Nebelhorn Trophy in the post olympic season

Men Short Program
Jimmy Ma opened the 2026 Nebelhorn Trophy, one of the first competitions in the Post-Olympic season. "To be honest with you, the fall didn't really phase me much. I know later on in the season I'm confident in the fact that the jumps are gonna come. But considering how late I started my training in the season I'm very happy with where I am right now. …I can't wait to see where that goes this season. I retired for 4 months."
Regarding the motivation to keep going, Jimmy said "Mama didn't raise a quitter. So, let's continue. I missed that crucial part of the season. The offseason, where I was able to play around with things like work on the new spins, work on new entrances." He added "I messaged Kaitlyn Weaver: Look, you've always wanted to work with me."

Aleksa Rakic skated well. Regarding his program he said "the music is 'Surf Rider'. It's a little bit like a biker dude. … like conc rock. The choreography sort of like headbanging is different than what I've done before, and so I thought it was an interesting piece of music. I want to stand out and try to push myself higher in the ranking…so we thought it would be a good vehicle for me."

Commenting on the start of the season with home-ice advantage here in Oberstdorf, Luca Fuenfer said, “…it helps with my orientation, but ultimately it’s just another competition.” Regarding his preparation for the season, he said, “I’ve trained a lot. I’m in good shape, both physically and mentally.” He will perform his new free skate program tomorrow.

Nikita Starostin commented on the quadruple Salchow: “Yes, it was the first clean quadruple jump in a short program. I'm satisfied.” He added, “…I've worked so hard since December that I've built up my confidence in these elements.”

Liam Kapeikis commented his second competition this season "Today was much better than Japan. But obviously there was still the one mistake that step out on the triple Axel so I know even from here, I can continue to bring that score up even higher. I'm very pleased."
He added "I'm actually dealing with a bit of an injury. I have an injury in my hip, and I was still learning how to skate with that injury when I was in Japan. … I probably need to do some time off. Which is not possible at this moment in the season so I'll just be managing it for the next little while and it should be okay."

Genrikh Gartung delivered a strong short program after his mistake on the quadruple jump. He said he had been nervous. He felt the pressure to perform well.

Pairs Short Program - Pereira Michaud took the lead
Lia Pereira and Trennt Michaud have already repeatedly started the new season in Oberstdorf.  "It's a great event to start the season. It's very like homey feeling. But at the same time, it's such a rink that has such a skating history to it that you like want to do."

Regarding the summer they said "it was so busy. …the season of the Olympics doesn't really end until June. Because we got home from the Worlds and we went into "Stars on Ice." Coming back from that we had team Canada celebrations and media stuff to do, which We're very grateful for that. It's great that the sport gets that much attention. But we didn't really get home and settled until like end of June."
The added "But we did a really good summer working on our new programs, and just having a lot of fun and getting excited to come back."
Regarding the new program they said "We're always looking to improve on our performance kind of not do something that's expected. We've really enjoyed the process of working with Madison and Adrian in London, with this short program. Especially Adrian, he's got all the moves." They added "...we've done "Stars on Ice." We had one show program that was fun and doing a short pretty much. We wanted to bring that aspect to the fans and for us, really just have a fun party. Adrian and Maddie really took a great wheel on this."

Audrey Shin and Spencer Howe started as new US couple in their first international competition. Audrey commented "It felt really good and I'm super comfortable with Spencer and skating with him. I just have a lot of fun."
Spencer said "We're just soaking up the experience. We're continuing to get to know each other and how to work together and to be a great team since we are so new. But I think we're doing a really great job, and it's just super exciting as we wrap up the short and we'll continue into the long."

Women Short Program
Mia Risa Gomez from Norway took the lead. She commented "I'm happy with the performance. I was a little bit stressed before. I think I haven't felt the nervous in a while. But I'm happy that I handled it well. … I have a new triple triple in the short program. I went with Toe Toe last year. Now I'm doing Flip Toe. I was a little nervous to try it for the first time, but I'm happy that I went for it." Regarding her program she said "the song is from "Grey’s Anatomy." It’s about the relationship between 2 characters that are very like in love and the girl loses the man, because he dies. It's been sad, but I try to show like the joy in it."

In her first season competing at the senior level, 18-year-old German skater Valentina Andrianova is in sixth place after the short program. “I’m training intensively right now and working every day to improve my technical elements and my entire programs,” said the high school senior. “The Nebelhorn Trophy is a great opportunity for me to kick off the new season and gain more experience.”

Men Free Skating - The favorite Aleksandr Selevko came out on top. 
Genrikh Gartung won silver, giving the German Skating Union its first medal in the men's event at the Nebelhorn Trophy in 16 years. France's Antoine Pitot took bronze. Nikita Starostin finished in eighth place. Luca Fünfer from Oberstdorf finished in 13th place.

Selevko is now training in the United States: "I like training in the US. I have good coaches. Good people around me and I think my inspiration is just coming from people around me. My girlfriend, my coaches, students they all giving me energy. I really like to work with different choreographers. That's why I am changing a lot. I'm trying to be different in every single program. And in every single-season I'm trying to make something new."

Genrikh Gartung, who finished second—the best German placement in a long time—was satisfied with his performance. However, he was frustrated with his stamina: “Breathing was harder today … but my concentration was better than yesterday. Yesterday I was mad at myself. Today I was more focused.”
The concept and idea for the free skate came from Joti Polizuakis, his choreographer: “Even though I didn’t like the music at first, I now like the free skate more than the short program. And working with Joti was really good.”
Nikita Starostin came in in eighth place. Luca Fuenfer was not satisfied with his 13th-place finish:: “Unfortunately, it didn’t go at all the way I had imagined. …The fall on the Lutz and toe loop—or rather, the fact that I didn’t take off—hasn’t happened to me even once in practice since I started working on this program.” Looking ahead, the top priority is therefore to “work on the areas where I’m still falling short.”

Ice Dance Rhythm Dance 
The ice dancing competition began with strong performances by the top pairs. Marie-Jade Lauriault and Romain le Gac performed an unusual rhythmic dance as 'Mr. Bean.' Lauriault: “I’m happy to see the audience having fun with this program. Because it's really what this program is about. It's a delicate work on the limit between the comedic and the too much. We try to work that fine line and I think it's still going to grow during the season, but it's really encouraging to see the audience reacting" Le Gac added: “It's really to bring the character of Mr. Bean in every little element. The goal it's really to make that it's everywhere.” Lauriault: “He is already pretty good. But it's kind of weird move. It's gonna grow during the year.” Le Gac: “We had this idea, when we did some comedy program to 'Big Panter' and 'Cobb's Bride' We like it. This way of working to really bring something lighter in the program, but really professional. There is the limit between it's either too much or we want it to keep like that. It's classy the class in the program”.

Charise Matthaei and Max Liebers were pleased with their season opener. Matthaei: “…skating today was fun from start to finish. The crowd was amazing! The program went just like it did in practice over the last few weeks. We skated through it perfectly.” Liebers added, “We’ll take a look at the judges’ scores to see what we can still improve.” Their preseason preparation went well: “We weren’t sick or anything, and we were able to work well the whole time. That’s why we’re very confident that we’ll be able to perform at our best here.” 

For Karla Maria Karl and Kai Hoferichter, the Nebelhorn Trophy marks their debut competition at the senior level. But their start didn’t get off to a good start. “I got sick right after the senior monitoring. And I’m still feeling it,” explained Karla-Maria Karl. “That’s why we weren’t able to build up our fitness the way we would have liked,” added Kai Hoferichter. Karl continued, “We’ve worked on a lot of details and fleshed out the narrative of our programs more. So we believe the programs are already coming together better than they did during the monitoring.”

Pairs Free Skating
Lia Pereira and Trennt Michaud of Canada, who placed third at the World Championships, secured first place for the first time, ahead of the new U.S pair skating team Audrey Shin and Spencer Akira Howe and the Chinese pair Jiaxuan Zhang and Yihang Huang.

Audrey Shin and Spencer Akira Howe won a medal in their first appearance at the Nebelhorn Trophy. Shin said “I felt pretty strong out there. And again, it's only our second competition together. It's really exciting that we got a medal”. Obviously, there's a lot more work that we can do like the throws for example. I can do them in practice, but it takes more time to get the timing and technique down together. But I mean, it's a work in progress”.
Speaking about the “Romeo and Juliet” program, Howe said, “I think it's a truly impressive program that tells a story all its own. Plus, many figure skaters have skated to it before and done a great job. Yes, I think the challenge is to develop our own style within this story and give it our very own touch”.

Women Free Sakting
Norway's Mia Risa Gomez celebrated her first victory in the Challenger Series, ahead of Marina Piredda (Italy) and Fee Ann Landry of Canada. Germany's Valentina Andrianova, who is now training in Oberstdorf again, finished sixth in her Seniors debut.

Gomez: "It feels really good. I didn't come with so much expectation. After the short, I realized that it was possible that I could make a medal or maybe even win. So I was mostly just focused on doing as good programs as possible."

Andirianova was really nervous before she started. “I felt like a tiger in a cage. My legs just wouldn't listen to me,” she said. Looking ahead to the further season, she said, “I’d like to compete in another Challenger, either the 'Denis Ten' or the one in Budapest.”

Ice Dance Free Dance
In their sixth Nebelhorn Trophy, Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko finally won the title. Behind them second were the Canadian pair Marie-Jade Lauriault and Romain Le Gac and third the Australian pair Holly Harris and Jason Chan. Co-favorites Katerina Mrazkova and Daniel Mrazek finished only in seventh place after Katerina fell during the rhythm dance and, despite scoring the highest points in the free dance, failed to make it onto the podium. In the end, they finished in 4th place. The German pairs Charise Matthaei and Max Liebers (8th) and Karla Maria Karl and Kai Hoferichter (11th) kept pace well in the rhythm dance but made a few minor mistakes and wobbles in the free dance, causing both to drop a few places.

Christina Careirra and Anthony Ponomarenko are confident in their programs for this season. Carreira said” We’re really excited when we heard that waltz was going to be the theme for the season (Rhythm Dance). When you give me a waltz, I want to feel like a princess. That's the vibe we chose for this year and I love her.” Ponomarenko added “I think even before the Worlds Christina suggested ‘My Fair Lady’. Overall, we really love the classic approach that we took. The music of our free dance is from the ballet 'Manon'. I fell in love with the music right away. Christina showed me a trailer from a small clip of the ballet and just so impactful, so we started listening to the entire score.”