RUSSIAN 15-YEAR-OLD LEADS THE WAY AHEAD OF FREE DANCE FINAL
vgenia Medvedeva says she is preparing for “war” to deny her close friend Alina Zagitova Olympic figure skate gold after her compatriot set a new world record in short programme yesterday.
Zagitova displayed maturity far beyond her 15 years in a spellbinding routine to music from the film Black Swan to earn a massive 82.92 points to lead the ladies competition.
Her flawless two-and-ahalf minutes on the ice at the Gangneung Arena, featuring a complex triple Lutz, triple toeloop combination, gave her a narrow advantage of 1.31 points over her training partner and buddy going into tomorrow’s free dance final.
Their closest challenger is Canadian Kaetlyn Osmond on 78.87, with Japan’s Satoko Miyahara in fourth. “We are friends, we are young girls, we can talk about anything with each other,” said Medvedeva, 18, who like Zagitova is making her Olympic debut.
“But on the ice, we must fight, I feel like it’s a little war, when you skate you are alone,” added the double world champion. Zagitova said she is up to
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Norway Germany Canada Netherlands USA France Sweden South Korea Austria Japan Italy Switzerland Czech Republic Slovakia Belarus Great Britain Poland Ukraine China OAR
G
13 12 9 6 6 5 4 4 4 3 3 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0
S
11 7 5 6 4 4 4 3 2 5 2 5 2 2 1 0 0 0 5 4
B
9 5 7 4 6 5 0 2 4 3 4 1 3 0 0 3 1 0 2 9
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33 24 21 16 16 14 8 9 10 11 9 8 6 3 2 4 2 1 7 13 the challenge. “I’ve said many many times, Evgenia and me are very good friends off the ice but in practice or competition I get this feeling of rivalry, it’s not bad or negative or malicious feeling of rivalry, but it is there.”
Asked at the post short programme press conference about her maturity and serious nature Zagitova replied: “I am very calm, I don’t show emotions, I don’t splash them around.”
Then almost apologetically she added: “This is how I am, it’s my nature.”
The two skaters are set to fight it out for what could be the first gold of the Games for the Olympic Athletes from Russia — who are competing as neutrals, after Russia were banned for doping.
Medvedeva refused to be drawn on the significance of that, commenting in English: “I’m trying not to think about medals, my main goal is to show a clean free skate, to be satisfied with my performance.”
Zagitova’s world record feat was all the more remarkable given she had watched Medvedeva a few minutes earlier breaking the record she had set last week in the team event with a score of 81.61.