Gabrielle Daleman Wins Women’s Event at 2022 Skate Canada Challenge

REGINA – Two-time Olympian Gabrielle Daleman posted the best scores in both the short program and Sunday’s free skate to win the women’s event to conclude the 2022 Skate Canada Challenge.

Daleman, who helped Canada win the gold in the team event at the 2018 Olympic Winter Games, earned 173.66 points. Amanda Tobin of Burlington, Ont., was second at 166.35 and Veronik Maillet of Sept-Iles, Que., was third at 162.95.

‘’It’s nowhere near perfect but it’s definitely going in the right direction,’’ said Daleman, at her third competition this season. ‘’It’s nice to be back into this atmosphere of a live audience and live judging and feel how I am with the adrenaline.’’

In ice dancing, Alicia Fabbri of Terrebonne, Que., and Paul Ayer of Brossard, Que., took the title with 179.61 points. Haley Sales and Nikolas Wamsteeker of Burnaby, B.C., followed at 175.31 and Marie-Jade Lauriault of Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines, Que., and Romain Le Gac of Laval, Que., tops in the free dance, were third at 173.66.

‘’In this performance we were focusing on having a strong connection and we achieved that especially in the free dance,’’ said Ayer, fifth with his partner at the Cup of Austria last month. ‘’We were especially pleased with our stationary lift for which we achieved our levels here.’’

Other winners this week in senior competition were Stephen Gogolev of Toronto for the men and Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps of Vaudreuil-Dorion, Que., in pairs.

In the last junior event on Sunday, Rio Morito of Toronto took the men’s title.

‘’I felt really good and achieved my goals,’’ said Morito. ‘’I’m working on other elements that I hope will be ready for the future.’’

Other winners in junior were Justine Miclette of Quebec for the women, Brooke McIntosh of Toronto and Benjamin Mimar of Terrebonne, Que., in pairs and Nadiia Bashynska and Peter Beaumont of Ajax, Ont., in ice dancing.

The winners in novice competition were David Shteyngart of Ottawa for the men, Kayla Halliday of Brookswood, Alta., for the women, Kaitlyn Ho and Daniel Yu of Alberta in ice dancing and Ava Kemp and Yohnatan Elizarov of Winnipeg in pairs.

Skate Canada Challenge is a qualifying event for novice, junior and senior skaters to earn entries to the 2022 Canadian Tire National Skating Championships, taking place in Ottawa from January 6 to 13, 2022.

This event is also the 2022 Pre-Novice National Championships.

In pre-novice the winners were: Liam Schmidt of Quebec for the men, Megan Woodley of Orillia, Ont., for the women, Alexane Jean and Charly Laliberté-Laurent of Quebec, in pairs and Auréa Cinçon-Debout and Earl Jesse Celestino of Quebec in ice dancing.

More information: https://skatecanada.ca/2022-skate-canada-challenge/#tab-id-7