Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron have issues with the scoring in their 2026 Winter Olympics gold medal-winning ice dance performance, too.
The French skating pair, who narrowly and controversially bested the married American duo of Madison Chock and Evan Bates last week, are unbothered by the heat created by the help they received from French judge Jézabel Dabouis, who favored Beaudry and Cizeron by nearly eight points over Chock and Bates, meaning the American pair would have won gold if Dabois’ score was removed.
In an interview with a French radio station, Beaudry and Cizeron thought they could have been given an even higher score, based on their belief that they performed a more difficult routine than the Americans.
“We had the goal of winning by five to seven points, but we made a few mistakes that cost us three or four points,” Cizeron said Thursday on the Super Moscato Show on RMC. “Winning the gold after just one year of working together, that’s kind of an achievement.”
After that mistake — “He didn’t really make a mistake, he just decided to be creative in the moment,” Fournier Beaudry joked — Cizeron briefly wondered if he killed the team’s chances of winning gold.
“It’s a mental battle to keep going and link the elements together, to get back into it and go for the points,” Cizeron said. “You have to cut off those negative thoughts that come in very quickly, and that’s where twenty years of experience come into play.
“I think that our friendship … allowed us to overcome all this pressure.”
Beaudry and Cizeron’s partnership was formed after the former’s partner/boyfriend was suspended by Canadian figure skating due to sexual abuse allegations.
Beaudry then chose to join the French figure skating team to pair with Cizeron, whose former skating partner, Gabriella Papadakis, accused Cizeron of being “often controlling, demanding and critical” in her recent memoir. He has denied the allegations.
U.S. Figure Skating opted not to appeal the French judge’s decision after the International Skating Union stood by the score.
2026 WINTER OLYMPICS
“It is normal for there to be a range of scores given by different judges in any panel and a number of mechanisms are used to mitigate these variations,” the ISU said. “[We have] full confidence in the scores given and remain completely committed to fairness.”
Chock avoided attacking the judge, but told CBS that there needs to be more transparency in scoring.
“Any time the public is confused by results, it does a disservice to our sport,” Chock said. “I think it’s hard to retain fans when it’s difficult to understand what is happening on the ice … People need to understand what they’re cheering for and be able to feel confident in the sport that they’re supporting.”
“We know how we felt on center ice after we skated. We felt like we delivered our absolute best performance that we could have. It was our Olympic moment. It felt like a winning skate to us, and that’s what we’re going to hold on to.
“I think it’s also important for the skaters, that the judges be vetted and reviewed to make sure that they are also putting out their best performance because there’s a lot on the line for the skaters when they’re out there giving it their all, and we deserve to have the judges also giving us their all and for it to be a fair and even playing field.”
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