After a major upset in the rhythm dance, its time for the free dance -- the second component of the Olympics ice dance event that decides who goes home with medals around their necks.
Gold medal favorites Madison Chock and Evan Bates from Team USA currently sit in second, just four-tenths of a point behind the French team of Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron.
Chock and Bates entered the individual competition as the three-time defending world champions with two Olympics team event gold medals to their names. They will skate in the penultimate slot today in hopes that their free dance pulls them ahead of the French team.
Though Fournier Beaudry and Cizeron are a new pair with less than one year of skating together, the pair with "sinister energy," according to retired figure skater Adam Rippon, are no stranger to the Olympics.
Cizeron is the reigning gold medalist with his former partner, Gabriella Papadakis, while Fournier Beaudry split with her former skating partner (and current boyfriend) after he was banned from the sport following a sexual assault accusation.
Two more of Team USA's ice dance pairs also qualified for the individual event and finished within the top 20 to continue onto today's free dance. Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko will go 10th after finishing 11th and Emilea Zingas and Vadym Kolesnik will start 15th after finishing sixth.
Today, Feb. 11, is the final day of the Olympics 2026 ice dance competition. The free dance is scheduled to begin at 1:15 p.m. ET on USA before moving over to NBC at 2:15 p.m..
If you don't have cable, you'll need a live TV streaming service to stream the Olympics for free.
DIRECTV is our favorite service for watching TV live for free -- it has a five-day free trial and there are a ton of options for plans that include USA Network and NBC (and every other channel you'll need for the Olympics), starting at $49.99/month.
You can also catch every minute of the Olympics with a subscription to Peacock, which starts at $10.99/month.
The start order for the free dance is determined by placements following the rhythm dance, with the team atop the leaderboard starting last. Below, find the start list alongside each pair's rhythm dance (RD) score.
Per the International Skating Union's handbook, the free dance is "a creative dance program blending dance steps and movements expressing the character/rhythm(s) of the dance music chosen by the couple."
While the rhythm dance follows a theme, skaters are free to choice any music of their liking for the free dance as long as the performance is four minutes long and features a balance of character expression and required elements.
There is a required set of elements that every free dance must include: the Dance Lift (2-3), the Dance Spin (1), the Step Sequence (1 in hold, 1 out), Synchronized Twizzles (2), and Choreographic Elements (3).
The highest recorded free dance score in competition is 138.41, achieved in 2023 by Chock and Bates.
The 2026 Winter Olympics end with the closing ceremony on Feb. 22 at 2:30 p.m. ET.
This article was written by Angela Tricarico, Commerce Streaming Reporter for Post Wanted Shopping, Page Six, and Decider.com. Angela keeps readers up to date with cord-cutter-friendly deals and information on how to watch your favorite sports teams, TV shows, and movies on every streaming service. Not only does Angela test and compare the streaming services she writes about to ensure readers are getting the best prices, but she's also a superfan specializing in the intersection of shopping, tech, sports, and pop culture. When she's not writing about (or watching) TV, movies, and sports, she's also keeping up on the underrated perfume dupes at Bath & Body Works and testing headphones. Prior to joining Decider and The New York Post in 2023, she wrote about streaming and consumer tech at Insider Reviews.