Las Vegas (United States) (AFP)
It is also by putting his hands on his face, struggling to hide his disappointment, that the 22-year-old skater finished his performance which turned into disaster after a fall on his first quadruple lutz, before he does not miss his second jump consisting of a quadruple flip.
"I still have to figure out exactly what went wrong. I don't want to make excuses for myself. I made mistakes. I didn't skate well," Chen commented.
The favorite for the Olympic gold medal was thus credited with a score of 82.89 points, some 28 points less than her personal best (111.17 pts) set last year.
The first place is occupied by his compatriot Vincent Zhou (97.43 pts), who is ahead of the Japanese Shoma Uno (89.07 pts) and another American Jimmy Ma (84.52 pts).
"I'm going to take that confidence built up to move forward. I did a good job running the program, while showing some of the good things I did in training. I can skate even better," assured the medalist. Worlds-2019 bronze medalist who, like Chen, has scheduled five quadruple jumps for his free skate.
American Vincent Zhou at Skate America Skating at Orleans Arena on October 22, 2021 in Las Vegas JAMIE SQUIRE GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / AFP
Earlier on Friday, Russian duo Evgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov wowed audiences with their brilliant performance to take the lead as a couple.
The double European champions obtained 80.36 points to well outstrip their young compatriots Aleksandra Boikova and Dmitrii Kozlovskii (75.43).
Skate America is the first step in an international calendar which has six dates, in the United States therefore, in Canada, in China, in France, in Russia and in Japan.
© 2021 AFP