by Anne Calder | Photos by Daphne Backman

The 2026 U.S. Figure Skating Championships were held in St. Louis, MO from January 4-11. The main event, which included the selection of the 2026 Olympic Team was held downtown at the Enterprise Centre.

Rhythm Dance

The Rhythm Dance was skated Thursday, January 8, the second day of the senior event.  Fifteen teams competed. Ten earned byes and five qualified at the 2026 Ice Dance Final in Henderson, NV.

The dancers skated to high energy and crowd pleasing “Music, Dance Styles and Feelings of the 1990’s.” Any music was possible as long as it was released originally or as a cover version in the 1990’s. Also allowed was remixed and/or remastered music, including cover versions and music created via AI in the Style of 1990’s.

At the end, the arena leaderboard showed: (1) Madison Chock & Evan Bates, (2) Emilea Zingas & Vadym Kolesnik, (3) Christina Carreira & Anthony Pononarenko (4) Caroline Green & Michael Parsons, (5) Emily Bratti & Ian Somerville.

Madison Chock & Evan Bates scored a season best 91.70 points for their performance to “American Woman”, “Fly Away”, “Always On the Run” and “Are You Gonna Go My Way” by Lenny Kravitz. The married couple trains at I.AM in Montreal, Canada.

Emilea Zingas & Vadym Kolesnik were second with a dance to “Poison” and “Something In Your Eyes” by Bell Biv DeVoe. The program scored a season best 85.98 points. The 2025 Finlandia Trophy bronze medalists train in Novi, MI with Igor Shpilband’s group.

Christina Carrera & Anthony Ponomarenko’s danced to “Sweet Dreams” by La Bouche and “100% Pure Love” by Crystal Waters, Basement Boys and scored 83.29. The team trains in London, Ontario, CAN with Coaches Madison Hubbell and Scott Moir and Adrian Diaz.

Caroline Green & Michael Parsons scored 80.55 with their dance to “Groove Is in the Heart” by Dee-lite, “I’m Too Sexy” by Right Said Fred and “Groove Is in the Heart (Scotty 2025 Remix) by Dee-lite. The team trains in Canton, MI with Coaches Tanith Belbin and Greg Zuerlein.

Emily Bratti & Ian Somerville (pictured, below) earned a 79.43 score with their performance to “Vogue” by Madonna and “Walk 4 Me” by Tronco TraxxFree Dance. They also train in Canton, MI with Coaches, Greg Zuerlein, Tanith White and Brooke O’Keefe.

Free Dance

The Free Dance was competed on Saturday after the teams were divided into three groups determined by the reverse finish order of the Rhythm Dance. Each group of dancers was introduced individually by skating order prior to its five minute warmup.

Group 1 opened the afternoon session with the teams that had placed 11-15 competing their Rhythm Dances.

In the evening, the final ten teams competed, beginning with the dancers who had finished 6-10 on Thursday. The event closed with the five highest scoring teams from the Rhythm Dance. The dancers performed in reverse order beginning with the fifth place team.

The order of the top four teams remained the same after the Free Dance. Several changes occurred with the teams five to fifteen. Dance medals were later awarded on the ice to the four highest scoring teams.

Madison Chock & Evan Bates (gold) claimed their seventh National Championship title, breaking the record held by Meryl Davis & Charlie White. The World Champions opted for reverse roles while dancing to “Paint it Black” by Ramin Djawadi with Chock as the male traditional matador and Bates as the bull. The team tapped the expertise of Spanish dancer and figure skating choreographer, Antonio Najarro to help create a unique marriage of Paso Doble and Flamenco. The program scored 137.17 and a total 228.87.

The team was asked about their plan to get on the Milan Olympic podium.

“It’s going to be more of what it has been,” Chock said. “We know what to do. We have a plan, and we’re executing it, and we don’t plan on deviating from it. We’re going to trust ourselves and trust our team.”

“I think our performance was definitely the best we’ve skated the free dance all year,” added Bates. “It shows our plan is working. We like to build momentum through the season. It’s a great feeing going into a big event knowing that you’ve skated well in the previous competition, so we’re going to roll with that momentum.”

Emilea Zingas & Vadym Kolesnik’s (silver) interpretation of Sergei Prokofiev’s classic ballet, Romeo & Juliet emphasized the darker gothic sides of the teenage characters with their choice of music pieces – “Dance of the Knights” and “Juliet’s Death” –  and the tragically dramatic drop-dead faceless ending. Choreographed by Benoit Richaud, the program scored 127.67 points and a 213.65 competition total.

“This is an extremely special event for us,” Zingas noted.  “Last year, at this time, we experienced some disappointment at the US Nationals and honestly, I feel grateful for that moment, because it taught me to know what I want, and taught me how I don’t want to feel after a national championships. I think that was a little bit of a blessing in disguise, because we were able to come together in the off season, and know exactly what our goal was, and exactly what we needed to do to get here.”

Carreira & Ponomarenko (bronze) danced to “The Girl with the Plums,” “Perfume – Distilled” and “Meeting Laura” from Perfume – the Story of a Murderer and “The Big Smoke,” “Strictly Taboo” and “Deceit and Betrayal” by Audiomachine. After struggling with inconsistency and missing the podium at their two 2025 Grand Prix events, the team abandoned the Notre Dame de Paris soundtrack. In November the team returned to the more successful 2023-24 program. The music and theme remained the same while the choreography was updated. The program scored 123.66 with a third place 206.95 total.

“We had a bit of a rocky start to this season, but I’m happy that we got our act together after the Grand Prix, and we were able to deliver a good performance here,” Carreira said. “I was really happy to be skating with Maddie and Evan. They’ve been with us since we teamed up, and we’ve always looked up to them.”

Caroline Green & Michael Parson’s (pewter) performed their dance to “Escalate” by Tsar B and “Son of Nyx” by Hozier that scored 121.50. The team medaled at three 2025-2026 international events. Unfortunately at the Cup of China, the duo was forced to withdraw after Parson’s fall in the Rhythm Dance resulted in a hip injury. The team finished in fourth place with a 202.05 total.

“We left every single piece of ourselves out there on the ice today,” Parsons said. “And it’s hard to speak now. I just feel empty, but, I mean in the best possible way.”

Bratti & Somerville skated first in the final group to the music of “Nureyev” from The White Crow by Ilan Eshkeri, Lisa Batiashvili and Dudana Mazmanishvili and scored 117.86. Their fifth place finish totaled 197.29.

“We were really happy with how it went,” Bratti said. “It was really hard. We gave it everything all week in practices, and we felt very tired from early on more than usual, so it felt like kind of a fight to get through it. We are really happy we were able to skate clean and get everything done.”

It was fun though,” added Somerville. “We made sure that we really connected mostly with each other, not really focusing too much on the audience this time. Very different than the rhythm dance.”

Senior Ice Chips:

The 2026 U.S. National Championships had a total attendance of 93,231 across the nine senior sessions at the Enterprise Center and two junior and novice sessions at Centene Community Ice Center. The St. Louis Sports Commission estimates the event brought 5,000 visitors to the region.

Congratulations to our new U.S. Citizens. Christina Carreira was born in Montreal, Canada and moved to Novi, Michigan when she was 13 to continue her ice dance training. Carreira became a U.S. citizen in November 2025. Vadym Kolesnik was born in Ukraine. He was 15 when he also moved to Novi, Michigan to train with Igor Shpilband. Kolesnik became a U.S. citizen in the summer of 2025.

Maia Shibutani & Alex Shibutani returned to the U.S. Figure Skating Championships after a seven-year leave of absence. The siblings earned several national and international medals during their careers. In the 2025-2026 season they competed at the ISU Grand Prix Series NHK Trophy (6th), Finlandia Trophy (5th) and the U.S National Championships (9th).

Oona Brown & Gage Brown honored their Italian-American heritage with a Free Dance story skated to the Godfather soundtrack.The mesmerizing performance earned a thunderous standing ovation from the captivated audience. The choreography always had the idea of amplifying the ending, but with a possible fall deduction the team put it on hold for a show or Nationals. Gage’s death roll on the ice made its debut in St. Louis.

Gage Brown: “When we’re in our ending position, especially with a skate like that, and the crowd at such a volume, so enthusiastic, knowing what we just did, to milk the ending was just a cherry on top, and it was really satisfying to do that for both of us,”

Elliana Peal & Ethan Peal advanced to the senior level after the 2025 Championships. In April, the siblings moved from Nashville, TN to London, Ontario Canada to train with new coaches.

Elliana:  “I feel like our skating has improved a ton since our move. We’re now going into each event with a different mindset than we had in the past. I feel like every year in junior we were always trying to get this one goal. Now we take it competition by competition. The goal is to do well there and then the next one and so on. We approach each competition as its own thing, and what we can learn from it?”

Ethan: “Just like today, we’re going try and figure out what we can learn from this event. If I could sum it up in one word, it would be transformative.”

Katarina Wolfkostin & Dimitry Tsarevski skated to the music from the Kill Bill soundtrack and “Malagueña” by Brian Setzer. For the second season their program ended with a death scene. The duo was asked if they had to practice dying on the ice. 

Wolfkostin: “Not exactly. This season we watched the movie and tried to pull inspiration from the very last scene where his character, Bill, gets struck with a five-point death punch or something like that.   

Tsarevski: “As we were choreographing, we realized that we were out of time, so we thought, let’s just add a death scene.”

2026 U.S. Olympic team:

Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko
Madison Chock and Evan Bates
Emilea Zingas and Vadym Kolesnik

Anthony Ponomarenko: “Unbelievable. I just can’t wait. … We are finally in a good groove, so just keep working. We still have a lot of little details to fix up and show the best possible version of ourselves at the Games.”

Madison Chock: “We are so excited. The Olympics definitely never loses its luster. I’m just as excited as I was the first we made the team. It’s such an honor to be a part of Team USA and represent our country and U.S. Figure Skating at the Olympics. I feel so grateful to be part of this team. All of the people on the team are so incredible, so special and so talented.”

Vadym Kolesnik: “For me, it’s a dream of my life to represent the U.S. Ever since I moved here at the age 15, I knew that I wanted to represent the U.S. and go to the Olympics and do my absolute best, so it’s an honor for me.”

Alternate 1: Caroline Green and Michael Parsons
Alternate 2: Emily Bratti and Ian Somerville
Alternate 3: Oona Brown and Gage Brown