Yagudin, Goebel lead at worlds

NAGANO, Japan (AP) -- Olympic medalists Alexei Yagudin of Russia and Timothy Goebel of the United States led their respective groups Monday after the men's qualifying free skate program at the World Figure Skating Championships.

In the pairs short program, Olympic bronze medalists Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo of China turned in a dynamic performance to finish ahead of this year's European champions Maxim Marinin and Tatiana Totmianina of Russia. Americans Kyoko Ina and John Zimmerman were third.

Goebel led an American one-two in the second qualifying group with Micheal Weiss second. Both Goebel and Weiss are former American champions.

Skating to music from the Oscar-winning film "Gladiator," Olympic gold medalist Yagudin opened with a flawless routine in the early qualifying group at the M-Wave that included a quad toe-triple toe combination.

Yagudin, the only gold medalist from Salt Lake City competing here, received all 5.8s and one 5.9 for technical merit and all 5.9s for presentation. He looked very relaxed both on and off the ice, signing autographs and giving a lot of attention to his Japanese fans.

"Actually, I was happy to go in the early group," said Yagudin, who celebrated his 22nd birthday Monday. "With the jet lag I feel really good in the morning." Yagudin arrived in Nagano on Saturday after a grueling 14-hour flight from Hartford, Connecticut.

Goebel, who won the bronze medal at Salt Lake City, turned in a solid performance that included two quads and no errors to the music "An American in Paris."

"Obviously, in qualifying it's not worth the risk of doing a third quad," said Goebel, who had three quads at the Olympics. "But I'm happy I did the quad-toe because I've been having trouble with that."

Weiss, the 1999 and 2000 world bronze medalist, attempted a difficult quad lutz but fell.

"I started trying the quad lutz before and after the Olympic Games," said Weiss. "I just landed a very clean one earlier this week so I just tried. For this one, I landed with one foot but I caught an edge." Weiss nearly landed one at the 1998 National Championships.

The Chinese pair of Zhao and Shen dominated a short program that was missing Olympic gold medalists Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze of Russia and Canadians Jamie Sale and David Pelletier.

Both pairs decided to skip this event, citing the whirlwind of activities that followed the Salt Lake City judging scandal.

The Chinese pair opened their routine to "Kismet" with a throw triple loop. Zhao threw Shen so high and far that she looked like she might land in another time zone. The received mostly 5.8s for technical merit and presentation.

The Chinese are not concerned that the top two gold medalists from Salt Lake City are not here.

"Whether they are here or not we will still be performing our best for the audience," said Zhao. "We are competing against ourselves not anyone else."

Ina and Zimmerman made no mistakes in a routine to Pink Floyd's "Shine on You Crazy Diamond" and earned marks ranging from 5.5 to 5.7 for required elements and 5.6 to 5.8 for presentation.

In pairs, short program counts for one third of the score, with the remaining free program worth two thirds on Wednesday.

 

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