Winter Olympics 2026: At 42, Deanna Stellato-Dudek makes Olympic figure skating debut – “A long time coming”
Deanna Stellato on her story: “Keep pursuing what you want”
Stellato made global headlines in 2024 when she and Deschamps captured the world pairs title, skating in front of a home crowd in Montreal. The team has struggled to maintain that top form in the past two seasons, but have still remained one of the most elite in the sport.
“To me, this has been a long time coming,” Stellato said. “I’m just lucky enough that I found the right partner to get me to these Olympic Games. I always hope in the future that someone breaks my record… that’s something that I would love to see.”
While Stellato is not the oldest figure skater in Olympic history, she breaks a mould in the modern sport: The average age of her 18 female peers in the pairs short program was around 24 years old.
“Keep pursuing whatever you want, ignore the haters, and love what comes to you,” she said. “Pursue that and don’t listen to anyone else.”
Their error came at the end of what’s called a group 5 reverse lasso lift, in which the female skate is hoisted over the male’s head, using just one of his hands to stay upright, as the duo rotate, and then come back on to the ice on a single blade.
It had gone off without a hitch as Stellato/Deschamp’s penultimate element, but then disaster struck.
“I was pretty proud of our performance until the lift,” she said. “That’s actually one of the elements we’re the strongest at, so that was really disappointing. That was a massive point loss.”
That did, indeed, cost them some five points – a score that would have had them in eighth place. Instead, they sit 14th.
Regardless, it was a transcendent moment: Stellato has had all the odds stacked against her throughout her comeback, and she’ll look to defy even more of them on Monday night (16 February) in the pairs free skate.
