ISU Congress 2026

[cocteautwin]

Or the season after, eh! Sigh. Retiring without saying they are, which has been a trend since the departure of Michelle Kwan, who never formally announced she was retiring.

I wonder what's the reason, maybe they want to keep sponsorship contracts as long as possible, maybe it's also better for commercial opportunities to leave the status open.
Anyway, I found it funny that after so many public events and media interactions in US, Evan confirmed that they will not compete in Tenerife, without Madi and to japanese media

 

[Andrea82]

ISU Council
Figure Skating 5 slots
ELECTED:
Lundgren (USA)
Matsumura (Japan) * incumbent
Lavoie (Canada)
Bianchetti (Italy)
Lynch (Finland)

Incumbent Susan Rakhamo unseated.
Elek WD as he became Vice President
The other incumbents were retiring (Samaranch and St Peter).

 

[Andrea82]

Michela Cesaro (Italy) wins Ice Dance Technical Committee chairmanship easily over incumbent Shawn Rettstatt

 

[Andrea82]

Single and Pair Committee

Chair: Laaksonen (Finland) as only candidate. She was a TC member in previous term.
Members elected
Daniel Delfa (Spain)
Leah Bates (Australia)
Feng Huang (China)
Kerstin Kimminus (Germany)

All new. Bianchetti and Lynch moved up to ISU Council. Laaksonen moved to Chair. Billow did not stand (and will chair the new judges evaluation and selection committee)

Ice Dance Commitee

Members elected
Marie Bowness (Canada)
Csaba Balint (Hungary)
Marcin Kozubek (Poland)

All new
Selby and Wolter aged out.
Molina and Rettstatt defeated

 

[cocteautwin]

Single and Pair Committee

Chair: Laaksonen (Finland) as only candidate
Members elected
Daniel Delfa (Spain)
Leah Bates (Australia)
Feng Huang (China)
Kerstin Kimminus (Germany)

Great, Feng Huang was suspended for 1 year for biased scoring at 2018 olympic, yet then was chosen to judge at another olympics, run ISU seminars and now is elected to technical committee. Well done, ISU.

 

[4everchan]

Election Day

1st vote is on ISU Vice-President - Figure Skating

Benoit Lavoie (Canada) was the incumbent but lost out to Grigory Elek (Hungary).
80 votes to 40 in the final round

Round 1
Elek 61 votes
Lavoie 34
Bianchetti 23
Novakovic 1

Round 2
Elek 65 votes
Lavoie 35
Bianchetti 19

Round 3
Elek 80 votes
Lavoie 40

I don't know about Elek. Lavoie, at least, before he was VP, had all my respect... is this good or bad for the sport you think. ?

 

[4everchan]

Michela Cesaro (Italy) wins Ice Dance Technical Committee chairmanship easily over incumbent Shawn Rettstatt

now, that's good

 

[4everchan]

Single and Pair Committee

Chair: Laaksonen (Finland) as only candidate
Members elected
Daniel Delfa (Spain)
Leah Bates (Australia)
Feng Huang (China)
Kerstin Kimminus (Germany)

All new. Bianchetti and Lynch moved up to ISU Council. Laaksonen moved to Chair. Billow did not stand (and will chair the new judges evaluation and selection committee)

omg

Selby and Wolter aged out.
Molina and Rettstatt defeated

claps

 

[BlissfulSynergy]

Well, the interview with Kim did not provide any more information than we already got. He, as face of ISU, tries to present himself as available and open to conversation, yet all the answers were general, avoiding any details or giving a solutions to a specific issues.

As for combined all-skating worlds, I'm not against the idea of trying new formats of events, let's see how it works, how it's perceived by athletes and fans. I think it's sth that can be tested and organized once in a while (e.g. every 4 years) if it's successful.
However, I do have some reservations about how many skating events are currently being organized in China. I would prefer not to give too much power to one federation and keep the diversity, it just so much more interesting when competitions are held in different places, cultures and with different crowds. Not to even mention homecooking factor in a judged sport. I get there are only few venues that can handle this format of event and federations nowadays are reluctant to hold big events because of finanacial burdens but if ISU wants to push for that format, they need to address this issue at first.

Exactly @cocteautwin. I agree with all of the points you have made.

 

[BlissfulSynergy]

ISU Council
Figure Skating 5 slots
ELECTED:
Lundgren (USA)
Matsumura (Japan) * incumbent
Lavoie (Canada)
Bianchetti (Italy)
Lynch (Finland)

Incumbent Susan Rakhamo unseated.
Elek WD as he became Vice President
The other incumbents were retiring (Samaranch and St Peter).

Interesting. I wonder the average ages of these council members? Elek seems very popular as the newly elected VP of the ISU (he formerly served one term as VP of figure skating, as @Andrea82 has pointed out). I wonder why he's so popular and what his actual views are? I think a change is good, as Lavoie is older and has been in the VP position for a while. I recognized Elek's name immediately. He's the guy who often presents medals as an ISU official during victory ceremonies. I wonder if Elek will one day be popular enough to be elected full-on president of the entire ISU? Only a few figure skaters have served as ISU president in the organization's 130+ years history! I checked this background today. It's fascinating. I previously had inaccurate info re the history of ISU presidents. I will follow-up with what I learned.

I checked Elek's background. He's a former ice dancer, like the 'unseated' Rakhamo. He sure looked different as a young figure skater!

Getty Images

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Elek today ... scroll down for ISU official photos:

Inside ISU

Corporate Home - International Skating Union

www.isu.org

 

[Andrea82]

Interesting. I wonder the average ages of these council members? Elek seems very popular as the newly elected VP of figure skating. I wonder why he's so popular and what his actual views are? I think a change is good, as Lavoie is older and has been in the VP position for a while. I recognized Elek's name immediately. He's the guy who often presents medals as an ISU official during victory ceremonies. I wonder if Elek will one day be popular enough to be elected full-on president of the entire ISU? Only a few figure skaters have served as ISU president in the organization's 130+ years history! I checked this background today. It's fascinating. I previously had inaccurate info re the history of ISU presidents. I will follow-up with what I learned.

He served as VP for only one term. He was first elected in 2022 replacing Lakernik. However, he has been on ISU Council since 2016.
Elek was first elected to ISU Council in 2022. Before that he was on Ice Dance Technical Committee in 2018-22 term.
Elek in his competition days: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRswMEXAeMk

 

[ladyjane]

Michela Cesaro (Italy) wins Ice Dance Technical Committee chairmanship easily over incumbent Shawn Rettstatt

This is going to many ID-lovers happy. And Michela won in a big way!

https://x.com/rockerskating/status/2065400127070638261.

 

[AuroraCherry]

I am just sad that there was nothing about expanding Worlds and letting more skaters from smaller federations compete. Every time i keep hoping the ISU will bring up an idea/proposal at least, but nothing.

Especially now that the member federations can't tear down and reject their new rules anymore, i hoped they would give their initial plan from 2022 another try, but it looks like they gave up after the disaster in 2024.

 

[BlissfulSynergy]

Jackie Wong and Michelle Ellis discuss the ISU Congress news, plus new partnerships, in addition to noting that Smart/ Dieck have confirmed they would like to point toward 2030 Olympics, but will take it one season at a time. Fournier-Beaudry/ Cizeron also confirm they will be back next season...

- YouTube

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www.youtube.com

 

[paulusfr]

The ISU President spoke about doubling the prize money https://www.facebook.com/reel/1761920664983141/
Not sure what he meant, because if you're not top 6 or top 8, you don't get any world ranking points.
But you can make a mickey mouse competition that nobody knows about to farm some points. I hope they considered that.
Long story short, Challenger events should not affect where this money goes.
Actually, it was reported that an updated ranking system would be presented after Worlds, but did they even mention it? It's been radio silence, and I haven't seen anything on that matter.