Summer success sends Brezden to the Black Sea

Breken Brezden got off to a flying start as a new figure skating season dawned in August making the Manitoban one to watch, once again, among the sport’s elite in Canada.

The Dauphin athlete pocketed a silver medal in Montreal, then notched a win in Waterloo, outscoring a handful of Canada’s higher ranked women along the way.

In Montreal, Brezden, 20, topped the standings in the free skate portion of the competition and, with a total score of 171.03, exceeded the 166 benchmark Skate Canada set for international assignments.

“I’m quite happy with how my summer competitions went,” said Brezden, who trains in Hamilton, Ont.

“My goal was to show off how I’ve been training and demonstrate that consistently in competition. Of course, I’m always looking to improve the quality of my skating and there were still some elements here and there where there’s still room to improve.”

Her summer performances clearly impressed Skate Canada’s high-performance directors. Last week, the federation’s decision-makers tapped Brezden to compete in Batumi, Georgia, at the Trialeti Trophy — one of 10 international events in the ISU’s Challenger Series.

But before she heads to the Black Sea city at the end of September, this weekend Brezden will compete in a third domestic event in Quebec City.

“I’m definitely looking forward to getting out there again,” said Brezden, who spent her formative figure skating years training in Virden with coach Patty Hole.

She chose to reprise her We’ve Only Just Begun short program from last season and intends to make it “bullet-proof” for upcoming competitions. She’d like to “break 60” points with her score for that program.

Her free skate program, set to selections from The Phantom of the Opera, is new.

“In recent times, it seems my free program has been the stronger of the two even though, in theory, it should be the more difficult one. But I guess the pressure and nerves that come with having only three jumping passes (in the short) kind of gets to you sometimes,” she said.

Brezden’s ultimate goal this season is to land on the podium at the 2027 Canadians in Mississauga. She’ll first have to qualify for the championships at the Challenge event in Winnipeg in late November.

With the travel and competitions on top of the 20-plus hours she puts into on- and off-ice training each week (and even more in summer), Brezden has to be mindful not to overtax her body. Her knees, in particular, gave her grief last season.

After turning heads with her fifth-place finish at the Canadian championships in 2025, she settled for 12th last January when training interruptions spoiled her preparation.

“(The injury) tends to flare up at the worst times. Right before Montreal, it wasn’t feeling too great,” she admitted.

“This summer, I’ve really focused on doing my physio exercises and my different recovery methods, so I’ve been doing a better job of managing (the pain) for sure. I’ve been able to continue training whereas there were points before when we had to come to a full stop.

“I don’t think it’ll be perfect as long as I skate because there’s so much that we do in a day. There’s a lot of impact and a big toll on the body to be a figure skater. It’s just something I’m learning to deal with,” added Brezden, a third-year health sciences student at McMaster University.

Brezden’s love of figure skating keeps her in the game despite the challenges.

“I think it’s an amazing sport. I love the competing aspect where you’re performing and showing off your technical and presentation. Even though it’s very intense and very difficult at times, I love the day in and day out of training and making those improvements — the step-by-step, inch-by-inch grind.”

While Brezden is packing her suitcase for Georgia, Winnipeg’s reigning world junior pair champions Ava Kemp and Yohnatan Elizarov will already be across the Atlantic in Germany where they’ll begin their first full season in senior international competition.

The duo is slated to compete at Nebelhorn Trophy in Oberstdorf alongside teammates Lia Pereira and Trennt Michaud, the 2026 senior world bronze medallists.

Their Challenger Series event, beginning September 24, will serve as a warm-up for both pairs ahead of Skate Canada International, the ISU Grand Prix event being held a month later in Kelowna.

Meanwhile, Davey Howes, the fourth member of the Manitoba quartet to have excelled on the frozen stage in recent years, has decided to pause his competitive career. The 19-year-old plans to do some coaching and choreography in B.C. where he attends university and trained the last two years.

The Winnipegger won the Canadian novice men’s title in 2023, a bronze medal in national junior competition in 2025, and finished 17th in his senior championship debut last season.

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