Ontario’s Budweiser Gardens will be the centre of attention for the figure skating world as the 2013 ISU World Championships take place from March 11-17.
With just a year to go before the Winter Olympics in Sochi the competition will be fiercer than ever between the world’s elite, and both the BBC and British Eurosport will be covering all the key action from Canada.
At last year’s championships in Nice, Italy’s Carolina Kostner was the star, winning gold in the women’s free, while Canadian sensation Patrick Chan won his second successive world title in the men’s event.
It is the first time the event has been hosted in Canada since 2006 in Calgary.
As an annual event that moves around the globe, it showcases the 200 best athletes from 50 countries in four disciplines – men’s, women’s, pair and ice dance.
Canada’s Patrick Chan is the defending men’s champion and the hopes of the home crowd will rest heavy on his shoulders.
After winning at the Cup of Russia in the Grand Prix series this season, he followed it up with a gold medal in the Canadian Figure Skating Championships in January.
Italy’s reigning women’s world champion Carolina Kostner recently defended her European title, edging Russian 16-year-old Adelina Sotnikova by less than a point to claim her fifth European crown.
The German duo of Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy are the defending pairs champions and chasing a fifth world crown.
Canadians Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir were the dance winners at the World Championships last time in France.
Great Britain will be represented in Ontario by Jenna McCorkell, Stacey Kemp and David King in the Pairs competition, and Penny Coomes and Nicholas Buckland in the Ice Dance competition.
The championships will serve as not only to name the current world champions in all four disciplines.
It will also identify the numbers of entries qualifying countries may send to the Sochi Winter Olympic Games in Russia less than a year away.
BBC Sport will have live coverage and extended highlights of the key action from the 2013 World Figure Skating Championships in Ontario, Canada.
Sue Barker presents a two-hour highlights programme on Sunday, March 17, on BBC Two and BBC HD at 4pm, which will include action from all free programmes – the pairs, men’s, women’s and the ice dance.
Joining Sue for commentary on proceedings will be 1980 Olympic champion Robin Cousins.
British Eurosport will screen a mixture of live and delayed coverage of the event.
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It would be good IF British Eurosport had Ice Skating on 11pm – 3am Sat – World Champs from Canada as advertised instead we have rubbish!!!!!!!