Hubbell and Donohue Cap Poignant Season with World Silver, Turn Attention to Olympic Year

Before they took the ice for their free dance at the ISU World Figure Skating Championships 2021 in Stockholm, Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue had a private moment.
 
"Backstage before we went out, the last thing I said to Zach was just that I was thankful for the year we've had, and that we really enjoyed every moment in practicing together," Hubbell said. "It just felt different this year, and part of that was the healing process that this program provided. Just enjoying the things we're good at and leaving all the stuff we've been through in the past."
 
That program, of course, was their free dance to "Hallelujah" by Jeff Buckley and k.d lang. It's been the story of their season, the talking point as they won 2020 Guaranteed Rate Skate America and the 2021 Toyota U.S. Figure Skating Championships en route to Stockholm. Even as they competed for a World title, "Hallelujah" was on everyone's mind.
 
It was a song that Hubbell and Donohue had skated to in 2015-16, and five years later, they brought it back for very personal reasons.
 
"Anyone that's really close to us and trains with us knows the intense journey Zach and I have been on together for the last 10 years," Hubbell said. "'Hallelujah' the first time came at a moment when we found our new team in Montreal, and at that moment it felt like hope. And the choice to revisit it in our hopes of what the program would mean was, I think, less about what we would accomplish competitively, but just experiencing, in that program, the last 10 years together, and our doubts and our fights."
 
As Hubbell spoke in the mixed zone following the free dance, she began to get emotional, the poignancy of the moment not lost on anyone.
 
But while the program was a vehicle of personal expression for the pair, it was also a vehicle that earned them some hardware.
 
It may not have been the gold medal they had been hoping for, but a second world silver medal is an accomplishment they say is dear to them all the same. They previously won silver in 2018, and also took bronze in 2019. (The 2020 World Championships were canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.)
 
"This is another World silver medal for us, and for the last three World Championships, we've been on the podium," Hubbell said. "We know that that takes a lot of work, and so we're proud of ourselves for being able to be consistently at the peak of our performance.
 
"Our performance felt very present and intentional, and it's really a joy to skate together when it's like that. So we're happy with that. But there's also that little dissatisfaction of not reaching our goal of bringing home the gold medal."
 
Hubbell and Donohue have been very frank about their desire to win a World title and, ultimately, an Olympic title. But even in falling just short of that goal, Donohue says, will benefit them.
 
"The last Worlds that was hosted was a drop for us. We went from our first second down to third, and that was a bit of a disappointment for us," Donohue said. 'It never feels good to feel like you're backsliding. So while, yes, we came here for a gold medal and there's definitely a sense of disappointment around that, that is only going to drive us in the future.
 
"We also know that we're progressing, that we're building, that we're getting the skills and the qualities that we want to be as a team, and we look at this as momentum. It's creating a hunger. I think we know what we're capable of. It's just another realization of that."
 
And while it's hard to look at a World silver medal as a failure, Donohue points out that it's often the struggle that's the most rewarding.
 
"We learn a lot more from failures," Donohue said. "We've had a lot of interesting ones over the years. If you can even call them that, right? It's a matter of perspective. But I think that you learn how to be a champion by struggling to become a champion. So for us, we take really the lessons we learn, especially as we look to the future and who we want to be as individuals, we take those lessons and we apply them to what we have on the ice, and they help us grow off the ice."
 
Hubbell and Donohue worked with two-time Olympic champion Scott Moir this season to choreograph their "Hallelujah" free dance. Hubbell has used Moir and partner Tessa Virtue's legendary battles with Meryl Davis and Charlie White for perspective on not just finishing in second place, but on success as a whole.
 
When so many incredible teams are in a competition, Hubbell's favorite performances were not necessarily the ones that won.
 
"I think working with someone as decorated as Scott, and having his advice and his perspective of what it felt like to be on the top, has kind of opened up our idea of what success means and what it's going to take to feel complete with our career," Hubbell said. "We're hungry for gold. We want to win the Olympics. But I know that, if we never win World Championships and we never win Olympics, we've had an amazing 10 years together, and next year 11, and we're going to enjoy that."
 
And you can be sure that they're heading into this Olympic season as motivated as they've ever been.
 
"While one team gets a medal, everyone else gets another dose of hunger," Donohue said of the World Championships. "When you get so close, when you feel that you're reaching the top and you're really trying to push your potential, you want it that much more when someone has it. To count out a team that doesn't win the World Championship going into the Olympics would be a mistake, because they're going to show up twice as hungry."