by Alexandra Stevenson
Germans Hold Title but are Outshone by Russians
who Soar Back from Despair after Short Program Eighth Place Disaster
1. Overall 201.49 Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy, 2.FS 132.86
(71.42+69.48); 1.SP. Their FS was set to music from the recent
German movie, Pina, about the life of an extremely famous modern
dance choreographer. Afterwards, Savchenko said, “I was really angry
at him (Szolkowy) for messing up the spin. I found it difficult to
skate tonight. But now we are very very happy to be World champions
for the fourth time. But mistakes like that mustn't happen, we'll
have to learn from our mistakes today.”
The scollded Szolkowy
said, “Everything was going well until I singled the Axel. Then my
power was gone. I don't really know why but I forgot the spin,
starting it on the wrong foot. It has never happened to me before
but we just tried to make the best out of it. Our preparation this
season was not the best of course. Plus we were obviously a little
nervous to skate tonight, having already won three Worlds. But now
we can be proud of having won our fourth title and look into the
future.”
2. Overall 201.38 Tatiana Volosozhar and Maxim
Trankov 1.FS 140.90 (71.42+69.48); 8.SP; What a remarkable recovery
– rocketing up from eighth with clearly the best Free. They nearly
displaced the reigning champions with a highly emotionally charged
routine to music from the black act of the ballet, Swan Lake. All
they needed was another 0.11 of a point. It can’t have been closer.
She said “Today is another day. We tried to forget about our Short
Program and to show our best. Both
European and World championships are about
psychology. All the pairs are really strong.”
He admitted, “We were very
nervous. It is very good, that we had one day rest in between. Today
we had a very good practice and the six minutes of warm up went
well. But it was the most nervous competition for us so far. In the
beginning of the program I took Tatiana's hand differently, not like
I always do. I had forgotten how I need to do that and nearly
panicked! But it was good in the end. It was very hard to swim out
of this swamp, where we were buried after our Short Program. We are
the first pair of our country, and we are not supposed to have
performances like that. We never lost the Short Program this season.
We are used to having 70 points for that routine and here we got
only 60.
3. Overall 189.69 Narumi Takahashi and Mervin
Tran 3.FS 124.32 (61.34+62.98); 3SP; This is by far the highest ever
for a Japanese pair. Of course, half of the team is Canadian and, of
course, they were both over-the-moon when last year’s world junior
champions heard this result. She said, “I love to collect medals. I
was so happy to get a small medal (for getting third place in the
Short Program). Now I have the big one. It's amazing. I felt so honored to skate last in this big competition. We are so honored to
be the first Japanese pair skaters to win a world medal. I cannot
describe this feeling.” He, too, was overcome. “I have no words. It
is a dream come true. I can't believe it. I thought we might be able
to finish fifth, but we finished even higher.”
4. Overall 186.05
Qing Pang
and Jian Tong 6.FS 118.95 (55.36+64.59 -1); 2.SP; A medal
possibility for the Chinese 2006 and 2010 world champions
disappeared on their very first element, their side by side triple
toe loops when he fell. Falls happen a lot on jumps but it is
usually the women who wipe the ice on this requirement because they
have less strength than their partners needed to soar to the height
required to accomplish triple rotation. Tong admitted, “I was
crooked in the air and that's why I fell. We didn't compete
internationally for a year (since the 2011 Worlds). I regret that
this was probably our worst-ever competition and I think we weren't
really prepared for how to recover from the mistake.”
Pang: France is great but
our competition was rather disastrous. Next season we plan to
compete and we will start completion earlier with the Grand Prix.
There were two other mistakes. Their mid-program triple twist had
-0.20 removed from the base value, and she nearly fell on their
second throw, a triple loop towards the end.
5. Overall 185.41
Meaghan
Duhamel and Eric Radford 5.FS 121.72 (63.73+57.99); 5.SP The
Canadian champions, who presented a routine to Coldplay’s Viva La
Vida and Yellow, left the ice smiling. She said, “These are the
strongest programs we have ever skated internationally. We are very
proud of
our
performance both today and in the short program.” He agreed. “We are
incredibly happy. We knew we weren't coming here to win but we are
setting ourselves to be competitive in Sotchi (where the 2014 Winter
Olympic Games will be held). Of the 12 elements they presented,
their only negative Grade of Execution was for a flub on their
second move, a three-jump combo, triple flip to half loop to double
toe. That didn’t faze them and their next element was a combination
of clean triple Salchows. Two of their lifts, the flying change foot
combination spin and their final element, the pair combo spin, were
Level 4. Their opening triple twist was a superior Level 2 and the
back outside death spiral Level 3.
6. Overall 183.68
Vera Bazarova and Yuri Larionov 7.FS 118.66 (57.64+63.02 -2); 4.SP. The
Russians were very disappointed to drop two places. She said, “I
don't know what happened. We were calm. We were ready to perform our
program. And it started well. But then and then this mistake in the
Throw jump...
Larionov:
(on their plans) We will work. Honestly we have nothing to say right
now.
7. Overall 182.42 Yuko Kavaguti and Alexander
Smirnov 4.FS 122.83 (58.27+64.56); 11.SP. The 2010 European
champions have survived several injuries. She has had shoulder
operations to correct it from popping out. He had to have his
appendix out in January, which took them out of this year’s
Europeans.
They
received no marks for their ninth element, the Group 3 lift, which
has a base value, when executed at Level 4 with the 10% bonus for
being accomplished in the second half of the routine, of 4.40
points. Although they climbed up from their disastrous 11th place in
the SP to 7th, if they had accomplished this lift, it would have
taken them up to 4th overall.
Smirnov explained, “We just
didn't have right timing in this lift. Plus the mistake in our short
program put pressure on me. But I am glad that, except for that
element, we skated well and did a nice program. After the short we
couldn't fight for medals anymore, but we still fight to please
ourselves and the audience. I think we pleased ourselves for 80
percent, and I hope that the audience got 100 percent.
Kavaguti said, “Although we
used to be higher ranked despite mistakes, yesterday's result was
different. We were pushed to a very low placement. So, I thought we
don't have anything to lose for this
part. I skated this free program (which was set
to Clair de Lune) an exhibition. I tried to go out with a refreshed
mind but I didn't succeed very well. Maybe that is why I made
several mistakes. One good thing was that we landed the second throw
triple loop which we have been struggling with since the Vancouver
Olympics.”
8. Overall 180.37 Caydee Denney and John
Coughlin 8.FS 117.89 (59.04+58.85) 7.SP. Even though they dropped a
place after the Short Program, the new US champions were delighted
to finish in the top eight. She said, “This is, by far, the best
field we've ever been in and we answered the bell. That program
(Puccini’s Nessun Dorma) felt easy. Our training at home was
awesome. What a great first Worlds! I'm so excited. You only get one
first Worlds and this one is good to build on, to recharge the
battery for new choreography and bigger tricks for next season. I
always have a good time whenever I perform in front of a huge crowd.
I made one mistake (singling a double Axel) but I always learn from
each competition and I'm looking forward to the future.” That one
lapse, in their sequence of back-to-back double Axels, was their
only fault.
9. Overall 179.44 Wenjing Sui and Cong Han 9.FS
116.17 (59.19+56.98) 6.SP. Despite landing a flawed throw quad Salchow, with -1.43 removed from its base value of 8 points, the
current Four Continents and three-time World Junior champions
dropped three places. He said, “We tried to do our best today.
Unfortunately, we failed one of our lifts.” Their routine, set to
The Soul of Flamenco, concludes with two lifts. But they aborted the
next-to-last Group 5 reverse lasso. If, as they normally do, they
had executed this move at Level 4, including the 10% bonus for being
second half, they would have earned 7.15 points, which would have
brought them up to fourth overall. He said, “But being here in our
first (senior) World Championships was amazing, it is a wonderful
experience.” Asked about the quad throw, he said, “We are little
skaters, so we can do these kinds of difficult elements.”
10. Overall 170.90
Mary Beth
Marley and Rockne Brubaker 10.FS 111.28 (57.36+54.9- 1) 10.SP The
silver medalists in this year’s US championship and bronze medalists
in the recent Four Continents Championships began w ell with a
combination of triple toe loop to double toe loop and a +0.40 triple
twist. But then she fell on her double Axel. “I messed up the double
Axel, but to be able to keep all the excitement and nerves under
control and my head on at my first world, that’s what I'm most proud
of.”
Brubaker said,
“Just from where we've come and what we've done this year - it's
been a pretty good year all around and a solid way to end. Next
season we'd like to focus on increasing and perfecting quality in
our skating on a day-to-basis basis and not just at competitions.”
11. Overall 168.16
Stefania
Berton and Ondrej Hotarek, Italy, 11.FS 107.77 (53.76+54.01); 9.SP.
Berton admitted, “We were in trouble a few times out there, but are
happy that we could still save most of it.” Laughingly, she said,
“At least we were beautiful. You can't be perfect every day.” He
said, “We could have been better. We had a few mistakes. But overall
we can be pleased with our performance (which was set to Albinoni’s
Adagio in G Minor).”
12. Overall 156.36 Jessica Dubé and Sebastien
Wolfe, Canada, 12.FS 100.53 (51.88+51.65 -3); 12 SP. Dubé was a
little stunned afterward their performance set to Heroes by Philipp
Glass. She said, “We are very disappointed with this free skate. I
don't know what happened on the throw jumps, I
wish I knew, but I guess they were a little
over-rotated. Overall, we could deal with the stress and the
pressure and our practice was good. Now we need
to put it all together in competition. We just don't
have that much experience yet since we have
just been skating together for a year. He put a slant on the outing.
“The free skate was a big disappointment but it was a good week.
We'll take we can out of the experience and built on that.”
13. Overall 145.80
Maylin
Hausch and Daniel Wende, Germany, 13.FS 97.32 (49.57+48.75 -1); 15
SP;
The Germans
climbed two places but were not pleased. He said, “Unfortunately the
program didn't go as we had wished. I made errors on the solo jumps
and we had the fall on the throw triple flip. The rest was good and
we had fun skating the program. We confirmed that we are the number
two team in Germany, but we need to bring the consistency on the
throws that we have in practice to competition. The same goes for
the solo jumps, I messed them up. She explained her fall on the
throw triple flip, “I rushed it. That was a pity because we did a
beautiful one in warm-up.”
14. Overall 143.29
Mari Vartmann and Aaron van Cleave, Germany, 14.FS 95.38 (51.04+44.34);
16 SP;
The German
third ranked pair, who are trained by Knut Schubert, opened the Free
portion, skating to The Island by Globus, and advanced two places.
She said, “We showed a good program, even better than in the
preliminaries. We had a little mistake on the throw loop, but we
could show what we can do so we are really happy. Now we want to
improve for the next season. We hope we can go to Worlds again and
we want to work for that.”
15. Overall 137.31
Nicole
Della Monica and Matteo Guarise, Italy, 88.24 (43.21+45.03); 14 SP.
The Italians came to ice from the roller world. He explained, “It
was very difficult to learn edges because, in roller skating, you
just use your foot as opposed to using the blade’s edge. We had only
four and a half months to prepare for competing here. We started in
November, so this is quite an accomplishment.
16. Overall 130.70
Vanessa
James and Morgan Cipres, France, 16.FS 80.19 (37.96+42.23); 13 SP.
The French champions dropped three places. She said, We are not
happy with that performance at all.” Asked what happened to make her
single the throw triple loop, she said, “It all went too fast. I
wasn't over my right leg properly. We wanted to have a good end to
this season here since we already placed 6th at Europeans this year,
but it didn't happen. Anyway, we learned a lot here and this is how
we grow. We do now have a good base for the next season and we'll
try work on especially on transitions and we want to come back with
better programs.”
Eliminated after the Short Program:
17. Danielle Montalban and Evgeni Krasnopolski,
Israel
18. Anais Morand
and Timothy LeeMann, Switzerland
19. Stacey Kemp and David King, GB
20. Ji Hyang Ri and Won Hyok Thae, North Korea