Report and Photos by Anne Calder

The 2026 Pacific Coast Sectional Singles & U.S. Ice Dance Final was held at the America First Center November 02-05, 2025 in Henderson, Nevada. Twelve Juvenile, eleven Intermediate, twelve Novice, thirteen Junior and nine Senior teams competed.

Ten Junior teams plus two with Final byes will join the five highest scoring Novice teams to compete at the Centene Community Center in the northwest St. Louis, MO suburb of Maryland Heights the week of the 2026 U.S. National Championships.

The 2025-2026 Junior Rhythm Dance includes the music dance styles and feeling of the 1990’s.

Any music is possible as long as it was released, either originally or as a cover version in the 1990’s and fulfills the Rhythm/Theme as well as the required characteristics. Remixes and/or remastered music, including cover versions is permitted. Music created via AI in the style of the 1990’s is permitted.

The teams have to execute two sequences of the Rhumba followed by one sequence of the quickstep in their pattern dance element, with a consistent tempo (a minimum of 120 beats per minute, in 2/2, 2/4, or 4/4 time).

PLACEMENT & MEDALS

The awarding of a pewter medal for fourth place began at U.S. figure skating championships in 1988. It is not given at international events.

The Junior Rhythm Dance highest scoring teams: Effie Chen & Gordei Chitipakhovian (59.53), Jane Calhoun & Mark Zheltyshev (58.22),  Aneta Vaclavikova & William Lissauer (58.07) , Anaelle Kouevi & Yann Homawoo (54.47).

The Junior Ice Dance Final podium: (gold) Jane Calhoun & Mark Zheltyshev (146.58), (silver) Effie Chen & Gordei Chitipakhovian (146.51), (bronze) Aneta Vaclavikova & William Lissauer (146.18), (pewter)  Anaelle Kouevi & Yann Homawoo (135.07).

QUICK QUOTES

Jane Calhoun / Mark Zheltyshev

JC: We’ve been skating together for 9-10 months.

MZ: This is just our second competition. The ice is really good.

Coach Giulietti-Schmitt: Mark came to Colorado Springs from Perm, RUS. We had a two day tryout, then in July competed at LPIDI. It happened fast. It’s been great from the very beginning. They match very well together. They get along. Everything is going really well.

Ellie Chen / Gordei Chitipakhovian

EC: I’m so happy to be here. It’s amazing. We’re so grateful for this opportunity.

GC: I’m especially grateful to be here. The competition is good. I was in Colorado Springs for just one week.

EC: We got him. He’s a keeper!

Aneta Vaclavikova / William Lissauer

Today is William’s 19th birthday

WL: Our Rhythm Dance was definitely good. A season’s best. You can’t complain about that. There’s always stuff to improve. The FD felt pretty good except for a bobble in the twizzle. We’re concentrating on skating together, trying to add power to the connection.

Anaelle Kouevi / Yann Homawoo

AK: Our skate could have been better, but over all it was good.

YH: There’s always room to improve, but it’s not bad for this competition.

AK: Our first JGP was to Ankara, TUR. It was really fun and enjoyable. I really liked it a lot.

YH: Seeing skaters from different nations and their customs was really great.

Annelise Stapert / Maxim Korotcov

AK: The ice was a little weird today. The program felt good, other than my bobble on the twizzle.

MK: Today’s skate was better. We recovered from yesterday’s mistake [in the RD Rhumba Steps].

AK: Our first JGP in Ankara, TUR was awesome and an amazing experience meeting so many new people.

Clara Fugate / Warren Fugate

CF:. I love Juniors. This is our first year. It feels very free.

WF: It gives us more opportunities – to go places like the JGP. We’ve been very fortunate to experience all these things. To be able to share it with my sister is awesome. Our hard work is paying off.

CF: We’re living out our dream together.

Marian Carhart / Denis Bledsoe

MC: I thought the skate went pretty well especially since we were off ice for a month and a half with my injury. I fractured my femur. I’m very proud what we did today.

DB: We now know what we have to work on for the next competition at Nationals. We’ll come back better.

Michelle Deyche / Ryan Hu

The team commented on their goal after a fall in the Rhythm Dance.

MD: Our plan today was to show what we’ve trained. We did do a lot this past month to prepare for the event. RH: Basically we skated as far as we could. I had to take a moment to stop. When we came back we skated where we left off. 

Grace Fischer / Luke Fisher

GF: Moving to the Arctic Edge Arena in Canton, MI  has been very challenging. It has helped us be better skaters. We’re really trying to keep growing as a team.

LF: Our program wasn’t the best. I got injured two weeks ago, so we had to take time off.

GF: We went to Gdansk, Poland for a JGP. It was my favorite competition ever.

LF: It was so cool skating internationally – meeting all the people.

Sophia Feige / Wiles Middlekauff

SF: [The skate] started off okay with the one-foot. It’s been doing better in practice.

WM: After the twizzles and dance spin, we pulled ourselves together and got better as it went along.

Annie Huang / Simon Minz

AH: The skate wasn’t our best. We made a mistake on the twizzles.

SM: This is just our second season together.

Nicole Kirsanov / Kejin Peng

NK: We’re very happy with our score for the amount of time we’ve been skating together, which is just five months.  We partnered when Coach Gates moved from North Carolina to Delaware. He brought Kejin along.

KP: We had a tryout and everything was good.