Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue arrive in Detroit hot off the biggest win of their year career:
a gold medal at the Grand Prix Final in Vancouver, British Columbia, in early December. It was their fourth international win of the season, and their first medal at the Final.
The World silver medalists unveiled
major changes to their programs in Vancouver, especially their free dance to the 1996
Romeo + Juliet soundtrack. The team's coaches in Montreal, Quebec, Marie-France Dubreuil and Patrice Lauzon, gave them three new lifts and changed the first piece of music.
"Zach and I have always been drawn to subtle, romantic pieces but the truth is, when you (perform) in a big stadium, the audience has to be behind it," Hubbell said. "A lot of our competitors have programs that finish with a roaring end and standing ovations."
Donohue said music changes were designed to make their
Romeo + Juliet more dynamic.
"We knew we wanted to take the risk here and be more trained for the big events — nationals, Four Continents and Worlds," he said. "It's such an iconic love story, and while what we had was successful, it wasn't telling the full story."
Hubbell and Donohue's performance quality and confidence make them odds-on favorites to defend their title in the Motor City. But their training partners in Montreal,
Kaitlin Hawayek and Jean-Luc Baker, won their first Grand Prix gold at NHK Trophy and also qualified for the Grand Prix Final. After a series of fourth and fifth-place finishes at the U.S. Championships, they are poised to make a big move in the standings.
The 2014 World Junior champions think they are coming into their own after relocating from
Detroit to Montreal last season.
"In terms of the way they're trying to develop our skating since we moved, is (to add) a little bit more control," Baker said. "A lot of the time before, we'd have a very energetic and charismatic bounce to the ice in a way, and I think that they're really trying to work on our control and our consistency and just bring a new glide to our skating."
Madison Chock and Evan Bates are huge question marks. The skaters, who
moved from Michigan to Montreal this summer following Chock's ankle surgery, have not competed since placing fifth at the 2018 World Championships. The two-time World medalists and 2015 U.S. champions plan to compete at a tune-up event in Poland a few weeks before the U.S. Championships, and will debut a free dance featuring Michael Buble's version of the Elvis Presley classic "Burning Love" there.
 Â
"It's a massive year of change for us," Bates said. "I've lived in Michigan my entire life, but we feel we needed to be re-invigorated for the next four-year (Olympic) cycle."
For more information and tickets, visit the event website here. Read the full championship competition preview in the January issue of SKATING magazine.
