GATINEAU — It’s the final showdown for Roman Sadovsky and Stephen Gogolev — and the stakes couldn’t be higher.
The two Canadian skaters are locked in a battle to represent the Maple Leaf at the Olympics, becoming incidental travel companions along the way.
From Boston and Germany to Saskatoon and Helsinki, Sadovsky and Gogolev have boarded the same cross-continental flights to four competitions this season, going head-to-head at each step.
But there’s only one ticket available for next month’s trip to the Milan Cortina Games — and it all comes down to this week as Sadovsky and Gogolev face off for a fifth time at the Canadian figure skating championships.
“I feel like we both pushed each other,” Gogolev said. “We’ll see what happens.”
After solid competitive seasons from both skaters, one of Sadovsky or Gogolev will in all likelihood be selected for Canada’s lone men’s singles entry in Milan. Yet instead of fostering a rivalry with their Olympic dreams on the line, they say it’s just healthy competition.
“Kind of a happy accident that we end up going to every event,” Sadovsky said. “He’s a very good competitor, we’re very different skaters — it makes it very interesting.”
“It doesn’t change my approach at all, not even a little bit,” added the 26-year-old from Vaughan, Ont. “It’s just a bit of heightened anxiety and activation. Definitely makes you feel alive, it gets you a little tingly as you skate, and that’s the only reason I’m really doing it. If I was dead inside, I wouldn’t really like it.”
Gogolev was once Canada’s next big thing before injuries and a growth spurt slowed his progress, but the 21-year-old from Toronto is enjoying a resurgence. Sadovsky, meanwhile, is the reigning national champion.
So on their various trips through airports and customs, did they ever talk about the elephant in the room?
“You’d be surprised how little Olympic talk we have off the ice because it’s all in here,” Sadovsky said, pointing to his head after a practice session Thursday. “That’s all like an internal monologue kind of thing. We’ve had good times at all the competitions, and yeah, it’s a very healthy relationship.”
Sadovsky and Gogolev take to the ice Friday for the short program and Saturday for the free program at Centre Slush Puppie. The full Olympic team will be announced Sunday evening after competition concludes.
The selection is not determined solely by results at nationals — Skate Canada’s Olympic qualifying criteria takes into account a skater’s body of work over the past couple seasons.
With the chance of a medal in singles looking slim, Skate Canada high-performance director Mike Slipchuk says choosing a good fit for the Olympic team event — where Canada hopes to challenge for bronze — factors into the decision-making.
Slipchuk said it’s important Skate Canada has confidence the athletes on the way to the Olympics “have shown us over the season that they can put up scores in a short and a free program that put us in the mix.”
“If they come to Canadians and they just have this breakout performance, have they done it during the year, or is that just a one-off?” he added. “Because then you don’t know what you’re going in with.”
A legend of the sport, meanwhile, hopes it all comes down to the performances in Gatineau.
“I’m really hopeful that they use this event as the decider for the one spot at the Olympics,” said eight-time national champion Brian Orser. “I understand the body of work, but it gets a bit too cushy I think and you can kind of lean on that.
“You need to be able to handle this in order to go to the Olympics and handle that, because boy, oh boy, that’s a lot of pressure.”
Sadovsky and Gogolev have split their four matchups this season, each winning a gold medal on the lower-tier Challenger circuit.
Gogolev holds the international edge after winning bronze at the Finlandia Trophy Grand Prix — the top series in figure skating — with 253.61 points. Sadovsky finished fourth with 243.29.
“The two of them have really, really … stepped up to another level this season,” Slipchuk said.
LONG SHOT
A dark horse in the running is Keegan Messing, a two-time national champion and former Olympian who spiced up the men’s event by coming out of retirement last summer — hoping to reach the Olympics.
In three lower-level events since his return, the 33-year-old hasn’t replicated his past form. He said returning to competition after two years on show tours has been more difficult than expected.
“It’s a whole lot harder than skating shows, you know? Those long programs are suckers,” he said. “I did forget the difference between skating a program in practice and skating a program on the ice, in front of a crowd, with the adrenalin and how much more taxing that is on your body — not to mention the next morning when you wake up and can’t move.
“It was a little humbling to remember that part.”
Messing’s personal-best of 275.57 points set in 2023 would be far and away the best Canadian score this season. In his only international event this season, he scored 218.41.
“We know what Keegan brings to the table, but that was three years ago,” Slipchuk said. “You never can count out any athlete in this, but definitely the men’s landscape in Canada has changed.”
SURPRISE, SURPRISE
Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps surprised a lot of fans when they became the first pair to land an “assisted backflip” earlier this season. The 2024 world champions – and specifically the 42-year-old Stellato-Dudek – have another surprise in store this week.
“I have new costumes by a very high-level partner,” she said.
The new collaboration will be unveiled during Friday’s short program and Saturday’s free program.
“There’s no better sport for fashion to partner with than figure skating,” Stellato-Dudek said. “It’s so apropos, we’re wearing thousand-dollar costumes, we are the only ones in sport that do that.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 8, 2026.
Daniel Rainbird, The Canadian Press
