Belarusian skaters return to international tournaments: results and prospects

After a long absence, the Belarusian skaters again perform at international tournaments, but already in a significantly updated composition. So far, athletes have to win rating points from scratch and perform in conditions of limited quotas. However, the start of the season has already brought encouraging results, writes sb.by.

Victoria Safonova. Among women, the leader of the Belarusian team remains 23-year-old Victoria Safonova. In the new season, she has already managed to perform at two tournaments of the Challenger series - in Batumi and Almaty. The athlete failed to climb the pedestal, but both times she was close to medals, losing only to more titled rivals or skaters, in the arsenal of which there are elements of the ultra-si: triple axel and quadruple jumps. These competitions are also important because their results are taken into account in the world ranking of skaters. The position in the classification directly affects the possibility of obtaining quotas for major tournaments of the next season, in particular, for the stages of the Grand Prix series. After a long suspension, Safonova will have to re-acquire rating points, so now there are no insignificant starts for her.

If Safonova is already used to performing at tournaments under the auspices of the International Skating Union, then for Belarusian men such competitions are still a novelty. 18-year-old Vasily Borokhovsky this season is trying his hand at once in two age categories. At the stages of the junior Grand Prix series, he confidently entered the top ten strongest, and at the debut adult tournament, the Minsk citizen took fifth place, receiving just over 218 points. And Borokhovsky scored such a sum, even in spite of gross mistakes. Given that the Belarusian has elements of the ultra-si in reserve, its potential is much higher. It is worth noting another of our skaters - Georgy Kozlovsky. In his arsenal there is the most difficult jump in figure skating - a quadruple lutz. However, it is still hampered by instability to rely on high places.

In ice dancing leaders are Ekaterina Andreeva and Dmitry Blinov. At the challenger in Batumi, they lost only 0.07 points to the third position. And in Almaty, Belarusians received 69.49 points for rhythm dance. This is a solid result: at the last World Cup, such an assessment would have allowed them to qualify for an arbitrary dance.

In general, the results of the Belarusian skaters at the start of the season give grounds to expect that at the upcoming European and world championships they will be able to go as far as possible and not finish the fight in the early stages. Belarusian juniors showed themselves in the international arena. At the “Denis Ten Memorial” in Almaty, 13-year-old Belarusian Varvara Stakhovich with a score of 195.61 stopped a step away from the first international medal, second only to Russians who own elements of the ultra-si. It is worth noting that at the last junior world championship in Tallinn, such an assessment would allow Stakhovich to take fourth place - less than two points would separate it from the bronze medal.

Following Varvara in the final minutes of the tournament in Almaty is another junior – 13-year-old Yaroslava Knyazeva, who scored 182.81 points. In Tallinn, the young Belarusian would also not be lost and would confidently enter the top ten.

Belarusian skaters returned to the international arena with restrictions. At the European and World Championships, our country will be able to declare only one athlete or one pair in each discipline: women's and men's single skating, ice dancing and pairs skating. The nearest major tournament for Belarusians is the European Championship, which this season will be held from 25 to 31 January 2027 in Lausanne, Switzerland.