By Matteo Morelli | Photos by Melanie Heaney

The Rhythm Dance at the 2026 Winter Olympic Games of Milano-Cortina is now completed, with the temporary rankings leading into the free dance that will determine the new Olympic medallists.
The top two teams are separated by half a point: France’s Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron finished first, followed by USA’s Madison Chock and Evan Bates in second place. Currently in third place are Canada’s Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier. Let’s have a more in depth look at what happened during the rhythm dance.

Event Recap

Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron began their Olympic journey as a new team. With this being their first season, their rankings had them starting within the second group at the event. Their Madonna routine delivered: they scored 90.18, a new personal best, which placed them in first place. Although there is only half a point between the top two teams, this is the first time that the newly crowned European Champions upset the World Champions Chock and Bates, who had so far managed to stay ahead of them at both the Grand Prix Final and the Team Event rhythm dance.

With just 24 hours winning their second consecutive gold medal in the Team Event and starting the individual event, Madison Chock and Evan Bates finished in second place with 89.72 points. Despite the proximity of the two events, they managed their energy to deliver another strong performance. In the mixed zone, they said they were pleased with the results but also felt they skated better than they did at the Team Event’s rhythm dance, where they earned a season best of 91.06 points. With gold medal as their objective, they will give all they have to earn every point toward realizing their dream.

Canada’s Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier finished in third place with 86.18 points for their rhythm dance. Skating to their programme based on RuPaul’s “Supermodel (You Better Work),” they scored a new season best and remain in contention for a podium finish. In their third Winter Olympics together, this very experienced team will do all it takes to maintain their top three position and earn an Olympic medal.

Great Britain’s Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson finished in fourth place with 85.47 points, still within reach of a podium finish. Their Spice Girls routine received two very special endorsements: first, before the Olympics started, they were mentioned in a comment and a story by Mel B, Scary Spice; before the rhythm dance began, they received another surprise, with the BBC showing them a message of support from Mel C, Sporty Spice!

Italy’s Charlène Guignard and Marco Fabbri won an historic bronze medal with Team Italy in the Team Event. They are currently in fifth place with 84.28 points, but with such narrow margins, nothing is to be taken for granted and another medal is not out of reach. They are based in Milan and, after their Olympic achievement, it wasn’t a surprise to witness them receive the loudest cheers from the audience.

USA’s Emilea Zingas and Vadym Kolesnik are currently in sixth place and earned a score of 83.53. This exceeds their personal best by three points and, if they continue this trend in the free dance, they can aim for a top ten finish at their first Winter Olympics.

Lithuania’s Allison Reed and Saulius Ambrulevičius earned 82.95 points and looked in great shape. They entered this event with one of the higher competitions count this season, given their early start at the Skate to Milano event where they won to qualify for these Olympics.

Completing the top ten are France’s Evgeniia Lopareva and Geoffrey Brissaud in seventh place with 82.25 points, just short of their personal best; Canada’s Marjorie Lajoie and Zachary Lagha with 79.66 points, a season best earned with a very energetic skate; and Spain’s Olivia Smart and Tim Dieck with 78.53 points and a new personal best.

The next ten qualified teams are:

USA’s Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko (new season best)
Finland’s Juulia Turkkila and Matthias Versluis
Georgia’s Diana Davis and Gleb Smolkin
Czech Republic’s Natálie Taschlerová and Filip Taschler
Canada’s Marie-Jade Lauriault and Romain le Gac
Great Britain’s Phebe Bekker and James Hernandez (new personal best)
Czech Republic’s Kateřina Mrázková and Daniel Mrázek
Australia’s Holly Harris and Jason Chan
Sweden’s Milla Ruud Reitan and Nikolaj Majorov (making history as the first Swedish couple at the Winter Olympics)
Spain’s Sofia Val and Asaf Kazimov

Not qualified for the free dance are China’s Shiyue Wang and Xinyu Liu; Korea’s Hannah Lim and Ye Quan, with a costly mistake on the twizzles; Germany’s Jennifer Janse Van Rensburg and Benjamin Steffan, also paying the price for a mistake on the twizzles. We still hope they enjoyed skating on Olympic ice and wish them to cherish these memories forever.

The free dance occurs on Wednesday, February 11, from 7:30 p.m. (CET).