(December 4, 2005)
Make it two gold medals on this season's ISU Grand Prix circuit for ice dancers Marie-France Dubreuil and Patrice Lauzon.
Dubreuil and Lauzon, who won gold at MasterCard Skate Canada International, their first Grand Prix event this year, won all three portions of the event at the 2005 NHK Trophy - the compulsory dance, original dance and free dance - to clinch the title and a spot at the upcoming ISU Grand Prix Final.
This will be Dubreuil and Lauzon's sixth straight trip to the Final. They placed fifth last year.
The three-time Canadian Ice Dance Champions skated their free dance on Saturday. They looked very comfortable skating their enchanting program to John Barry's Somewhere in Time. The program featured difficult twizzle sections, intricate footwork and Dubreuil and Lauzon's signature impressive lifts.
Dubreuil and Lauzon's total score for the free dance was 95.39. Their overall score for the event was 189.72, which beat their winning score of 179.60 at MasterCard Skate Canada International.
"This season we really enjoyed the music we picked, we really enjoyed the choreography," said Dubreuil. "Plus all the work we have done, the technique, everything together has led us there and so far we are having a really great time training and competing."
Finishing eighth overall were Chantal Lefebvre and Arseniy Markov. The duo earned a total competition score of 146.55. They were fifth in the compulsory dance, eighth in the original dance and eighth in the free dance.
Winning the silver medal was the Bulgarian team of Albena Denkova and Maxim Staviski. The two-time world medallists were awarded a total score of 173.23. Taking home the bronze medal were Anastasia Grebenkina and Vazgen Azrojan, of Armenia.
Canada had two men taking to the ice for the men's short program on Saturday.
Christopher Mabee currently stands ninth with 54.55 points. Ben Ferreira is 10th with 54.10 points. They will perform their free skates tomorrow.
Finishing first in the short program was Japan's Daisuke Takahashi. He earned a score of 77.70 for his short program. His teammate, Nobunari Oda, is second with a score of 74.15. World bronze medallist Evan Lysacek, of the United States, is third with 71.05 points.