Bronze yesterday's juniors
This year, Evgeny Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov, whom this tournament obeyed three years ago, could not compete for the medals of the Grand Prix finals. During the selection, the Russian duo lost to the Canadians Kirsten Moore Towers and Michael Marinaro, although it is unlikely that many expected them to be in the top six of the best couples in the first half of the season. With a Russian couple, the finale would definitely be more interesting, and the North Americans themselves confirmed this with their rentals.
The free program of the Canadian couple turned out to be as unsuccessful as the short one. A drop occurred on the outlier, but not with the partner, but with the partner - for pair skating this is a real rarity. There were many other minor errors and shortcomings, and this was immediately reflected in the estimates. Moor Towers and Marinaro did not score 200 points in two days, which is considered unacceptable for high-level couples.
Anastasia Mishina and Alexander Gallyamov, on whose conscience also lies the absence of Tarasova and Morozov in Turin, performed much cleaner and can be satisfied with their first adult Grand Prix finals. For a free program, they prepared a complex cascade of two triple salchows through an oiler, in which the judges saw a shortage. Because of this, it was not possible to break a personal record, and Mishina and Gallyamova need to grow further in components, and in such competitions they do not grow in young couples. The first Russian duet out of three scored 203.13 points in total.
Following the Chinese, Peng Cheng and Jin Yang managed to beat the world junior champions due to more substantial allowances for their less complicated program with emission errors. This turn was a real surprise - a couple from China scored 134.60 points for a free program, which was her season record, and in total earned 204.27 points. From fifth place after a short rental, they began to climb up.
🎶 Lyrical and beautiful, Cheng Peng / Yang Jin of 🇨🇳 skate their way on to the podium at the Grand Prix Final!
Full results: https://t.co/iq7OtZG5ex#GPFigure#FigureSkatingpic.twitter.com/QvcuvzwpeI
Russian couples had every chance to stop their ascent. But first, there was a failure between Daria Pavlyuchenko and Denis Khodykin. The skater began the program with an unexpected fall, which turned into almost a real somersault on ice. And although Pavlyuchenko then purely performed both a triple flip and a cascade of three sheepskin coats, then it was too hard for her to keep on her feet. The flip release also ended in a fall, and so unpleasant that the athlete could not get up for a few more seconds. Like a year ago, Pavlyuchenko and Khodykin became the last in the Grand Prix finals.
The failure of Alexandra Boykova and Dmitry Kozlovsky, from which they expected the fight for gold, was absolutely surprising. But compared to the pair that marvelously skated at the Moscow stage of the Grand Prix, they were like completely different skaters. They lost speed, lightness and stability at once. Boykova’s unsuccessful jumps, touching with her hand after the ejection and frustrated support took away so many points from Tamara Moskvina’s pupil that they ended up both in the Chinese duet and in Mishina and Gallyamov. The fact that at least one Russian couple will become the winner of the competition was expected, but who exactly got the medal came as a surprise.
Of course, this medal was supposed to be bronze. Closing the competition, Sui Wenjing and Han Tsong showed how to ride with mistakes, but still make a deep impression on the judges and the public. The jumps remained the weak side of the Chinese couple, but in their grandiose free program, they could have completely dispensed with these elements. World champions won their Grand Prix finals for the first time in their careers and brought China their first gold in ten years when Zhao Hongbo and Shen Xue, the coach of this pair, were still skating.
The revival of dance intrigue
Dancers have just begun their entry into the Grand Prix finals. Alexandra Stepanova and Ivan Bukin fell to open the rhythm dance, and for them such a draw is always considered unsuccessful - a pair is better to speak after someone else, so that judges could give more generous points in comparison with other participants.
This time no one caused a fire, and this immediately affected the assessment of the couple. The Russians put the second level on the Finstep section and on the partner’s steps, the components were also not the highest. It became almost impossible to fight for bronze with such input data by Stepanova and Bukin. The Russians earned 81.44 points and went to second place on the ice of the strongest warm-up, passing ahead of the Americans Madison Chock and Evan Bates.
Another Russian duet, Victoria Sinitsina, Nikita Katsalapov, got ready to take the lead on the ice of Gabriela Papadakis and Guillaume Sizeron, but this ambitious goal was not achieved. Katsalapov during his performance under the musical “Singing in the Rain” lost his balance on the path of steps. And although it looked comical, quite in the spirit of the original setting, the judges were adamant - the complexity of the track had to be cut. Students of Alexander Zhulin scored only 81.51 points, also behind Chock and Bates. The Russians lost almost five points to their season record.
A wave of mistakes has swept even the invincible French. Papadakis stumbled during twizzles and barely finished spinning. The rest of the performance in aerobics suits was perfect, the dancers moved in unreachable for the rest of the couples and exuded indomitable energy. Usually, one failure does not mean absolutely anything to four-time world champions, but the judges have not yet evaluated the path of steps and have also given her a second level of difficulty. The final grade was only 83.23 points, and it was a real sensation. For the first time since the Olympics in Pyeongchang, Papadakis and Sizeron received so little and allowed their rivals so close.
1 ... 2 ... 3 ... Work it !! Gabriella and Guillaume take the lead in the Rhythm Dance 🏋️‍♀️🏋️‍♂️
Full results: https://t.co/Es6p8Oo9vb#GPFigure#FigureSkatingpic.twitter.com/LfJpju5jRu
The competition was closed by Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donoghue, whose seasonal record was much higher than what the French earned. But the judges still did not dare to violate the established order in ice dancing, when in any situation only one duo takes first place. The Americans also got a mistake on the track, and they got 82.72 points. All the couples for Papadakis and Sizeron settled so tightly that even the chances for a medal returned to Stepanova and Bukin, not to mention Sinitsina and Katsalapov, who could have finished the first day of the competition with their leaders without their annoying mistake.
Valieva's victory over the quadruples
The junior Grand Prix finals are in full swing, and the girls won the first set of medals among the young skaters. At the beginning of the season, it seemed that in this tournament, as well as in the adult, everything would be decided by quadruple jumps. American Alisa Lew and Russian Kamila Valieva mastered them and have already won many competitions with them. In Turin, two “quadists” were to meet for the first time face to face.
But in the middle of the season, misfortune happened to Valieva - a serious injury left her for a long time without practice, and when she still returned to the ice, there was no question of quadruple jumps. She came to the finals after only three weeks of training without the hardest elements.
However, the quadruple jumps are not the only trump card Valieva. Nothing betrays her at a very young age in the skating of the 13-year-old skater - her choreography is so fascinating, the ligaments are saturated and the approaches to jumping and their execution are difficult. Replacing the quadruple sheepskin coat with two double axles did not globally affect the student’s assessment of Eteri Tutberidze for an arbitrary program to the music of Muse, which also uses Evgeny Medvedev this season. Valieva earned 138.45 points and scored 207.47 points in total - at least that would be enough for silver for her.
A touching performance 💛 Kamila Valieva 🇷🇺 is the champion of the Junior Grand Prix!
Full results: https://t.co/VUdMZmYWM6#JGPFigure#FigureSkatingpic.twitter.com/s43eo6vVwh
Lew spoke shortly after the Russian woman and could due to the technical complexity to break ahead. However, for the American, arbitrary rental was unsuccessful. She fell from the triple axel, in both quadruple lutz she undercooked, and then there were blots on the cascade with a double axel. Lew could only defeat the judges with his skating, but she still comprehends the basics of everything that is not directly related to jumping. Leadership after a short program evaporated, and in the end, the American lost almost three points to Valieva. Another student of Tutberidze Daria Usacheva won the bronze. Russian figure skaters continued the winning streak in the final of the Junior Grand Prix, which Adeline Sotnikova started in 2010.
The medal draw among the girls was preceded by the rhythm dance of the strongest young duets in the world. In this discipline, Russia is represented by three pairs of participants, but there is only one place in the intermediate three leaders, and that is not the highest. Elizaveta Shanaeva and David Narizhny became the third with a score of 66.21 points, but their lag behind the representatives of Georgia Maria Kazakova and George Revia and the Americans Evonli Nguyen and Vadim Kolesnik is only two and a half points.