MILAN, Feb 10 (Reuters) - On most mornings this season at the Ice Academy of Montreal, triple world champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates were carving patterns into the ice just metres away from their French rivals, Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron.
Thirteen of the 23 ice dance teams competing at the Milano Cortina Olympics come from the same unlikely place: a rink in Montreal where the best in the world share the same coaches and - in some cases - will try to beat each other for Olympic gold.
Fournier Beaudry and Cizeron edged Chock and Bates by less than a point - 90.18 to 89.72 - in Monday's rhythm dance, making for a thrilling showdown in Wednesday's free programme.
The academy known as I.AM, and founded in 2014 by former Canadian double world silver medallists Marie-France Dubreuil and Patrice Lauzon, alongside French coach Romain Haguenauer, has become the gravitational centre of modern ice dance.
They had one team at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, but boasted seven of the top 10 at last year's world championships in Boston.
It is an odd ecosystem, where rivals know every rise and fall in each others choreography, and can hear hesitation in a lift or the slightest twizzles misstep.
But it is a place where the best in the world gather not despite their rivalry, but because of it, with a philosophy built on openness rather than secrecy.
"I think we get a lot of energy from training all together, and we have a really common love for the sport and a deep respect for each other's work," said Cizeron, the reigning Olympic gold medallist and five-times world champion with previous partner Gabriella Papadakis.
"As much as we're in our bubble, and we're all very competitive, we also try to appreciate each other's work and each other's qualities," he said after Monday's rhythm dance.
"I think we all have different styles, and we bring different emotions and different stories on the ice. And I think it gives, hopefully, a nice show and makes (young) skaters want to skate."
THIRD CONSECUTIVE ICE DANCE GOLD?
I.AM are all but guaranteed the school's third consecutive ice dance gold medal after Canadians Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir -- who now oversees the school's satellite Ice Academy in London, Ontario -- danced to victory in 2018 in Pyeongchang and Cizeron and Papadakis won four years ago in Beijing.
The academy could even sweep the podium, with Britain's Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson sitting fourth and less than a point behind Canadians Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier, one of the few top teams not based in Montreal.
Despite the rivalry, relationships at the academy run deep, a key reason the dance partnership between Fournier Beaudry and Cizeron, who teamed up in March, has been so seamless.
They had been close friends for the better part of a decade through training at the centre.
Although the Montreal centre dominates the dance landscape, the idea of skaters from different nations training under the same roof is hardly new in figure skating.
Canada's two-times Olympic silver medallist Brian Orser has coached some of the world's top singles skaters out of the Toronto Cricket Club.
At the 2018 Pyeongchang Games, Orser wore the red and yellow coat of Spain while coaching Javier Fernandez to bronze, then quickly tugged on the white and red of Japan for Yuzuru Hanyu, who skated to his second consecutive Olympic gold.
From centres in Colorado Springs, Detroit, Toronto and Lyon, top athletes have gravitated to coaching hubs that promised better ice time, stronger technical guidance or richer creative environments, often forming cosmopolitan training groups where teammates one day become opponents the next.
Lauzon said the Montreal centre works because, "We take care of the human being more than anything else."
When the medals are decided on Wednesday night in Milan, I.AM will almost certainly be celebrating gold — no matter which of its teams emerges on top.
Another Olympic title would be more than a victory lap; it would be an affirmation of a philosophy that has turned a single Montreal rink into the sport's most powerful incubator.
(Reporting by Lori Ewing; Editing by Ken Ferris)
