The scheduling was surely not a coincidence as the ice dancing pairs served up some much-needed Valentine’s Day cheer at the Capital Indoor Stadium in Beijing, on a day figure skating was overshadowed by the Kamila Valieva case.
The gold medal, won with a world record score of 226.98, went to France’s Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron, who danced to Gabriel Fauré’s Élégie. That also added a redemptive twist to the competition. In 2018, they became breakout social media stars of the Pyeongchang Games in South Korea for all the wrong reasons.
