A Large Canadian Contingent to Tackle Sixth Junior Grand Prix
October 3, 2022/by Skate Canada
OTTAWA, ON (October 3, 2022) – Following a great showing at the fifth Junior Grand Prix, which saw four Canadians finish in the top-10, a large Canadian contingent return to Gdansk, Poland for the sixth event of the series. A total of fifteen athletes will be competing at the event scheduled from October 5-8, including one woman, two men, three pair teams and three ice dance teams.
14-year-old Hetty Shi will be competing at her first Junior Grand Prix and will be the sole Canadian entry in the women’s category. Hetty previously competed at the 2022 Egna Spring Trophy in Italy and showed a lot of promise as she captured a silver medal in novice women.
This will also mark Edward Nicholas Vasii’s first Junior Grand Prix participation, after the Montréal native finished 5th in novice men at the 2022 Egna Spring Trophy last season. He will be joined by current Canadian champion Anthony Paradis, who bounced back from fourth to first in order to claim gold at the 2022 Canadian Tire National Skating Championships.
In the pair discipline, Canada will be sending three solid teams who have already competed in the series this year and have all stepped on the podium. Leading the team will be Chloe Panetta and Kieran Thrasher, who captured a bronze medal at the Ostrava Junior Grand Prix. The first-year junior pair teams comprised of Ava Kemp & Yohnatan Elizarov and Ashlyn Schmitz & Tristan Taylor will bolster the Canadian firepower, having won silver and bronze medals respectively at the Riga Junior Grand Prix.
Nadiia Bashynska and Peter Beaumont will be setting their sights on another podium finish after winning their first international gold medal last weekend at the fifth ISU Junior Grand Prix. They will be joined by Chaima Ben Khelifa & Everest Zhu and Jordyn Lewis & Noah McMillan who placed fifth and seventh respectively at their first ISU Junior Grand Prix of the season.
Competitions kick off on Thursday, October 6 with the women, men and pair short programs. Friday, October 7 will see pair and women complete their free program and ice dancers perform their rhythm dance. The event concludes on October 8 with the free dance and men’s free program.
There was a last minute change of plans as it was determined that there would be WIFI connection problems that would not permit Mark to commentate remotely. He had to fly back to Gdansk at the last minute to join Ted in the rink, leaving a wife and young family at homeElizabeth wrote: Tue Oct 04, 2022 9:21 am Ted remained in Gdansk (or the area) between events and Mark returned home to England - he will be doing his part of the coverage "from his garage" according to how they explained it last week
Today he will be commentating on 49 Jr Women, 10 Jr Pairs, and Jr Men on something like 1 hr of sleep!! 
Bashynska and Beaumont Win Second Straight Gold on ISU Junior Grand Prix Circuit
October 8, 2022/by Skate Canada
GDANSK, Poland (October 8, 2022) – Canadians Nadiia Bashynska and Peter Beaumont won gold in ice dance for the second consecutive weekend on Saturday to conclude the sixth stop on the ISU Junior Grand Prix figure skating circuit.
The Ajax, Ont., team bettered their score from last week’s JGP win, also in Gdansk, by more than a point finishing with 171.61 points placing first in both the rhythm dance and free dance.
Darva Grimm and Michail Savitskiy of Germany took the silver with 154.41 and Jordyn Lewis of Komoka, Ont., and Noah McMillan of Ilderton, Ont., won the bronze with 149.83.
‘’This is a big achievement for both of us,’’ said the Ukrainian-born Bashynska, whose grandparents and father were in the audience. ‘’We worked a lot on this and this was our goal.’’
The Canadians stamped their name as an international junior power last season with a bronze at the ISU World Junior Figure Skating Championships®.
‘’Knowing we had a win under our belts was a boost for us this week,’’ added Beaumont. ‘’We went in with the mindset that we could do it again.’’
Lewis and McMillan showed a big improvement on their showing from Riga last month. They jumped from seventh to third and improved their score by over 15 points.
Chaima Ben Khelifa of Laval, Que., and Everest Zhu of Waterloo, Ont., were ninth.
In pairs, Chloe Panetta of Laval, Que., and Kieran Thrasher of Amherstburg, Ont., missed the podium by one spot finishing fourth with 133.72. Last month they were third at the Junior Grand Prix stop in Ostrava, Czechia.
‘’We are satisfied with our performance,’’ said Panetta. ‘’It wasn’t what we fully wanted. We lacked in the levels at this competition.’’
Anastasia Golubeva and Hektor Giotopoulos Moore of Australia were the winners with 161.17, Violetta Sierova and Ivan Khobta of Ukraine second at 154.76 and Sophia Baram and Daniel Tioumentsev of the U.S. third at 152.49.
Ava Kemp and Yohnatan Elizarov of Winnipeg were fifth at 129.37 and Ashlyn Schmitz and Tristan Taylor of Regina sixth at 125.38. Those Canadian couples were second and third at the Riga JGP stop.
Canadian junior champion Anthony Paradis of Boisbriand, Que., took 10th spot in the men’s event which was won by Japan’s Takeru Amine Kataise. Edward Nicholas Vasii of Montreal was 14th.
Ami Nakai of Japan finished ahead of two South Koreans to win the gold in the women’s event. Hetty Shi of Mississauga, Ont., was 13th in the junior Grand Prix debut.
The next stop on the circuit is this Thursday to Saturday in Egna, Italy.
Full Results: http://www.isuresults.com/results/seaso ... gppol2022/
You're right about those medals, Judy. On top of that, for the 2nd event Mark had to make an unscheduled last minute trip back to Gdansk and was going on an hour of sleep!!Judy wrote: Mon Oct 10, 2022 4:21 pm While I haven’t had a Han e to watch much yet, I’d say Ted and Mark deserve gold medals, providing commentary on 48 women, twice!
A gold medal for Elizabeth too for keeping us informed. Thank you.