FIGURE SKATERS ZAGITOVA AND MEDVEDEVA PROVE THEY ARE IN A CLASS OF THEIR OWN
aetlyn Osmond was all smiles after a magnificent free skate at the Pyeongchang Olympics, and a memorable month that began with a gold medal in the team event and ended with individual bronze.
It was, the Canadian figure skater said, the best she could have done.
Especially the way the Russians have come to dominate women’s figure skating.
Alina Zagitova won individual gold with 239.57 points Friday — competing for the Olympic Athletes of Russia, due to the IOC doping ban on Russia competing outright — beating her training partner and close friend Evgenia Medvedeva by less than two points. That they would stand on the top two steps of the podium at Gangneung Ice Arena was about as predictable as the sun rising over the nearby Sea of Japan, the only question left being what order they would finish.
Osmond put together two clean programmes for what she claimed was the first time ever, and she still only managed 231.02 points, leaving her a distant — but quite happy — third.
“I’m trying to close the gap,” she said with a smile, “as little as I can.”
It’s going to take a lot more than one skater from one nation.
The Russian Federation has poured vast resources into supporting its women skaters, identifying the top talent as soon they step on the ice. They are squirrelled away in the top schools with some of the best coaches, pushed to attempt the hardest jumps and most advanced combinations at the youngest ages, then unleashed on their unprepared rivals in major events.
No end in sight
There appears sight, either.
Zagitova is only 15, so she could certainly be around for at least another Olympic cycle. At the prestigious Junior Grand
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in Prix Final in December, Russian women took the top three spots and five of the top six, the only skater to break the flood was Rika Kihira of Japan.
Indeed, Canada and Japan may be the closest to challenging Russian superiority. The United States? Not so much.
Like their rivals, the Canadians and Japanese tweaked the new scoring system put in place by the International Skating Union several years ago to challenge their young skaters. The result has been an influx of talented athletes capable of putting up the monster technical numbers required to succeed.
Satoko Miyahara finished fourth at the Pyeongchang Games. Kaori Sakamoto was sixth. And along with Mai Mihara, the trio swept the podium at the important Four Continents event this season — an event not involving European skaters.
The Canadians have likewise poured resources into their figure skating programme, and the result was evident in their haul in South Korea. They opened the games by convincingly winning team gold, ice dancers Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir likewise won gold, and the pairs team of Meagan Duhamel and Scott Radford added another bronze to give the Canadians a nation-leading four medals overall. Total 37 26 27 21 18 11 15 13 12 13 11 10 3 9 14 6 3 4 2