French duo Beaudry and Cizeron beat US stars Chock and Bates in controversial Olympic ice dance

MILAN — Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron arrived at the Milan Cortina Olympics amid a swirl of controversy, with the French ice dancers hoping to upset the dominant American duo of Madison Chock and Evan Bates when it mattered most.

They will leave with a gold medal.

Maybe a little bit more controversy, too.

Beaudry and Cizeron answered a season-best free dance by Chock and Bates with a season best of their own Wednesday night, giving them 225.82 points and the top step of the podium. Chock and Bates finished with 224.39 and a bittersweet silver medal after having lost just four times in the four years since they finished fourth at the Beijing Games.

''We're still in shock,'' said Cizeron, who also became the first skater to win back-to-back ice dance gold with different partners, having won previously with Gabriella Papadakis. ''Looking back a year ago, when we started dreaming this, it's pretty incredible.''

There were some who viewed their victory as unbelievable.

Cizeron made several mistakes, including a glaring one during his twizzle sequence, while Chock and Bates were nearly perfect. Yet the French judge favored the French skaters by nearly eight points in the free dance, while five of the nine judges favored the American team. The other three that gave top marks to Guillaume and Cizeron did so by a slim margin.

The Canadian team of Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier earned the bronze medal with 217.74 points, pulling away from the Italian team of Charlene Guignard and Marco Fabbri and the British duo of Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson with a deeply emotional free skate.

''I usually prefer Guillaume and Laurence,'' Fabbri said, speaking candidly following the medal ceremony. ''But today, in my opinion, they didn't skate so well. So I think Madison and Evan would have deserved to win.''

Beaudry and Cizeron arrived at the Winter Games with controversy hanging over them stemming from their former partners.

This time last year, Beaudry was wondering whether she would even compete this season after Skate Canada banned her partner and longtime boyfriend, Nikolaj Sorensen, amid allegations of ''sexual maltreatment.'' Beaudry has maintained his innocence and the suspension was overturned in June on jurisdictional grounds, but the case is still pending.

Cizeron stepped away from competition after the 2022 season, shortly after his Olympic triumph, and retired two years ago. But the chance to make a comeback with Beaudry, who was ninth with Sorensen at the Beijing Games, was too good to pass up.

''It's been quite a challenge that we set out to do,'' Cizeron said. ''I think from the beginning we tried to create a bubble where we really supported each other through everything, and we've been through some incredibly hard moments. But I think the love we have for each other and for the sport really draws through, and it kind of helped us keep our heads on our shoulders.''

Beaudry and Cizeron hardly seemed distracted by any of it Monday night, when they edged Chock and Bates in the rhythm dance.

The French team most definitely was not distracted by anything Wednesday night.

It would have been easy to be thrown off, too, the way Chock and Bates performed in the minutes before them.

Skating to an orchestral version of ''Paint it Black'' from the dystopian sci-fi show ''Westworld,'' they turned in the kind of program that they have spent the last 15 years together working toward. Every movement seemed to be in perfect harmony, and the flamenco-styled choreography had the crowd clapping along with them.

It looked as if Beaudry and Cizeron gave them an opening with a bobble on their twizzles. But they soon settled into their program, set to the soundtrack from ''The Whale,'' and moved as if they were under water with a marvelous degree of refined elegance.

As their winning score was read, Chock and Bates joined the crowd inside the Milano Ice Skating Arena in applauding them.

Then, an hour later, Chock was fighting back tears in a tunnel far from the ice.

''It's definitely a bittersweet feeling at the moment,'' she said. ''We have had the most incredible year — fifteen years on the ice together. First Olympics as a married couple. And we delivered four of our best performances this week. I think we're really proud of how we handled ourselves here and what we accomplished.''

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