TEAM HELSINKI ROCKETTES RECLAIM THE WORLD TITLE AFTER 14 YEARS
It’s been a long 14 year wait, but Finland’s Helsinki Rockettes captured their 4th World title at the ISU World Synchronized Skating Championships 2025 in Helsinki on Saturday night.
As leaders after the short program, they were last to skate and their “Criminal” free skate program stole the hearts of the capacity audience in the Helsingin Jäähalli to bring the title home to Finland for the first time since 2018. Skating with great speed, precision and confidence, they gave a flawless performance to amass 155.88 for a total of 235.78. They clearly peaked at just the right time as they set season’s best scores in both short and free programs. It was a perfect way to celebrate 40 years of synchronized skating in Finland.
Speaking immediately after the event team captain Eveliina Tikkinen commented:
“We couldn’t have done any better in this situation. It was the best possible performance.”
Asked if they could hear their music over the noise of the cheering capacity crowd she remarked:
“Yes we could, but we are used to practicing the program without the music anyway so it was not a problem and the support from the crowd was absolutely amazing.
Team Unique (FIN) took the silver medal, but won the free skate with 156.98 points for an overall score of 234.29 points to narrow the gap to only 1.02 points. Their spectacular Chicago program was flawless and skated with great assurance and superb musicality with every element perfectly hitting the highlights in the music. brought the crowd to its feet.
Speaking for the team after their skate Mea Penttinen said:
“It felt really good. Somehow we could really enjoy the performance. It was so wonderful.”
Peppiina Snygg added:
“We only expected to perform as well as we could and that is what we did.”
On whether the silver medal was a disappointment, Mea Penttinen commented:
“Not at all. We got an even shinier medal, the little gold, for winning the free skate and we are really happy that we could end the season with such a performance.”
These results further strengthen Finland’s position as the most successful nation in the history of synchronized skating with a total of 10 World titles (out of 23) since the inception of the Championships in 2000 and 31 World Championship medals in total.
The bronze medal went to Haydenettes (USA) with a season’s best score of 148.24 to have an overall total of 224.77 as they skated to Caves and Eleanor Rigby. They were pleased with their performance, particularly as they had made some recent changes to the program and were very happy to have shown two such good clean skates. During the press conference they also commented on the amazing support of the capacity crowd.
Les Suprêmes (CAN) put everything into their free program and actually placed 3rd in the free skate with a season’s best score of 150.91 and this did allow them to overtake their compatriots, Nova Senior (which scored 139.80), but it was not enough to overcome the deficit they had after the short, and they finished in 4th place.
Overall the championships marked the high point for 13 of the 20 competing teams which achieved season’s best scores including 3 teams setting new personal best scores.