2022 Olympics: First look at the competitors

Looks like we finally have the full competitor's list for the competition! Teams are below with some cheeky comments from me (as always). Who are you most excited to see?


 Armenia

        Ice Dance: Garabedian/Proulx-Senecal

These guys are having a great year-their highest ever finish at Euros (13th), and will hope to have a strong showing at the Olympics maybe even a top 10 finish at Worlds later this year? Who knows!

Australia

        Men: Brendan Kerry

        Women: Kailani Craine

Austria

        Women: Mikutina

        Pairs: Ziegler/Kiefer

Azerbaijan

        Men: Litvintsev

        Women: Ryabova

Ryabova and Litvintsev are also having strong years-finishing well at Euros. Side note, did you know he once participated in something called "Open Ice Mall Cup"...they couldn't think of a better name I guess?

Belarus

        Men: Milyukov

        Women: Safonova

Belgium

        Women: Loena Hendrickx

Belgium's sole competitor in Beijing-hopefully she can shake off that rocky FS from Euros. 

Bulgaria

        Women: Feigin

Canada

        Men: Messing, Sadovsky

        Women: Schizas

        Pairs: James/Radford, Moore-Towers/Marinaro

        Ice Dance: Fournier-Beaudry/Sorensen, Gilles/Poirier, Lajoie/Lagha

Surprisingly (to me anyway) the choice for Canada to go with James/Radford in pairs was a little controversial. Though looking at the 2nd place finisher from Nationals  (Walsh/Michaud) they finished lower in their GP assignments (6th at NHK, 8th at Skate America) compared to James/Radford (4th at both GP France and Skate Canada). And looking at the points game, it's no contest, James/Radford have them beaten by 20-40 points depending on the kind of competition they're having. To me-it's a no brainer. And yes, we have to talk about the fact that James/Radford are more recognizable than Walsh/Michaud. That's how it goes when you compete at an Olympics or win an Olympic medal! On a separate note, big yikes to Megan Duhamel who basically came out and said her former partner didn't deserve to be chosen. 

Honestly it's almost refreshing to know it's not just Ashley Wagner who gets this kind of hate for being chosen by the NOC to be on the Olympic team. 

China

        Men: Jin 

        Women: Zhu 

        Pairs: Peng/Jin, Sui/Han

        Ice Dance: Wang/Liu

Czech Republic

        Men: Brezina

        Women: Brezinova

        Pairs: Zukova/Bidar

        Ice Dance: Taschlerova/Taschler

Very cool to see a sister/brother duo going and competing in separate events in figure skating. I'm not sure if this has ever happened before, though I'm not able to find any evidence to support/refute it. Good for them! I hope he has a strong showing because I suspect we may hear of his retirement soon.

Estonia

        Men: Selevko

        Women: Kiibus

I hope she gets tons of attention in Beijing, she's such a great performer. She deserves all the good things!

Finland

        Women: Saarinen

        Ice Dance: Turkkila/Versluis

France

        Men: Aymoz, Siao Him Fa

        Ice Dance: Papadakis/Cizeron

Skating gods-do the right thing this time!!!

Georgia

        Men: Kvitelashvili

        Women: Gubanova

        Pairs: Safina/Berulava

        Ice Dance: Kazakova/Reviya

Germany

        Men: Fentz

        Women: Schott

        Pairs: Fabienne-Hase/Seegert

        Ice Dance: Muller/Dieck

Great Britain

        Women: McKay 

        Ice Dance: Fear/Gibson

Hungary

        Pairs: Chtchetinina/Magyar

Israel

        Men: Bychenko

        Pairs: Kops/Krasnopolski

Italy

        Men: Grassl, Rizzo

        Women: Gutmann

        Pairs: Della Monica/Guarise, Ghilardi/Abrosini

        Ice Dance: Guignard/Fabbri

According to Wiki, Rizzo withdrew from Euros due to equipment issues and I just can't imagine surviving this world only to be taken out by equipment issues. 

Japan

        Men: Hanyu, Kagiyama, Uno

        Women: Higuchi, Kawabe, Sakamoto

        Pairs: Miura/Kihara

        Ice Dance: Komatsubara/Koleto

I love Yuzu, and as much as I think this Olymipcs is probably Nathan Chen's to lose, I think the whole world would collectively lose its mind if Yuzu won 3 in a row. Also! I can't believe I didn't know until this season that Diasuke Takahashi that now competes ice dance is THAT Diasuke Takahasi...the one that won the bronze medal behind Lysacek and Plushenko back in 2010! Mans is 35 and still competing. And like!!! They are legit so good!? A little sad they won't be in Beijing, but honestly Komatsubara/Koleto are also lovely and look to be the more consistent team. Very excited to see the rise of Asian ice dance to be honest. We saw the rise of North American teams, now it's time for Japan and China and the other Asian countries to have their time in the sun-and the 2 teams I mention just so happen to be training with some of the best coaches in the world, so I bet you it's going to happen in the next 5-10 years. 

Latvia

        Men: Vasiljevs

HELL YES DENISS. Please repeat that Euros FS performance. Everyone deserves to see it.

Lithuania

        Ice Dance: Ramanauskaite/Kizala

Honestly, absolute bummer for Reed/Ambrulevičius to earn a spot only to get her citizenship rejected. I have heard that it's incredibly difficult to get citizenship in the Baltic states-you have to prove you can speak the language (which is quite unique and complex as languages go). Not sure the reason Alison's was rejected, but definitely heartbreaking.

Mexico

        Men: Carrillo

Netherlands

        Women: Zundert

Poland

        Women: Kurakova

        Ice Dance: Kaliszek/Spodyriev

I think Kurakova will get some attention in Poland-being both an amazing skater and...cute? (Can I say that? She is adorable, the little shimmy she did after her SP at Euros was amazing and if she had done it in Beijing, I bet you that'd be the new meme).

Russia (ROC)

        Men: Kolyada**, Kondratiuk, Mozalev, Semenenko

        Women: Shcherbakova, Trusova, Valieva

        Pairs: Boikova/Kozlovskii, Mishina/Galliamov, Tarasova/Morozov

        Ice Dance: Davis/Smolkin, Sinitsina/Katsalapov, Stepanova/Bukin

**Kolyada is out. He is the first athlete to test positive for COVID-19 and had to withdraw. Semenenko takes his place

Wiki informs me that Russia (or Russian Olympic Committee athletes) is the only NOC to attain the maximum number of competitors in each category. And duh. What I actually do find interesting is that, if we think back, Russia (or the Russian competitive equivalent in years past) was usually very competitive in pairs, ice dance and men's figure skating. As recently as 2006, Russia took gold in every category except ladies figure skating. Now things are a little flip flopped. It's all but a foregone conclusion at this point that they'll win, if not sweep the podium in the ladies division. And while its possible they could take away gold in pairs (possible) and dance (definite maybe), in the men's division it is. Doubtful, shall we say. I find that longevity or lack thereof really interesting, especially as the current judging system will turn 20 years old in the next couple of years. It's interesting to think now about how it allows competitors to jump up in the ranks, and yet we do find there are still issues of favoritism and corruption in judging. 

South Korea

        Men: Cha, Lee

        Women: Kim, You

Spain

        Pairs: Barquero/Zandron 

        Ice Dance: Smart/Diaz

Sweden

        Men: Majorov

        Women: Taljegard

Switzerland

        Men: Britschgi

        Women: Paganini

Ukraine

        Men: Shmuratko

        Women: Shabotova

        Pairs: Holichenko/Darenskyi

        Ice Dance: Nazarova/Nikitin

USA

        Men: Brown, Chen, Zhou

        Women: Bell, Chen, Liu

        Pairs: Cain-Gribble/LeDuc, Knierim/Frazier

        Ice Dance: Chock/Bates, Hawayek/Baker, Hubbell/Donohue


And that's all she wrote for now! We assume of course that other competitors will have to withdraw due to the plague so this list will most likely change before February 3. I may update again before that-we'll see!

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