From Whistler, CAN
(November 21, 2025) – France’s Lucas Defayet was the first slider off in the season opening men’s skeleton race and set a time that would not be matched over the remainder of the race as he won gold in Whistler.
Defayet led Canadian Ryan Kuehn and South Korea’s Chanhyuk Yeo after one heat. In the second heat though it was Josip Brusic who stood out and took the lead after entering the heat in sixth.
Brusic’s second start was considerably better than his first, and he used that momentum to set the quick time of the heat to take the lead, a lead he would hold all the way until Defayet’s second effort.
The Frenchman’s second downtime was a half of a second slower than his first, but his first effort was good enough to retain the lead and gold by just .13 over Brusic.
Defayet’s gold was the first of his career and just second medal all time.
Brusic took silver, and Kuehn bronze. Yeo finished fourth, ahead of Taiwan’s Lin-Wei Peng and Israel’s Jared Firestone.
Canada had six sliders in the field and placed four of them in the top ten. Behind Brusic and Kuehn, Sebastien Regnier was seventh and Zander Greco tenth. Kyle Donsberger was 16th and Massimo Ardizzoni 23rd to round out the Canadian effort.
The United States struggled in the NAC opener. Noah Park led the way in 20th. Sam Allred, Tyler Madl, Lukas Kissell, Tony Furnells, and Tyler Lutz were 24th to 28th, respectively.
Results:
| Pos | Name | Nation | Bib | Start 1 | Start 2 | Run 1 | Run 2 | Finish |
| 1 | Lucas Defayet | FRA | 1 | 4.71 | 4.71 | 54.00 | 54.51 | 1:48.51 |
| 2 | Josip Brusic | CAN | 6 | 4.78 | 4.70 | 54.40 | 54.24 | 1:48.64 |
| 3 | Ryan Kuehn | CAN | 9 | 4.63 | 4.65 | 54.16 | 55.04 | 1:49.20 |
| 4 | Chanhyuk Yeo | KOR | 3 | 4.63 | 4.64 | 54.22 | 55.39 | 1:49.61 |
| 5 | Lin-Wei Peng | TPE | 2 | 4.71 | 4.79 | 54.74 | 54.88 | 1:49.62 |
| 6 | Jared Firestone | ISR | 4 | 4.74 | 4.78 | 54.24 | 55.73 | 1:49.97 |
| 7 | Sébastien Ragnier | CAN | 14 | 4.76 | 4.76 | 54.68 | 55.38 | 1:50.06 |
| 8 | Jonathan Yaw | MAS | 5 | 4.77 | 4.83 | 54.90 | 55.18 | 1:50.08 |
| 9 | Hiroatsu Takahashi | JPN | 30 | 4.69 | 4.75 | 54.79 | 55.41 | 1:50.20 |
| 10 | Zander Greco | CAN | 27 | 4.74 | 4.78 | 54.39 | 55.83 | 1:50.22 |
| 11 | Eduardo Strapasson | BRA | 18 | 4.89 | 4.92 | 55.05 | 55.77 | 1:50.82 |
| 12 | Yeonsu Shin | KOR | 7 | 4.78 | 4.81 | 55.14 | 56.13 | 1:51.27 |
| 13 | Hayato Kawano | JPN | 13 | 4.69 | 4.72 | 55.60 | 55.75 | 1:51.35 |
| 14 | Taido Nagao | JPN | 23 | 4.72 | 4.74 | 55.25 | 56.16 | 1:51.41 |
| 15 | Kevin Heng Lee | TPE | 10 | 4.79 | 4.79 | 55.68 | 55.80 | 1:51.48 |
| 16 | Kyle Donsberger | CAN | 17 | 4.79 | 4.83 | 55.25 | 56.30 | 1:51.55 |
| 17 | Adrian Rodriguez | ESP | 11 | 5.43 | 4.79 | 56.88 | 54.93 | 1:51.81 |
| 18 | Peter Makrides | AUS | 21 | 4.79 | 4.93 | 55.98 | 55.89 | 1:51.87 |
| 19 | Oren Milstein | ISR | 12 | 4.92 | 4.98 | 55.66 | 56.59 | 1:52.25 |
| 20 | Noah Park | USA | 19 | 4.98 | 5.03 | 55.93 | 56.44 | 1:52.37 |
| 21 | Akwasi Frimpong | GHA | 15 | 4.84 | 4.92 | 56.39 | 56.24 | 1:52.63 |
| 22 | Jeff Bauer | LUX | 8 | 5.02 | 5.06 | 56.14 | 56.54 | 1:52.68 |
| 23 | Massimo Ardizzoni | CAN | 20 | 4.67 | 4.68 | 56.14 | 56.72 | 1:52.86 |
| 24 | Sam Allred | USA | 24 | 4.82 | 4.82 | 56.99 | 57.11 | 1:54.10 |
| 25 | Tyler Madl | USA | 25 | 4.82 | 4.88 | 56.68 | 57.72 | 1:54.40 |
| 26 | Lukas Kissell | USA | 22 | 4.83 | 57.09 | 0:57.09 | ||
| 27 | Tony Furnells | USA | 26 | 4.84 | 57.91 | 0:57.91 | ||
| 28 | Tyler Lutz | USA | 16 | 4.66 | 57.98 | 0:57.98 | ||
| 29 | Youngmin Song | KOR | 28 | 5.22 | 59.48 | 0:59.48 | ||
| 30 | Yinka Oyebanjo-Odofin | NGR | 29 | 5.09 | 59.75 | 0:59.75 |