Canada wins three medals at Skate Canada International
Canada won three medals on Saturday at Skate Canada International. Pairs skaters Kirsten Moore-Towers and Michael Marinaro won bronze. Keegan Messing claimed silver in the men’s program while Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier brought home the ice dance bronze.
Moore-Towers and Marinaro claimed Canada’s first medal of the weekend, landing on the podium with a score of 200.93. Vanessa James and Morgan Cipres of France took first place, followed by Cheng Peng and Yang Jin of China.
Canada’s Kirsten Moore-Towers and Michael Marinaro perform their free program in the pairs competition at Skate Canada International in Laval, Que. on Saturday, October 27, 2018. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson
After the short program where they earned 71.26 points, Moore-Towers and Marinaro were in third place.
Moore-Towers said of their Friday performance, “We felt really great. We’ve been struggling with our short program this season so our main goal here was not to take ourselves out of the game early.”
Canada had two other pairs in competition. Evelyn Walsh and Trennt Michaud (172.53) finished fifth, while Camille Ruest and Andrew Wolfe (162.16) were eighth.
Canada’s Keegan Messing performs his free program in the men’s competition at Skate Canada International in Laval, Que. on Saturday, October 27, 2018. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson
Canada’s second medal was won by Keegan Messing. He finished Friday in first place after the short program, with a personal best score of 95.05 points. In the free skate, despite a fall, Messing still landed on the podium in second spot. He earned 170.12 points for the free program, ending the weekend with a total of 265.17 points.
Shoma Uno won the top spot, finishing with 277.25 points. Uno was the silver medalist at Pyeongchang 2018.
Last year, Messing placed eighth at the World Championships and sixth at the Olympics.
Also in the men’s competition were Nam Nguyen and Roman Sadovsky. They finished in fifth (240.94 points) and twelfth (210.60 points), respectively.
Canada’s Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier perform their free program in the ice dance competition at Skate Canada International in Laval, Que. on Saturday, October 27, 2018. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson
Gilles and Poirier won Canada’s third medal of the day. The ice dance duo earned 66.95 points for their rhythm dance, and were in sixth place. They were deducted one point when they skated too close to the boards, causing Gilles to have a major slip.
In the free dance, the pair came back strong, earning 120.02 points on their routine, for a total of 186.97. They finished behind Russians Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov, and gold medallists Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue of the United States.
Canada had two other couples in the ice dance competition. Carolane Soucisse and Shane Firus finished eighth with 156.74 points. Right behind them in ninth place were Haley Sales and Nikolas Wamsteeker with 150.23 points.
Competition continues through Saturday in Laval, Quebec with the ladies free program concluding the night.
