Silver Medal Streak Continues for Ice Dancers Fournier Beaudry & Soerensen
Espoo, Finland (November 18, 2023) – The Canadian ice dance team of Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Nikolaj Soerensen of Montreal, Que., captured their second consecutive ISU Grand Prix series silver medal on Saturday at the Grand Prix Espoo in Finland – a venue they also won a bronze medal at in early October at a Challenger Series event.
The reigning Canadian champions in ice dance, Fournier Beaudry and Soerensen set a new season’s best total score of 206.32 to secure the podium position with strong skates to both of their programs, setting them up well to qualify for the Grand Prix Final taking place in Beijing, China in early December.
“We’re just super happy. Finishing our second Grand Prix, and another great performance of this program that we love so very much,” said Soerensen following the event. “We love coming to Finland – the crowd is great, and the rink is really familiar to us, so this is an event we really enjoy.”
Nadiia Bashynska and Peter Beaumont of Ajax, Ont., made their senior Grand Prix debut at the event and finished eighth with a total score of 167.87.
“We came here with the goal of having clean and expressive performances. We did a lot of preparation for this event – the past three weeks have been really tough, so we’re really happy with how it went this weekend,” said Beaumont, who together with Bashynska captured a bronze medal at the 2023 ISU World Junior Figure Skating Championships.
The reigning World Champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates of the USA won gold with a total score of 209.46 while Juulia Turkkila and Matthias Versluis of Finland captured bronze with a total score of 195.80.
In the pair competition, Brooke McIntosh of Toronto, Ont., and Benjamin Mimar of Terrebonne, Que., who claimed their first Grand Prix medal last year at the NHK Trophy, finished seventh overall with a total score of 147.27. They were sitting in fifth after their short program but had a tougher time with their free skate that dropped them further down the final rankings.
Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin of Germany won gold with a total score of 197.72. Sara Conti and Niccolo Macii of Italy took the silver (188.60), while Maria Pavlova and Alexei Sviatchenko of Hungary captured the bronze medal (186.19).
Next up for Canadian skaters is the final event of the 2023 ISU Grand Prix circuit – the NHK Trophy taking place in Osaka, Japan from November 24-26, 2023.
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