2026 Olympics: Gala Exhibition

[niks]

Adeliia was at the Gala practice. So pretty sure, she will be there..

Ok, I must be honest here. This is probably one of the clearest pieces of evidence I've seen of how far-reaching Eteri's power is in international figure skating. And I for one, I'm surprised of its sheer magnitude, even with the ban, with Kamila, with other etc and etc, there she is reigning strong. Wow The politics and diplomacy worlds surely lost a talent there.

And this is not a diss against Adelia. I like her and I was hurt for her reading an interview she gave full of self-criticism and reproach for her Olympic results. It's hard to see how much pressure she puts on herself and how hard she can be with herself So, in that sense, I'm glad if she got invited to the Gala and can have some fun hopefully out of all this Olympic experience. But given the circunstancies, the only plausible reason why Adelia was invited is Eteri and I'm just surprised to see she is in such a strong position to pull that off... (or maybe, Adelia just promised to do 3 quads in her exhibition, who knows, we'll have to wait and see )

Though to be fair, on a second look, things look somewhat off with the Gala lists in general: 5 pairs, 6 ice-dance teams, 7 men and 8 women. Is this normal? Can't say I follow galas all that much but all those I remember have always had the same number of participants by discipline, and certainly not such big gaps as here where there are almost half number of pairs compared to women ....

 

[Andrea82]

Full Gala line up

https://wmr-static-assets.scd.dgplatform.net/wmr/static/_PDF/OWG2026/FSK/2026-02-20/FSK-------------------------------__C51F_1.0.pdf

other than the invited skaters listed above there will be
Carolina doing the opening number
Host Country Team doing a group number to open second segment
Team USA doing a group number to open third segment

 

[frompolandwithlove]

Ok, I must be honest here. This is probably one of the clearest pieces of evidence I've seen of how far-reaching Eteri's power is in international figure skating. And I for one, I'm surprised of its sheer magnitude, even with the ban, with Kamila, with other etc and etc, there she is reigning strong. Wow The politics and diplomacy worlds surely lost a talent there.

To be fair, IOC is pretty vocal about wanting to let russians back in. It's the ISU that stands its ground on keeping the ban (and honestly I respect them very much for that). So it might not be the case of backstage deals and such this time.

 

[SmileHappy34]

Actually, it was the pair team who won the Team Gold for USA. Ilia was clearly supposed to won both his events and in the end, he underperformed, losing one point in the SP. The pair team overperformed in their FS and won one more point than expected. Without this extra point, even with Illia winning the FS, USA and Japan would have had the same number of points, and Japan would have won the Gold medal based on the tie-break rules.

No. They all won
Yes it true the pairs gain a point in free skate. That was equally out by the loss of point done by amber.
She lost the point Alyssa had 9. Both alyssa and Amber could have finished 2nd o.
Instead they finished 2nd , 3rd.
Yes it true that ilia finished 2nd in sp and expected to win both.

So for all pair team talk.
Why didn't they finish 4th in sp as well with 7 points. They capable didn't.
So they didn't win for u.s. alone on fp.
They help

The

If anyone it was alyssa and chock and bates the wo. Both sections.
Alyssa finished 2nd.

The pair team capable of finish 4th in both sections didnt.

Be glad that u.s. got team gold.
Be unhappy that japan didn't.
It goes to show how close and good japan is . It could have went either way.

A 1 point difference. A 1 small mistake team gold or not.

 

[Janice4th]

Well well well... At galas, they often invited the top 4-5 and then a couple more special performers.

Ilia is still a world champion with exciting moves that please the crowds.

He is also an olympic champion.

I mean they invited Adam. Adam is neither a world champion nor an olympic medalist. He placed below the top 5 like Ilia. However, like Ilia, he is an extremely popular skater at shows. So it makes sense they would invite him as well.

I don't see why the big fuss about inviting someone who is extremely popular with a large audience. As mentioned, I am not going to watch the gala unless I have nothing else to do , but from what I have seen, the selection is not only logical but extremely predictable. There is nobody on the roster that is a real surprise here. Seriously. Not sure why there is such a talk about inviting Malinin or anyone else on the lists provided so far. I also fail to notice people who should have been invited and weren't.

And they are only complaining about Ilia.

On another note, I wonder if Mone didn’t get the invite because they want to spread the participants amongst different countries, so two max from each country in each discipline.

 

[dorispulaski]

It is nice that team USA and Team Italy have group numbers, but they should have had Team Japan too IMO.

 

[Arigato]

The pairs team earned an unexpected point in the US's favor then Amber lost a point by coming in 3rd instead of the expected 2nd in the FS. Ilia's skate broke the tie.

Considering how many answers are being thrown around as to who earned which point and when, how about if everyone just chills out and accepts it was a team effort and USA won.

 

[skatedreamer]

Considering how many answers are being thrown around as to who earned which point and when, how about if everyone just chills out and accepts it was a team effort and USA won.

You're kidding, right? That kind of common sense could make my head explode!

 

[Rikku]

List

 

[CoyoteChris]

Ok, I must be honest here. This is probably one of the clearest pieces of evidence I've seen of how far-reaching Eteri's power is in international figure skating. And I for one, I'm surprised of its sheer magnitude, even with the ban, with Kamila, with other etc and etc, there she is reigning strong. Wow The politics and diplomacy worlds surely lost a talent there.

And this is not a diss against Adelia. I like her and I was hurt for her reading an interview she gave full of self-criticism and reproach for her Olympic results. It's hard to see how much pressure she puts on herself and how hard she can be with herself So, in that sense, I'm glad if she got invited to the Gala and can have some fun hopefully out of all this Olympic experience. But given the circunstancies, the only plausible reason why Adelia was invited is Eteri and I'm just surprised to see she is in such a strong position to pull that off... (or maybe, Adelia just promised to do 3 quads in her exhibition, who knows, we'll have to wait and see )

Though to be fair, on a second look, things look somewhat off with the Gala lists in general: 5 pairs, 6 ice-dance teams, 7 men and 8 women. Is this normal? Can't say I follow galas all that much but all those I remember have always had the same number of participants by discipline, and certainly not such big gaps as here where there are almost half number of pairs compared to women ....

I would personally take your first sentence and substitute "Russia" for "Eteri".

 

[lariko]

Full Gala line up

https://wmr-static-assets.scd.dgplatform.net/wmr/static/_PDF/OWG2026/FSK/2026-02-20/FSK-------------------------------__C51F_1.0.pdf

other than the invited skaters listed above there will be
Carolina doing the opening number
Host Country Team doing a group number to open second segment
Team USA doing a group number to open third segment

Aha, here where they have Lara! Happy she is there!

 

[maofan]

Aha, here where they have Lara! Happy she is there!

I don't see Lara Naki Gutman on this lineup!

 

[lariko]

I don't see Lara Naki Gutman on this lineup!

The Team Italy number.

 

[Blades of Passion]

Mone Chiba excluded from the Gala, in favor of the #6, #7, and #8 ranked skaters.

WTF.

 

[Arigato]

Is this host country not allowed to do what the heck it wants at its own gala?

 

[maofan]

The Team Italy number.

Daniel, Charlene/Marco, Sara/Niccolo they are in the Team Italy number but also in individual numbers, that's why I was hoping for Lara to have an individual exhibition too! Well, it is what it is, the host is allowed to invite whoever he wants!

 

[dorispulaski]

Mone Chiba excluded from the Gala, in favor of the #6, #7, and #8 ranked skaters.

WTF.

We don't know whether she was invited and refused the invitation. She might be injured or ill.

 

[DancingCactus]

I would have loved to see Mone. I kind of see why they would include Ilia, but Petrosian? Does she have a super unique gala program or do we have to assume it's because fo politics again?

 

[yfan1]

Wait. They've invited Ilia to skate at the gala? I'm not sure how I feel about that.

He's an Olympic gold medalist, in the team event. They actually should have invited the other medalists too, people noted Rizzo was left off. I really would have let Siao Him Fa go, in favour of Rizzo.

Adeliia Petrosyan is the strangest addition in all this. Assuming Chiba was all good, she was snubbed here, and Petrosyan would be the most obvious substitute.

 

[yfan1]

Also, let me stomp my feet a bit on Sui/Han not getting invited, and be the rabid fan that I am and say they had the best gala here. I don't even know what it is, I just know that's true.