Ice dancing has no clear favorite

By Helene Elliott

March 24, 2009 12 AM PT

Only this is certain about the ice dance competition at the World Figure Skating Championships, which begin today at Staples Center with the compulsory dance: the injury-induced withdrawal of 2008 winners Isobel Delobel and Olivier Schoenfelder of France guarantees a new champion will be crowned.

But it’s not safe to assume last year’s runners-up, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir of Canada, will move up. Virtue had surgery on both shins six months ago, and the duo lost the Four Continents title to U.S. champions Meryl Davis and Charlie White, who could be in the mix here. Turin Olympic silver medalists Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto can’t be counted out either, despite a fourth-place finish last year.

“Everybody wants to win but I really feel like the steps have been taken to only one position,” Belbin said Monday. “We’re not fighting for a podium position. We’re fighting for gold.”

Also likely to contend are Federica Faiella and Massimo Scali of Italy and two Russian duos, 2008 bronze medalists Jana Khoklova and Sergei Novitski, and 2008 European champions Oksana Dominina and Maxim Shabalin.

helene.elliott@latimes.com

Olympics

Helene Elliott

Helene Elliott was with the Los Angeles Times’ Sports department from 1989 to 2024, first as a staff writer and then, starting in 2006, as a columnist. She became the first female journalist to be honored with a plaque in the Hall of Fame of a major professional sport as the 2005 winner of the Hockey Hall of Fame’s Elmer Ferguson Award, awarded to writers “who have brought honor to journalism and to hockey.” A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., and graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, she has covered 18 Olympics.

Ice dancing has no clear favorite

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