Pang and Tong glide to gold
0 
 |
|
China's Pang Qing and Tong Jian on their way to gold in the pairs free skating competition at the World Figure Skating Championships on Wednesday at the Palavela ice rink in Turin. |
Pang Qing and Tong Jian have a world title to go with their Olympic silver medal.
Runners-up at the Vancouver Olympics last month, Pang and Tong easily won their second title on Wednesday at the World Figure Skating Championships. The Chinese pair finished with 211.39 points, more than six ahead of two-time defending world champs Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy of Germany.
"For us, it's the impossible dream because ... there are so few people who can be here in the rink for such high-level competition. Skating at this level is our dream, the big dream," Tong said.
Russia's Yuko Kavaguti and Alexander Smirnov, second after the short program, settled for a second straight bronze after she fell on their throw quadruple salchow - the hardest element attempted by any of the pairs.
Coming so soon after the Games, the world championships in an Olympic year tend to feature watered-down fields. When Pang and Tong won their first title, in 2006, the runner-ups were the only Turin medalists to compete.
But this was no gimme. Though Olympic champions Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo weren't here, all of the other big names were.
Bronze medalists Savchenko and Szolkowy, in third after the short program, skated second-to last and put up quite a challenge. Their "Out of Africa" routine was emotional and well-executed.
Though she doubled one of the jumps in their opening combination, Savchenko and Szolkowy more than made up for it with a spectacular spiral sequence. They ended the program with a punch, landing a throw triple salchow.
"It was a long season, a hard season. We did good programs, bad programs," Szolkowy said. "Now the last program was a good program. That is important for us, for our future."
The Germans have already said they have their sights set on the next Olympics in Sochi, Russia.
Pang and Tong weren't perfect; she doubled one of their side-by-side jumps. But the rest of the program was clean and athletic and, with their lead after the short program, good enough for gold.
Earlier on Wednesday, Olympic bronze medalist Daisuke Takahashi took the lead in the men's competition, dazzling the judges with huge jumps and speedy steps in his short program. Canada's Patrick Chan was second with a clean, well-polished tango, followed by France's Brian Joubert, who rebounded from a disappointing Olympics with an impressive routine that started with a quad-triple combination.
"I did a good performance, even if I did not skate as fast as I could," said Takahashi, who scored 89.30 points. "I know that I can also do better."
Olympic champion Evan Lysacek isn't competing at worlds and neither is silver medalist Evgeni Plushenko. That makes Takahashi the favorite; and he delivered. He's more than a point in front of Chan (87.80) and Joubert (87.70) going into the free skate.
Go to Forum >>0 Comments