The short program for men, with which the Russian figure skating championship started the day before, did not allow any of the main characters to seize a big advantage. Between the intermediate leader Yevgeny Semenenko and Alexander Samarin, who closed the top six, there were less than four points, so that none of the strongest warm-ups of the free skating lost their chances not only for a medal, but even for victory.
But one significant figure skater loved by the fans was literally thrown overboard the day before. The reigning European champion Dmitry Aliev did not make a triple axel and fell to 12th place. Of course, it was too early to deny him the right to fight - two years ago, when Aliyev won the national championship, Artur Danielyan managed to win silver after 13th place in the short program. But for this, an absolutely perfect second rental was needed, which one could not wait for the whole season from Dmitry.
There was no miracle in St. Petersburg either. Aliyev risked starting the program with a quadruple lutz, but immediately deviated from the axis and stayed on his feet only by touching the ice with his hand. The quadruple sheepskin coat did not work either, which had to be reduced by one turn. At the same time, Aliyev continued the cascade and repeated the jump, being left without the right to perform it in a different combination. Not without the traditional error on the triple axel. As a result, Aliyev will no longer either defend the European title in Tallinn or play at his second Olympics.
By the time the final six entered the ice, Andrey Mozalev was in the lead with a good amount of 278.28 points by international standards - this would be the fifth result in the world ranking of the season.
Alexander Samarin failed to come close to such serious numbers.
His success entirely depended on the pure execution of the quadruple lutz cascade - triple toe loop, but on the first jump, the European vice champion fell.
The skater simply had nothing to make up for lost time, since he did not dare to enter the quadruple flip.
Samarin, who performed with a plaster on his face, lost not only to Mozalev, but also to Peter Humennik.
Another of the leaders of Russian figure skating for the last four years was left without the main tournaments of the season.
Mikhail Kolyada spoke next to him unusually early. After the short program, he was only fifth due to the butterfly on the triple axel, so in the free program the fans expected from him not so much the return of the legendary White Crow as a clean ride, without breakdowns out of the blue and inexplicable falls.
Kolyada started quite well - he performed the starting set of the first three and most difficult jumps well. But then his content began to lose dramatically in basic value. The quadruple toe loop was left without one turn, and the triple axel was left without a worthy continuation in the cascade. Finally, the final triple salchow turned out to be only double. With outward well-being, the rental was no longer clearly champion. Kolyada earned less for the technique than Mozalev, but bypassed him thanks to colossal components that no one received at international competitions. The total amount of the student of Alexei Mishin was 283.70 points.
Aleksey Erokhov could have caused a sensation while experienced skaters were losing points. But he also left the line for medals. The alarm bell sounded when he slightly carelessly performed the quadruple salchow, after which he was left with zero for the axel. Erokhov performed at his first Russian championship in four years and let several skaters go ahead, who more often visited the main tournament of the country.
With Makar Ignatov on the ice, a real fight for medals has already begun. In the free program, he skated to the first concert of Tchaikovsky, and it would be symbolic if this music brought him a ticket to Beijing, where they would look forward to it. But the figure skater, who took third place after short skates, was in for the most deafening failure that day. Each jump performed by Ignatov made the judges frown and choose negative marks. The vice-champion of Russia did the almost impossible - he was behind Aliyev.
By that time, viewers were already tired of waiting for high-quality rentals from those who would like to climb the podium themselves, and not be on it due to the mistakes of their rivals. Only Mark Kondratyuk became such a skater. Performing to the music from the musical "Jesus Christ Superstar", he himself became a real superstar on ice. He performed the entire first half of the jumps brilliantly, leaving the most interesting for the second - there he had two quadruple salchows.
Kondratyuk made them too, providing himself with a small increase in points. If not for the confusion with basic jumps, one of which was not performed according to the rules, he could feel like a leader even before the announcement of the estimates. But he still had to wait for the final verdict, which turned out to be positive - the student of Svetlana Sokolovskaya overtook Kolyada by 0.67 points. The skater who brought the Russian national team the third quota at the Olympics won it for himself.
It only remained to wait for the last word from Evgeny Semenenko.
But the intrigue around the name of the new champion of the country quickly disappeared when the athlete fell from the quadruple sheepskin coat, and then also tore off the triple axel.
The last mistake cost him not just a victory, but a place on the podium.
The third step on it was eventually taken by Mozalev, who was only the eighth on the first day.
As expected, the men's competition at the Russian Championship turned out to be completely unpredictable.