24:23 — Talinn Trophy 1:28:00 — South Korean Ranking Competition 1:32:16 — Wrap-Up

The final 2025 Grand Prix qualifier event provided a terrific women's competition, more judging controversies in ice dance, plus blood, tears, and several truly memorable, beautiful performances.

Chapters

0:00 — Intro 0:31 — Dance Scoring Controversy 19:47 — Errors and Incompetency 21:21 — Ice Dance Competition 47:50 — Ice Dance GPF Qualifiers 49:47 — Men's Competition 1:02:54 — Men's GPF Qualifiers 1:03:38 — Pairs Competition 1:12:21 — Pairs GPF Qualifiers 1:14:27 — Women's Competition 1:29:00 — Women's GPF Qualifiers 1:30:32 — Gold in our Hearts 1:32:04 — Warsaw Cup 1:36:19 — Wrap-Up

The penultimate Grand Prix Qualifier, Skate America, featured a hotly contested women's podium, some spectacular ice dance performances, numerous disasters in pairs, and a surprisingly weak men's event.

Chapters

0:00 — Intro 1:44 — Women's Competition 1:51 — Alysa Liu vs Rinka Watanabe 4:56 — Anastasiia Gubanova vs Lara Naki Gutman 7:06 — Starr Andrews 10:00 — Top 5 score comparisons 11:31 — Chaeyeon Kim 12:21 — Lea Serna 12:43 — Haein Lee 14:31 — Hana Yoshida 15:11 — Ekaterina Kurakova 15:49 — Wakaba Higuchi 17:47 — Josephine Lee 18:26 — Pairs Competition 18:54 — Miura and Kihara 19:58 — Metelkina and Berulava 24:55 — Laurin and Ethier 27:05 — Chan and Howe 29:18 — Hocke and Kunkel 29:57 — Akopova and Rakhmanin 31:30 — Plazas and Fernandez 31:53 — Flores and Wang 32:10 — Men's Competition 32:23 — Kevin Aymoz 36:39 — Mikhail Shaidorov 41:33 — Kazuki Tomono 44:14 — Jason Brown 45:33 — Daniel Grassl 47:16 — Vladimir Litvintsev and Joker Cosplayers 52:45 — Ice Dance Competition 52:48 — Chock and Bates 56:53 — Lajoie and Lagha 1:00:42 — Lopareva and Brissaud 1:03:00 — Demougeot and le Mercier 1:04:29 — Carreira and Ponomarenko 1:06:54 — Brown and Brown 1:10:12 — Mrazkova and Mrazek 1:13:31 — Bekker and Hernandez 1:18:24 — Gold in our Hearts 1:20:51 — News and Errata 1:23:08 — Nat Taschlerova Post 1:28:40 — Finlandia Trophy Preview 1:30:51 — Wrap-Up

Kaori Sakamoto reigned supreme at her final NHK Trophy competition! The Japanese Grand Prix event gave us exciting podium wins, surprise come-ups, frightening injuries, and a disappointing debut from the returning Shib Sibs.

#FigureSkating #GPfigure

Chapters

0:00 — Intro 1:33 — Women's Competition 1:50 — Kaori Sakamoto 5:52 — Sofia Samodelkina 7:55 — Loena Hendrickx 10:34 — Young You 14:05 — Sarah Everhardt 16:29 — Yuna Aoki 19:23 — Anna Pezzetta 20:02 — Wakaba Higuchi 21:17 — Elyce Lin-Gracey 22:17 — Canadian Women / Ice Challenge 24:18 — Ice Dance Competition 25:25 — Fear and Gibson 25:56 — Guignard and Fabbri 29:02 — Green and Parsons 33:09 — Taschlerova and Taschler 34:21 — Wolfkostin and Tsarevski 36:36 — Shibutani Siblings 44:49 — Orihara and Pirinen 45:36 — Fabbri and Ayer 46:49 — Men's Competition 46:58 — Yuma Kagiyama vs Shun Sato 50:39 — Lukas Britschgi 52:17 — Boyang Jin 53:06 — Junhwan Cha 54:39 — Adam Hagara 56:00 — Andrew Torgashev and Jimmy Ma 1:02:35 — Pairs Competition 1:02:38 — Conti and Macii 1:03:49 — Pavolva and Sviatchenko 1:06:04 — Sui and Han 1:09:56 — Nagaoka and Moriguchi 1:12:36 — Efimova and Mitrofanov 1:13:58 — Chan and Howe 1:14:52 — Kovalev and Kovalev injury withdrawl 1:17:26 — Other NHK thoughts 1:18:34 — Gold in our Hearts 1:21:10 — Skate America Preview 1:23:02 — Wrap-Up

The third stop on the Grand Prix series gave us a bombastic new world record from Ilia Malinin, a shaky win from Gilles and Poirier, some pleasant surprises in pairs, and a charming trio of medal-winners in the women's event. Plus more frustrating judging, and potentially racist kiss 'n cry fan gifts.

Chapters

0:00 — Intro 1:57 — Men's Competition 21:39 — Ice Dance Competition 52:34 — Women's Competition 1:10:06 — Pairs Competition 1:18:20 — Racist Kiss 'n Cry fan gifts? 1:23:22 — Gold in our Hearts 1:24:53 — NHK Trophy Preview 1:29:13 — Wrap-Up

The second Grand Prix event of 2025 featured the return of Olympic champions Sui & Han, exciting wins from Amber Glenn and Shun Sato, and a nervous victory for Chock & Bates. Plus more questionable judging, and a kiss 'n cry controversy.

Chapters

1:37 — Women's Competition 24:10 — Pairs Competition 39:16 — Men's Competition 57:21 — Ice Dance Competition 1:21:45 — Final thoughts on Cup of China 1:22:25 — Gold in our Hearts 1:23:42 — Skate Canada Preview 1:26:23 — Wrap-Up

#figureskating #gpfigure #cupofchina #figureskatingpodcast