ISU World Figure Skating Championships 2007
Day Two
The 2007 World Figure Skating Championships continued in
Tokyo, Japan, with the Men’s Short Program and the Pairs
Free Skating. The Toyko Metropolitan Gymnasium was sold out
with over 6,000 spectators.
Men, Short Program
The Men’s event started with the Short Program. Brian
Joubert of France captured the lead ahead of Canada’s
Jeffrey Buttle. Daisuke Takashi followed in third place. The
skaters ranked third to sixth are separated by less than two
points.
Joubert delivered an energetic performance of his “James
Bond” routine “Die Another Day”, hitting
his opening quadruple-triple toeloop and the triple Axel and
showed good footwork. He had the crowd behind him from the
first second. The European Champion put down his hand on the
triple flip, but he earned a level four for his three spins
and a level three for both step sequences. The Frenchman collected
83.64 points (44.85 element score/38.79 program component
score), exceeding his previous best of 80.75 points. “I’m
very happy with my performance. I beat my personal best. I
did one small mistake on the triple flip, and I’m a
little disappointed about that. Everything else was clean”,
Joubert commented. “I was very nervous. I saw Stéphane
Lambiel just before me and that he did mistakes. He did not
have a good short program, and it gave me more confidence.
He helped me a lot. When I came on to the ice, I just wanted
to do my job. That’s all”, he went on.
Buttle landed a solid triple flip-triple toe, a triple Axel
as well as a triple Lutz in his elegant Tango routine to a
piano version of “Adios Nonino” by Astor Piazzolla.
His three spins were all graded a level four by the Technical
Panel. The Olympic bronze medalist scored 79.90 points (42.76/37.14)
an set a new personal best for himself. “Despite the
short season I think I made a stride this year, and I’m
just really looking forward to the long program”, Buttle
said, referring to the back injury that had kept him out of
the Grand Prix events. “I was just able to train in
ways I was not able to train before Nationals and Four Continents.
It was a lot more intense. We were able to get a lot more
run-throughs done, and just be a lot harder on the back than
I was before. So I really think that made a huge difference,
and I feel stronger because of it”, answered when asked
on how he progressed since the Four Continents Championships.
Takahashi opened his program to Peter Tchaikovski’s
Violin Concerto with a triple flip-triple toe, but the second
jump was underrotated and downgraded. The 21-year-old went
on to produce a triple Axel, a triple Lutz as well as a level-four
combination spin to score 74.51 points (36.94/37.57).
“It was my worst performance in this season. I was
not able to show what I can do. I am very lucky to end up
in 3rd place”, Takashi told the press and admitted to
feeling pressure. “We are the host country, and the
crowd had very high expectations and I tried to respond to
it. This made me very nervous. I’ll have an aggressive
attitude towards the Free Skating tomorrow in competition
and positive thoughts.”
Johnny Weir (USA) finished in fourth place at 74.26 points.
His performance included a triple Axel and a triple Lutz-triple
toeloop combination, but he stumbled out of his triple flip.
Evan Lysacek (USA) risked a quadruple toeloop for the first
time in the Short Program, but stepped out of it. He is currently
standing in fifth place (73.49 points). Two-time and reigning
World Champion Stéphane Lambiel (SUI) came in sixth.
He fell on his triple Axel and downgraded his planned quad-triple
toe combination to a triple-double (72.70 points).
Pairs, Free Skating
The Pair event concluded with a dramatic Free Skating. Xue
Shen/Hongbo Zhao of China skated to the gold with their teammates
Qing Pang/Jian Tong edging Germany’s Aliona Savchenko/Robin
Szolkowy for the silver medal. It was the third World title
for Shen/Zhao. Pang/Tong completed their set of World medals
with the silver while Savchenko/Szolkowy stood for the first
time on the podium at the World Championships.
Shen/Zhao put out a strong performance to “Mediation”
from “Thais” by Jules Massenet. The crowd cheered
for every move as they reeled off the side by side triple
toeloop-double toeloop combination, side by side double Axels,
a big triple twist and throw triple loop. They produced a
level-four forward outside death spiral, and also received
a level four for two of their three lifts. When Shen landed
the last key element, the throw triple Salchow, a big smile
lit up her face. After they had finished, Shen/Zhao shared
an emotional moment on the ice, knelt down and hugged each
other while the audience gave them a long standing ovation.
The Chinese received 132.43 points (65.29 element score/67.14
program component score) accumulated a total score of 203.50
points.
Pang/Tong had drawn to skate last and ended a difficult year
on a high note with their best performance of the season.
Their program to “Phantom of the Opera” featured
a double Axel-double Axel sequence, a triple toeloop, a high
triple twist, a triple throw loop and Salchow as well as a
difficult one-armed lift and a level-four spiral sequence.
The defending World Champions earned 121.71 points (61.65/60.06)
for this program which added up to a total of 188.46. They
moved up from third to second, edging Savchenko/Szolkowy by
1.07 points.
The Germans had skated first in the final flight. They opened
their routine set to “The Mission” by Ennio Morricone
with a throw triple flip followed by a triple toe, but Szolkowy
stepped out of it. The European Champions hit the triple twist,
the throw triple Salchow and strong lifts (all three of them
were awarded a level four), but Savchenko singled the Axel
(in a sequence with a double toeloop). Savchenko/Szolkowy
scored 119.74 points (59.93/59.81) and slipped to third at
187.39 points.
“Right now I’m very tired, and what we need is
a long break. This break might take maybe one year. There
may be a comeback in the future, but when this will happen
we will have to look at our competence and ability as well
as physical strength to decide”, Shen explained. “We
were just full of joy, and we were overwhelmed with emotions,
so we weren’t really thinking very much about the standing
ovation. But I would like to thank the audience, because it
was the greatest gift any audience could give to us”,
Zhao added.
“All top three pairs performed well tonight. For me,
I saw the score for the pair that skated before us which motivated
me to skate well. We want to continue to work better and harder
to improve our performances. Last year, we were the world
champions, but it was very hard for us this year because of
our accident and illness. But all that made us very strong
for the competition. I am so happy about our result”,
Tong said.
“Until now we still have mixed feelings between joy
and disappointment. We can skate better than that. We made
a few mistakes. But that’s sport, unfortunately, that’s
the way it is. We’ve had a hard season. It was difficult
to skate yesterday the short and also difficult in the free
program today, but we fought for it. Considering that, we
did quite well. To be on the podium was our big goal and we
fulfilled that. The bronze medal means a lot to us. Tomorrow
morning at the latest when we will wake up, we will be very,
very happy with it”, Szolkowy commented.
Tatiana Volosozhar/Stanislav Morozov (UKR) moved up from
eighth to fourth with a personal best Free Skating that contained
a triple toe-triple toe sequence, a triple Salchow and high
triple throws (173.62 points). Dan Zhang/Hao Zhang (CHN) rallied
back from a faulty Short Program and finished fifth at 173.39
points. They completed a side by side triple Salchow, a triple
twist, throw triple loop and Salchow, but he fell on the back
end of the planned double Axel-triple toe combination.
Dorota Siudek/Mariusz Siudek (POL) withdrew after the warm
up for the Free Skating as he injured his back. They stood
in 9th place after the Short Program. Maria Petrova/Alexei
Tikhonov (RUS) withdrew earlier today due to injury as well.
According to the medical bulletin he suffered from an adductor
injury in the right leg. They had finished 11th in the Short
Program.
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