The 2026 Winter Olympic are in full swing in the depths of Milano Cortina, Italy. Of all the United States’ placements since that day, their third place in pairs skating is the most controversial (as of Feb. 12, when this column was written) thanks to the French pair that won gold, Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron.
Beaudry and Cizeron have a very interesting history. As in, they have none.
The pair has been skating together for one year following the suspension of Nikolaj Sørensen (Beaudry’s previous partner), who was banned from the sport for at least six years following Canada’s investigation into sexual assault allegations against him. According to USA Today, the alleged assault took place in April 2012 and he was suspended in October of 2024. In June 2025, the Sport Dispute Resolution Centre of Canada overturned the suspension on jurisdictional grounds but since then, it has been ruled that said decision must be reviewed, possibly putting the ban back in place. Beaudry and Sørensen have been dating for the last 12 years, and said that she and Cizeron will continue to stand by him and support him in a Netflix documentary titled “Glitter & Gold.”
On top of this, Beaudry directly discounted the alleged victim’s testimony, stating that Sørensen would never do anything like that and that it’s been hard for her integrity since the allegations came out.
Cizeron is also facing allegations of abuse from his former partner, Gabriella Papadakis, whom he won the 2022 Olympic gold with, who stated in her memoir that he was often controlling and critical, as well as demanding. Papadakis made it clear she would not skate with Cizeron unless a coach was present. Following the release of her memoir, Papadakis was dropped from NBC Olympic commentating for a perceived bias and Cizeron accused Papadakis of defamation.
While this is all alleged, it sets an interesting precedent for abuse in the skating community if twice in one year, victims came forward and were met with Netflix airing content insinuating Sørensen’s allegations were false, and NBC seemingly standing behind Cizeron by dropping Papadakis.
The United States ice dance team, Madison Chock and Evan Bates, have only lost four times since they lost at the 2022 Beijing Olympics. The pair is married and were hoping to win their first ever Olympic medal and did. Even if it wasn’t gold.
Besides the above reasons, there is also public suspicion of judge bias during the opening rhythm dance and the free dance. While most judges ranked the French team very closely with the United States and Canada, the French judge on the panel ranked France first and the United States at the bottom, while giving Canada a poor score as well. In the end, Beaudry and Cizeron scored a total of 225.82 points while Chock and Bates scored a total of 224.39 points, leading the public to wonder if the French judge’s scoring is the ultimate reason for Chock and Bates’ silver medal.
