By Hiro Yoshida

Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps had mixed fortunes last season with early success being followed by illness and disappointment at just missing out on a medal at the 2023 World Championships in Saitama, Japan. This week they begin their season at the Skate Canada Autumn Classic in the hopes of coming back to Montreal next March for 2024 Worlds and this time finishing their season on a high.

After winning a silver medal at Skate America and a gold at Trophée de France on last year’s Grand Prix, Stellato-Dudek was struck down by illness right before the Grand Prix Final which hampered their performance for most of rest of the season. She was fully recovered by the time Worlds rolled around in March, but the competition did not turn out the way they wanted. Although they posted the highest total score of their career together, they ended up in fourth place just off the podium.

“The Grand Prix Final was the beginning of my sickness journey that lasted for three months,” Stellato-Dudek said. “Going into the Final we had the third highest score, so we just wanted to try to better that score and the illness really held us up at that competition, and many others past it.

“I think the whole year culminates with Worlds. It’s always where you want to do your best performance and it didn’t happen for us this time so it was very disappointing.”

“There was a lot of learning throughout the week,” Deschamps said. “It was her second Worlds. It was my first ever and in the last month or two I was more nervous than usual.”

“You can’t control how anyone else does,” Stellato-Dudek said. “You can’t control how you’re judged. But at least if we could put out our best performances and get our highest score then when you get off the ice your success is your contentment with yourself.

“I would have liked to have gotten off and been happy and content with how I did and said, ‘Well I did everything I could and the chips fell where they did’.”

Besides the Soviet Union, Canada has won the most medals in the pairs event of any nation in the history of the World Championships. After winning their first Canadian title in January of this year, Stellato-Dudek and Deschamps also felt there was anticipation that they would add to the medal count in Saitama. Even though the pair hold some regret that they were unable to take home a medal, they recognise they did their best under the circumstances.

“Canada has always had a very long and very high pedigree in pair skating,” Stellato-Dudek said. “I felt very honoured to be amongst those top-level pair skaters, and definitely also had an expectation to carry on the tradition. Coming with expectation for your first Worlds versus coming with no expectation for your first Worlds are two very different feelings. I felt like we dealt with that pretty well in the short. Not as well in the long, but some of the mistakes that were made were uncharacteristic too. I thought that we dealt with everything pretty well, considering we didn’t know we were going to be in that position.”

“To be able to go out there with expectation in the short and still perform really well and be in the last warm-up for the free, this is a pretty good high for me,” Deschamps said. “We went out there. We did our best. We are just always learning about what we can do better next time.”

“My mom is always super happy for me and she’s always proud of me no matter what, but she knows me and she knows that I was really frustrated and disappointed with that performance and my expectations for myself were higher than that,” Stellato-Dudek said. “If you think that you have so much to improve upon and you’re fourth in the world you’re probably in pretty good shape is what she told me.”

Stellato-Dudek’s unorthodox career in skating garnered quite an amount of media attention throughout last season. Quitting the sport in her teens and coming back to it in her thirties, she is not surprised people are fascinated by her journey as a skater.

“I’m used to that. It has to be discussed because it’s not normal.

“I just have a passion for figure skating. I love going into the rink every day. I love training. I love trying to get better. I love thinking of ways to improve ourselves. I’m lucky. I think there’s a lot of people in the world that don’t get to wake up and do what they love every day.

“You have to have some amount of drive, of course, to continue doing it and a lot of dedication at my age because it takes more for nutrition and cooldown and stretching. All of that requires more when you’re older.”

During their warm-up at Worlds, their introduction in Japanese elicited an enormous reaction from the audience at the Saitama Super Arena with the announcer relaying information about their backgrounds in the sport, in particular focusing on Stellato-Dudek’s unique story.

“I heard the people clapping and really applauding for when they said our name,” Deschamps recalled. “I didn’t know what they were saying, but I remembered this.”

“We’d never had a chance to have the Japanese crowd see us and establish some kind of connection with us before,” Stellato-Dudek said. “I felt very embraced by them right away.”

With last season behind them, the Canadian pair looked forward to spending the summer improving the technical aspects of their skating.

“We’ve got to work on consistency,” Stellato-Dudek said. “Our triple toe has been really great, but we have to work on our Salchow. We need that consistent second triple. We’d like to go back and maybe work on the Lutz a little bit also. We took it out for Worlds, the Lutz throw. We did it all year, except for Worlds.

“I feel like our strengths and weaknesses are so clear. We had the highest points in the twist at Worlds. We’re always top three in our lifts. It’s the other places that we need to improve. The throws always score well when they’re landed well.”

“The other places we know we need to improve are the more secure elements, like the spins,” Deschamps said.

They will have two brand new programmes this season. “Oxygène” by Cirque du Soleil for their short and the “Interview with a Vampire” soundtrack for their free. The creative process is an all-female affair with Stellato-Dudek, coach Josee Picard and choreographer Julie Marcotte contributing.

“It’s a joint collaborative decision,” Stellato-Dudek said.

“It’s their collaboration,” Deschamps confirmed. “I don’t have a say. Even yes or no, I don’t have that option. Just yes.”

“Max has not listened to a lot of music,” Stellato-Dudek explained. “He reads and does things like that. Music is more for the girls and then he can get on board with a tango theme or something like that. But he leaves the decision making to the girls.”

Stellato-Dudek and Deschamps are fired up at the prospect of 2024 Worlds in their back yard.

“I’m really excited,” Deschamps said. “For me, it will be like not the Olympics but almost like an Olympic feeling that’s going to be big. I feel it’s going to be a great preparation for the Olympics in three years.”

“I’m glad that we had one experience at a World Championships before we have a home country Worlds,” Stellato-Dudek said. “We’ll have a little bit more experience to carry with us. Of course, there’ll be lots of attention and all the Canadian athletes will be there. That’s where we live and train.”

“It’s my home town,” Deschamps said.

“It’s where he was born so it’s a different level of home Worlds,” Stellato-Dudek said. “It’s one thing to have it in another province or state of the same country that you’re from but to have it where you are from is pretty unique.”

“I’ve been at that arena to watch hockey games, but to be able to skate there at the highest stage possible is going to be fun,” Deschamps said.