Ice: Guignard-Fabbri, silver at the figure skating world championships

The dance of Charlene Guignard-Marco Fabbri at the World Championships in Saitama is silver: and for the couple of the Fiamme Azzurre, at their eleventh participation in the event, it is a consecration. Their union, after a very long run-up, culminated in a season – the current one – which had already given them the European title (in Espoo) and third place in the Grand Prix final (in Turin) after the successes in two stages of the circuit (in Angers and in Sheffield). All great firsts. At 35 and 33, that of Charlene and Marco, who have been together for a dozen years even romantically, is the medal of maturity: the Milan-Cortina 2026 Olympics remain far away, but now perhaps a little less.

The race

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The students of the former world champion Barbara Fusar Poli, in the free, a very intense and demanding program with dark shades, including music, confirm the splendid second place of the Rhythm Dance on Friday. The ranking, in the first seven positions, does not change. The gold, with 226.01 points, goes to the Americans Madison Chock-Evan Bates, already silver in 2015 and bronze in 2016 and 2022, with nine world championship participations behind them. Despite her fall, almost irrelevant because it did not occur on an element, they bring the country back to the podium of the specialty ten years after the success of Meryl Davis-Charlie White in London 2013. Guignard-Fabbri are second with 219.85 and 131.64 in the free, all personal firsts. The bronze, as in Stockholm 2021, instead rewards the Canadians Piper Gilles-Paul Poirier, another tandem with great experience (217.88). Followed by the British Lilah Fear-Lewis Gibson (214.73), the other Canadians Laurence Fournier Beaudry-Nikolaj Soerensen (214.73) and the other Americans Caroline Green-Michael Parsons (201.44). Applause also to the second Italian couple, Viktoria Manni-Carlo Roethlisberger, eighteenth with 162.97 (seventeenth in the free), after the 23rd place in 2019, again in Saitama, when they were still flying the Swiss flag.

History

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Charlene and Marco, last year in Montpellier quarters, present very rich technical contents. They deserve maximum levels (4) in all elements except in the sequence on one foot (3). What makes the difference is their precision and attention to detail. Fruit of the painstaking work they do every day in training on the IceLab rink at the Assago Forum. She has a doctorate in chemistry, she is French from Brest, he is about to graduate in foreign literature, he is from Milan, their artistic liaison dates back to a meeting that took place in 2009 on “Ice Partner Search”, a website that unites skaters looking for “soulmates” . Meanwhile, their result is part of a tradition, that of blue dance. Before them, on the world podium, Barbara Fusar Poli-Maurizio Margaglio, silver in Nice 2000 and gold in Vancouver 2001, Federica Faiella-Massimo Scali, bronze in Turin 2010 and Anna Cappellini-Luca Lanotte, gold in Saitama 2014 had already climbed. The Japanese location on the outskirts of Tokyo bodes well for the Italian figure: the only time a tricolor World Cup with two medals (including the bronze for Carolina Kostner) dates back to that edition. This time we add that of Sara Conti-Niccolò Macii in the pairs of artists.