What to watch this weekend in Olympic sports

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The calendar says winter is still a couple weeks away, but we're already in the thick of the winter Olympic sports season. Here are the top things for Canadian fans to keep an eye on in skating, skiing and sliding:

Figure skating: Big titles up for grabs

The exclusive Grand Prix Final is happening in France, where the top six in each discipline compete for one of the most prestigious titles in the sport.

For the fifth straight time, no Canadian singles skaters qualified for the Final. No Canadians are involved in the pairs competition either after reigning world champions Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps withdrew due to an illness.

Canada's two remaining entries are in the ice dance, and both teams are outside a podium spot after today's opening round. Marjorie Lajoie and Zachary Lagha sit in fourth place, which isn't bad considering they ranked sixth in the season-long standings. But third-ranked Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier are dead last after Poirier fell during today's skate. Everyone is chasing back-to-back world champs Madison Chock and Evan Bates of the United States, who will try to wrap up their second straight Grand Prix Final gold in the free skate on Saturday at 1:40 p.m. ET.

WATCH | CBC Sports tells you what sports to watch this weekend:

The women's free skate is on Saturday at 7:30 a.m. ET. Three-peat world champion Kaori Sakamoto of Japan is a surprising fourth after a disappointing short program. The men's free goes Saturday at 3 p.m. ET. World and Grand Prix Final champion Ilia Malinin of the U.S. built a huge lead in today's short skate.

The pairs event wrapped up today with Germany's Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin winning for the second straight year. Here are the latest results.

Alpine skiing: Speed events launch and Vonn's comeback begins

The first World Cup downhill of the season took place today at Colorado's Beaver Creek resort. Swiss journeyman Justin Murisier was the surprise winner, upsetting runner-up Marco Odermatt for his first World Cup victory and just the second medal of his career. Odermatt, also from Switzerland, is the defending World Cup men's downhill, super-G and giant slalom champion and is trying for his fourth consecutive overall title.

Canada's Jack Crawford, the reigning super-G world champion, placed fourth — 0.16 of a second off the bronze medal. Brodie Seger was 10th while Cameron Alexander, the downhill bronze medallist at the 2023 worlds, failed to complete the course.

Beaver Creek will host the season's first super-G on Saturday at 12:30 p.m. ET, followed by a giant slalom on Sunday at noon ET.

The women's World Cup stop scheduled for Quebec's Mont-Tremblant this week was cancelled due to a lack of snow. But American great Lindsey Vonn is beginning her comeback at age 40 with some lower-level downhill and super-G races this weekend at Colorado's Copper Mountain.