American Chen clinches gold at Grand Prix Final

Hubbell, Donohue top Rhythm Dance

LOS ANGELES, Dec 8, (Agencies): Reigning world champion Nathan Chen took advantage of some major errors by Japan’s Shoma Uno to capture the men’s gold at the ISU Grand Prix Figure Skating Finals.

Chen, who was also first after short programme, picked up earlier grand prix wins at Skate America and Internationaux de France.

Despite a less than perfect free skate himself, Chen posted a total score of 282.42 points to beat out runner-up Uno who finished with 275.10 at the UBC Thunderbird Sports Centre in Vancouver, Canada.

“I made some mistakes but was able to get back on track after the mistakes,” he said. “I definitely need to bump this up to the next level.”

South Korea’s Cha Jun-hwan finished third with 263.49 points. Czech Michal Brezina (255.26) was fourth and crowd favourite Keegan Messing (236.05) of Canada rounded out the top five.

Chen earned $25,000 for finishing first while Uno collected $18,000.

Chen bounced back from a disappointing fifth-place finish at the Pyeongchang Olympics to win the world title by the largest margin in history.

Chen’s solid programme on Friday to ‘Land of All’ by Woodkid, US figure skater Nathan Chen performs in the Men’s Free Skating competition at the ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating in Vancouver,

Canada on Dec 7. (AFP)