Olympics-inspired Winnipeg pair looks to revisit past at world juniors

It’s been a long, yet exciting, season of new experiences for pair skaters Ava Kemp and Yohnatan Elizarov whose 2025-26 campaign has already seen them compete in Latvia, Turkey, Austria, Japan and China.

And, it’s not over yet.

Invigorated and informed by watching the Olympic competition in Milan, the Winnipeg athletes couldn’t wait to board the plane Saturday bound for Europe and the ISU World Junior Figure Skating Championships.

This week in the Baltic country of Estonia, Kemp, 17, and Elizarov, 22, will compete for the fourth time at the global meet.

Fresh in their minds is the inspired and inspiring Olympic gold-medal performance of Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara. The Japanese pair, who train in Canada, rebounded from a disappointing fifth place in the short program to win their country’s first Olympic pairs figure skating title.

“They showed determination and strong mindsets heading into the free program, and they skated beautifully,” Kemp shared via email ahead of their departure.

“Overall, we enjoyed watching the entire pairs event. There was a lot of great skating and we learned so much just by watching.”

Kemp and Elizarov first competed at the world juniors in 2023, finishing sixth. They repeated that result in 2024 and settled for 10th in 2025 after being sidelined for much of the season due to injury.

Asked how they have evolved since that first world meet, Kemp wrote, “We have changed a lot as a team — technically and artistically.

“Our first junior worlds was quite a surreal experience. It was in Canada, and it was our second year skating pairs. We had no pressure, and we were really just there for the experience.

“Over the years, pressure and expectations have risen (along with our goals), but one of our goals going into this junior worlds is to bring more of that 2023 junior worlds Ava and Yoni back in a way,” Kemp continued. “We want to enjoy the experience, skate freely, and the results will land where they land.”

Their coach Kevin Dawe said seeing how successful that mindset can be was the big takeaway from the Winter Games. The Olympians who skated well in Milan focused on performance and not outcome.

Women’s gold medallist Alysa Liu is the epitome of that approach.

“That’s something (Kemp and Elizarov) continue to work on and apply to their own competitions,” Dawe noted.

Kemp and Elizarov, who have trained in Toronto through three seasons now, launched this season in August with two wins on the Junior Grand Prix circuit. They next pocketed bronze medals in their debut in senior international competition and at the Junior Grand Prix Final in December.

A month later at the Canadian championships, the twice national junior champs finished fourth in their first go in the senior ranks. They followed that with an eighth place in their senior ISU championship debut at the Four Continents Championships in Beijing.

Eighteen pair teams from 12 countries will compete this week in Tallinn. Kemp and Elizarov are considered top contenders for the podium along with couples from China and the U.S.

The Winnipeggers lead the Canadian contingent of 12 athletes which includes two other pair teams as well as their training mates at the Granite Club in Toronto — singles competitors David Bondar and Megan Woodley.

The pairs will compete their short program on Wednesday and the free skate on Thursday.

“They’re very well trained. They’re ready,” Dawe said of the athletes he first coached as singles skaters in Winnipeg before suggesting they try pairs.

“They like competing. They’re excited to get out there and do it again, and show their continued improvement.”

Dawe emphasized his goal for his students is that they stay focused on the developmental process — on progress and performance — rather than medals as they complete the transition from junior- to senior-level competition.

“They have to learn to deal with pressure, to deal with expectations, to stay within their process and their performance and not get bogged down by results,” Dawe stated.

“Not always does the winner of junior worlds turn out to be a successful senior. The ones who stay on the process are the ones who are successful seniors.”

The 2026 championship in Estonia will mark the end of Kemp and Elizarov’s impressive junior careers, but whether it will also be a wrap on their season is not yet known.

Kemp and Elizarov are first alternates for the senior world championships in Prague the last week of March. They would be added to the Canadian team if either of the two pairs assigned to compete are unable to do so.

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