LETHBRIDGE, Alta. - Canada's Kaitlyn Weaver and Andrew Poje were within one event of a perfect season.

But a bronze medal at the world championships last March sent the ice dancers into the off-season unsatisfied, and vowing to do better.

The skaters from Waterloo, Ont., were back on top of the podium Saturday, winning gold at Skate Canada International.

"We feel like we still have an ax to grind," Weaver said. "We still want to come home with a gold medal from worlds. Period. And so that's a huge motivating factor going into this year."

Weaver and Poje dazzled the Enmax Centre audience with their free dance to Max Richter's haunting "On the Nature of Daylight," and scored 173.79 points for the victory.

American siblings Maia and Alex Shibutani were second with 168.36, while Ekaterina Bobrova and Dmitri Soloviev of Russia claimed the bronze with 161.11.

Weaver, 26, and the 28-year-old Poje won Skate Canada last season in Kelowna, B.C., to spark a spectacular season of victory upon victory that firmly affixed them as the favourites going into the world championships in Shanghai.

But it wasn't to be, and the Canadians came home with bronze.

"We still haven't achieved all our goals that we want to," Poje said. "We know that we deserve to be at the top so we wanted to push ourselves to prove to everyone, but mostly to ourselves, that we can be better than everyone else, better versions than what we think we can be."

Weaver said the two sat down and watched their performances on video after the world championships. They needed to know where it went wrong.

"It was a hard pill to swallow, to be honest, to be winning everything, and then not all of a sudden," Weaver said. "And we watched our videos and we thought 'We can do better than this.'

"Just because we came home with a gold medal from almost every event, doesn't mean that we've reached the top of our potential. And so that was a huge motivating factor."

The victory in Lethbridge was notable because they debuted a short program — to music by Strauss — that they'd only choreographed two weeks earlier. It was a marked departure from their original short dance to music by Elvis Presley.

After winning the Finlandia Trophy earlier this month, they sought feedback on their programs, and opted to change up the Elvis program for a more classical piece.

"This competition is proof that in our 10th season sometimes that longevity really helps," Weaver said. "And we have so much trust in each other, and in our coaches and in our team that we can make the right decisions, and bring it when we need to and that's a great feeling."