CALGARY — Roman Sadovsky says he's been greeted with "you made it" and "you have skates" at the Canadian figure skating championships in Calgary.
Nationals is his first competition this season because of an injury and travel headaches.
An ankle injury sustained attempting a triple axel while training last summer forced his withdrawal from October's Skate Canada in Vancouver.
When the 24-year-old from Toronto arrived in Poland for the Warsaw Cup in November, his skates didn't. They didn't make his connecting flight at Munich's airport and never arrived in Warsaw.
Storms forced the plane he was on to turn around en route to the Croatia Cup in Zagreb later that month. More bad weather grounded a second attempt to get there. He missed that event too.
"All season long, something was in the way," Sadovsky said in Calgary. "I'm super-excited to perform because I haven't. I'm here, I'm present and have skates. Body is in one piece."
There's a Canadian men's figure skating title to be claimed, or reclaimed, with the retirement of two-time champ Keegan Messing (2022, 2023).
Sadovsky, who won it in 2020, last year's runner-up Conrad Orzel, two-time bronze medallist Wesley Chiu and 2019 silver medallist Stephen Gogolev are among 2024's contenders.
Canadian champions in men's and women's singles, pairs and ice dance will be crowned after Saturday's free skates at WinSport Arena.
Ice dancers Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier are two-time world bronze medallists. Madeline Schizas seeks a third straight women's title. Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps are defending pairs champions.
The men's competition is the most wide open of the four disciplines.
"This is the only event where it's difficult to figure out who is going to win," Orzel said. "Each other event, you can kind of tell who is going to win, but the men's event is really special because you don't even know who is going to be in the top five."
Results at nationals factor into Skate Canada's selections for the upcoming Four Continents championship in Shanghai from Jan. 30 to Feb. 4, as well as the world championship March 18-24 in Montreal.
Sadovsky would have competed in Montreal's 2020 world championship as the reigning Canadian champion, but it was cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"I've heard from several skaters who've been to Olympics that (say) a world championships at home is really special, so I'd love to know what that's like," Sadovsky said.
Canada will send a full contingent of three entries per discipline to Shanghai. Three ice dance and three pairs teams, two men and one woman will wear the Maple Leaf at Montreal's Bell Centre.
Toronto's Orzel accompanied Messing to last year's world championship in Saitama, Japan, where Orzel skated the men's short program, but didn't qualify for the free skate. The 23-year-old expects a multi-skater battle for men's gold in Calgary.
"The competition is so strong here. I don't feel like I am the favourite. I'm still the underdog," Orzel said.
Performing on wider Olympic-sized ice is a first for Sadovsky in a decade of national championships. That's where Vancouver's Chiu could have an advantage in Calgary.
The 18-year-old not only competed in the 2023 world junior championship in the same venue, but he trains on ice of Olympic dimensions at the Richmond Oval.
"It's definitely less of an adjustment for me for sure, " Chiu said. "It's definitely easier to maintain my patterns, keep up the speed, not have to adjust too many things."
Toronto's Gogolev, 19, withdrew from 2022 nationals due to a bout of COVID-19. After a rocky short program, he won the free skate in 2023 to vault to fourth.
"There's a lot of amazing skaters here and a lot of talent, so it's definitely going to be a fun competition," Orzel said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 12, 2024.
Donna Spencer, The Canadian Press
