(26 September 2021)  Sixteen Olympic spots for the Olympic pair competition were won at the World Championships, the remaining three at the Nebelhorn Trophy 2021 in Oberstdorf, Germany. There is one Olympic spot for pairs less than at the preceding Olympic Games because the IOC had asked the ISU to reduce the number of figure skaters by at least four athletes. Therefore there will be one pair (and one ice dance couple) less in Beijing than in 2018, 2014, 2010 and before. There was no U.S. pair at the Nebelhorn Trophy because the USA had won two spots at Worlds, but have no chance to get a third one.

Minerva Hase & Nolan Seegert from Germany won the Nebelhorn Trophy 2021 with 185.25 points. Germany has won one spot in pair skating at Worlds without any chance to get a second one. For them it was only a season‘s opening and an internal competition with the second German pair because the points of several competitions will be added and the pair with more points will compete at the Olympic Games. Hase & Seegert had several injury problems and therefore could not compete at the World Championships. But in Oberstdorf, they were in good shape again and had an elegant short program with six good or very good elements and only a small slip in the spin. In their free program to the music “People Help the People“ by Birdy, nine of the eleven elements were at least good, Seegert only fell on the triple Salchow and Hase did not land the throw triple loop completely clean. Their components were around 7.6 in both programs. They left their hometown of Berlin and work mainly in Sochi, Russia until the Olympic Games with coach Dmitri Savin, who they have liked as a second coach for already two years.

Laura Barquero & Marco Zandron, who compete for Spain, won the silver medal with 181.25 points and the first Olympic spot. Barquero has competed with other Spanish partners for many years. Zandron is Italian and the younger brother of single skater Maurizio Zandron who competes for Austria now. But Berquero & Zandron having qualified for the Olympic Games, Spain will give him Spanish citizenship within a few weeks. The same happened four years ago when two Spanish ice dancers with a partner from another country qualified for the Games and the partner received citizenship. Their triple twist was excellent in both programs, most other elements at least good and they skated in high speed. Only their side by side jumps in the free program were not clean.

Karina Safina & Luka Berulava from Georgia took the bronze medal with 178.16 points and an Olympic spot for their country. They won the short program in spite of a step-out of Safina on the triple Salchow. In their free, Berulava aborted a lift, the death spiral was not correctly executed and her jump combination was not complete. The other elements were very good.

For the second German pair of Annika Hocke & Robert Kunkel on fourth position with 168.21 points, the Nebelhorn Trophy was only the first part of an internal German qualification.They did not make a big mistake in the short program and only one in the free Program (Hocke fell on the throw triple loop), but their style is not as elegant as the style oft he other German pair.

Hailey Kops & Evgeni Krasnopolski from Israel finished on fifth position with 167.08 points and won the third and last spot for the Games. This was quite surprising because they have competed together only for some months. But Krasnopolski is a very experienced partner who had had many partners before and was at two Olympic Games with them. Kops also has several years of pair skating experience as a junior. Their main coach is Galit Chait, but for the elements they also worked a lot in the last two months with five time world pairs champion Robin Szolkowy from Germany who has a Green Card for the USA and traveled to New Jersey in the late summer and early fall. They skated much better than at the John Nicks competition two weeks before. In the short program they made two mistakes, but in the free, Kops only fell on a linking step and he touched down on the triple toe loop. The other elements were good.

First alternate for the Games is China after Yuchen Wang & Yihang Huang finished on sixth place with 162.69 points. If another country gives back its spot, China can send a third pair to the Games in their home country instead of only two. Belarus is second alternate, Australia the third one.