FIGURE SKATING
first US woman in a decade to win a medal at worlds. Another Russian teen, Anna Pogorilaya, took bronze.
American Gracie Gold, who led after the short program, fell on her opening triple-triple combination to drop to fourth.
Medvedeva looked a bit hesitant during Thursday’s short program in her first senior worlds. But she was captivating from the start Saturday. She landed seven triple jumps with never a hint of trouble, throwing an arm above her head on many of them.
“I won’t realize quickly I won today because one year ago I was still skating juniors,” she said through a translator.
It was a performance both youthful and mature at the same time. The program opens with Medvedeva peering out into the crowd with a look of wide-eyed wonder.
When it was over, she thrust both fists into the air in triumph.
“Actually I don’t really have any emotions right now — I left everything on the ice,” she said afterward.
Sitting in the kiss-and-cry area, the teenager came back out. She bopped her head to the music as she waited for her scores, squeezing her eyes shut and clutching a stuffed animal tight as the marks were about to be announced.
She finished with a total of 223.86 points, following in the footsteps of Adelina Sotnikova, who won the Olympic gold medal at age 17 in 2014, and Elizaveta Tuktamysheva, who won last year’s world title at 18.
Meanwhile, Canadian duo Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford retained their World Figure Skating Championship pairs crown on Saturday after a flawless programme which prompted deafening roars of applause.
Duhamel and Radford brought fans to their feet after nailing their throw quad salchow in a performance that clinched back-to-back gold medals following their victory at last year’s world championships in Shanghai.
Duhamel and Radford recorded a personal best for their free skate performance (153.81) to post a total score of 231.99.
Although the defending champions sensed they had done enough to win gold again, they had to wait until the final two contenders skated to confirm that. Overnight leaders Chinese Sui Wenjing and Han Cong added 143.62 to their tally for a total of 224.47 to finish in silver medal position for the second time.
Leading by just 2.5 points after the short, Sui and Han executed their quadruple twist lift but she couldn’t hang onto the throw quad salchow landing and tumbled to the ice.
German-French pairing Aliona Savchenko and Bruno Massot finished third in their world championship debut with 216.17 points overall.
Their performance featured a sky-high triple twist lift and earned 141.95 points.
They teamed up in 2014 after her former partner Robin Szolkowy, with whom she won five world titles, retired from competition. Russia’s 2014 Olympic and world silver medallists Ksenia Stolbova and Fedor Klimov finished fourth with 214.48 points.
Another Russian duo, 2014 Olympic gold medallists and 2013 world champions, Tatiana Volosozhar and Maxim Trankov struggled with some of their elements and dropped from third after the short programme to sixth overall (205.81).
Evgenia Medvedeva of Russia performs during the Ladies Free Skate Program at the ISU World Figure Skating Championships at TD Garden in Boston,
Massachusetts, on April 22. (AFP)
Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford of Canada perform their Pairs Free Program at the ISU World Figure Skating Championships at TD Garden in Boston, Massachusetts,
on April 2. (AFP)