On the first day of the World Figure Skating Championships, a short program was held in the first half of the women's singles, and Kaori Sakamoto, who won her second consecutive World Championship last month, made a mistake in falling on her jump and finished second.

On the first day of the World Figure Skating Championships, which opened in Tokyo on the 13th, a short program for the first half of the men's and women's singles and a rhythm dance for the first half of ice dancing will be held.

In the short program in the first half of the women's singles, Sakamoto, who won two consecutive world championships last month, was the last to appear among the participating players.

Sakamoto scored the double axel at the beginning of the game with almost perfect results from five of the nine judges, and he also neatly scored the following three-turn Lutz.

However, in addition to being under-rotated in all of the three consecutive jumps in the second half, he made a big mistake in the second half of the jump when he fell and missed the level even in the spin.

Sakamoto scored 2.9, second out of 5 players.

First place went to Lee Hae-in of Korea, who won the silver medal at this year's World Championships.

Mai Mihara made a mistake that disrupted the continuous jump of 3 turns and 3 turns, which is the source of the score, but she performed brilliantly until the end with the theme song of "Merry Christmas on the Battlefield" written by musician Ryuichi Sakamoto, who passed away last month.

The score was 3.72, which was fifth.

Sakamoto: "I want to stay focused and do my best until the very end."

Kaori Sakamoto said, "The moment it ended, I felt like I did it~, and it was the last short program of the season, so I was disappointed with this performance. The mistake in the jump was due to the timing of the jump even before the jump. It wasn't my usual rhythm."

Looking back on the short program that he has been working on this season, he said, "At first, I really had muscle pain all over my body every day, and I was very worried about whether I would be able to slide through this program to the end. It's hard to jump while dancing, but the fact that I did it will help me in the future and I want to make the most of it."

Ahead of the 14th, he said, "Tomorrow will be the last free event, so I want to finish the game well, so I want to stay focused and do my best until the very end."

Mihara "There are many moments when the program helped me"

MIHARA Maiyori reflected, "I was full of gratitude for the energy I received even before I started the team competition, and I was happy to be a member of the Japan team because I was able to start with a good sense of nervousness."

Regarding the program using the theme music for Ryuichi Sakamoto's Merry Christmas on the Battlefield, he said, "I was very happy when the choreographer asked me to express my life, and I almost cried every time I skated while acting and fighting together for one season. A program filled with various thoughts. Today is frustrating, but there are also many moments when the program helped me. For now, I want to take a hard look at my weaknesses and make the most of them so that I can continue to do my best."

Then, for Freelance, she said, "I want to be able to play a strong woman who is as strong as a different person from today, and I don't want to feel any more frustrated, so I want to give it my all tomorrow."