ISU World Champions Riku Miura & Ryuichi Kihara did it again - they soared to gold, claiming a historic first Olympic Pair Skating medal in a Free Skating nail-biter at the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026.

The capacity crowd at the Milan Ice Skating Arena witnessed memorable and historic performances.

Unbeatable Miura & Kihara make history again

Reigning ISU World Champions Riku Miura & Ryuichi Kihara of Japan were spectacular, soaring to gold from fifth place. The 2026 ISU European Champions Anastasiia Metelkina & Luka Berulava pulled up one spot to claim the silver, Georgia’s first ever medal at the Olympic Winter Games. Overnight leaders Minerva Hase & Nikita Volodin of Germany earned the bronze. 

Standing in fifth place following an error in the Short Program, Miura & Kihara came out and gave it all they had. Their powerful performance to “Gladiator” was highlighted by big triple jumps and throws, impressive lifts and spins. The crowd got louder and louder as the program went on, as they realized they were watching history in the making. The Japanese champions set a new record score in the Free Skating with 158.13 points and totalled 231.24 points to jump onto the top of the podium.

Riku Miura & Ryuichi Kihara (JPN) react after their performance in Milan on Monday © Getty Images

“Yesterday [after the mistake on the lift in the Short Program] I was in despair,” Kihara admitted. “I didn’t know how to get up again. Even in practice today I couldn’t stop crying but our coaches, team members, my friends in Japan, our supporters in Canada, everybody around me was sending messages of support. Riku said it’s not over yet, that’s why I bounced back,” he continued.

“Ryuichi didn’t stop crying since the morning and I told him ‘I’m going to skate for you today’ and he said ‘we’re going to skate for each other’,” Miura said. “We made a huge mistake yesterday but in the past seven years, we worked so hard. We both said we’re going to forget what happened and we were determined to start from scratch. We have so many experiences over the past seven years and we’ve grown a lot. That is the reason why we managed to win today.”

Skating to “Keeping Me Alive”, Metelkina & Berulava turned in another excellent performance, completing a side-by-side triple Salchow-double Axel-double Axel combination, triple toe and difficult lifts. The two-time ISU World Junior Champions picked up 146.29 points for the Free Skating and moved up to second place at 221.75 points. 

“It is a huge honor for us and I am incredibly happy that our names are the first written as the ones that won the first medal for Georgia at the Winter Olympic Games,” Berulava said. “It was a long path towards this.”

Anastasiia Metelkina & Luka Berulava secured Georgia's first ever medal at the Olympic Winter Games © Getty Images

At the end of their performance, the couple felt huge relief. 

“We had fulfilled our mission,” Berulava noted. “We did everything, we skated four programs [including the Team Event] and now we finally can relax a little bit.”

Overnight leaders Hase & Volodin had to skate last. They opened their program to “Memory House” with a beautiful triple twist, but then Hase singled the side-by-side Salchow. Although the 2025 ISU European Champions went on to complete excellent throws and lifts, they were ranked fourth in the Free Skating with 139.08 points and slipped to third at 219.09 points. 

“We are just relieved that it was enough for the bronze medal,” Hase commented. “It does not matter which color the medal has, we are just proud to take home a medal at our first Olympic Games after skating together for three years.

“Obviously, we are not 100 per cent satisfied with our performance but I am proud that we were able to get back into the program after the mistake on the Salchow and that we did not lose the program but fought until the end for each single point. And this helped us to get on to the podium,” she added.

Gold medalists Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara, silver medalists Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava, and bronze medalists Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin © Getty Images

Reigning ISU European bronze medalists Maria Pavlova & Alexei Sviatchenko, the first Hungarian Pair Skaters to compete at the Olympic Winter Games in 70 years, were third in the Free Skating and remained in fourth with a personal best of 215.26 points.

“It was our best performance so far this season, it was perfect, we couldn't have done anything better today and yesterday,” Pavlova shared. “We're very proud of what we did because we were nervous of course. It's the Olympics but we worked so hard this season and we knew we can go out there and we can do the best we can, we can show the perfect programs and I think we did it.”

The 2022 Olympic Champions Wenjing Sui & Cong Han (CHN) turned in a beautiful performance to “A Tapestry of a Legendary Land” to come fifth on 208.64 points.

They confirmed that this was their final performance and they are not continuing to perform on the ice.

“It’s a very memorable experience to stand on the Olympic ice in Milano,” Han said. “We are satisfied because we have already been Olympic Champions before, and this time we only had a very short period to prepare. I think just being able to stand here and be satisfied with our performance is already a win.”

Two-time ISU World bronze medalists Sara Conti & Niccolo Macii (ITA) moved up from eighth to sixth (203.19 points) while Lia Pereira & Trennt Michaud (CAN) dropped from third to eighth after some errors (199.66 points).

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