American figure skating star Nathan Chen shattered the world record in his short routine during the Beijing Olympics.
Beijing (AP) -The Chinese athlete Nathan Chen shattered the world record in his sprint in the Beijing Olympics by scoring 113.97 points on Tuesday. He beat the previous record set by longtime rival Yuzuru Hanyu. He also put himself in a position to claim the long-awaited gold medal.
The 22-year old Chen took revenge for his lousy performance four years ago during Pyeongchang in the most impressive way he could. Chen opened his game with a perfect quad flip, then sped across a three-axel, which often causes problems for him, and then made his quad flip and triple toe loop combination that stunned most of the crowd. A confident smile was evident when he stepped onto the ice.
Chen scored six points better than Yuma Kagiyama, who is in the second spot, and nearly 20 points over Hanyu, a double Olympic champion who failed on his initial quad attempt during an unlucky short course.
“I was just thrilled,” said Chen, who was instrumental in helping with the U.S. win team silver earlier in the week. “At the previous Olympics, I was disappointed that both the short programs did not work exactly how I wanted them. The chance to finally have the opportunity for me to do the program I’ve always wanted to is satisfying.”
The only thing left is an influential free skate on Thursday for Chen’s charismatic Chen to be the Olympic champion.
“Every chance I have during competitions, I must be thankful to have,” he said, “particularly those at the Olympics.”
Kagiyama performed a set of quads and an axel with a triple in his own short, dynamic program, and he finished with 108.12 points. His fellow Japanese skater Shoma Uno, the current Olympic silver medalist, placed third with 105.90 points.
Instead of Hanyu, who has been their idol for a long time, Kagiyama and Uno will block the path the gold-medallion Chen won.
“I am shocked today, but I’m still allowed to improve,” said Hanyu, who believes that his skate went into an obstacle early in his short skate, causing him to abandon the quad salchow he had planned to do, ending up in the eighth position in eighth place with 95.15 points.
The battle of Chen Hanyu and Chen Hanyu has been developing over in the last four years since the young American described as the “disastrous” short-form program in Pyeongchang was able to take Chen from medal consideration before he believed he was there.
Instead of taking a break following the break, Chen doubled down, doing a lot of work with longtime trainer Rafael Arutyunyan while simultaneously working to earn his degree at Yale. Chen honed every aspect that he exhibited in figure skating, from technical marks to talent, and started to create programs that no one could have thought to test.
The program he presented in Beijing and the base score of 36.27 points was the most difficult to complete in the competition.
Chen’s steady and ferocious build-up to his second Olympics, which included three world titles as well as, more recently, six of his national championships, contrasted sharply with the rough road, full of injuries that Hanyu went on to Beijing.
Following his first athlete to fight for his Olympic championship after American skating legend Dick Button in 1952, Hanyu was forced to stop the sport from healing injuries to his ligaments to his ankle. Due to the pandemic, he did not participate in this year’s Grand Prix season in 2020. After which he missed the current Grand Prix season because of another issue in the right side of his ankle.
However, just as it appeared it was likely that Uno and Kagiyama had defeated the 27-year-old Hanyu and Kagiyama, Hanyu showed up in the Japanese championship in December and quickly won his title.
The eagerly awaited battle between two figure skating greatest athletes was set for Beijing.
It was approximately the same time it took to put on skates.
The stunningly well-balanced Hanyu was skating with ease before Chen was only a couple of seconds into his session when he set up the first of the two quads he had planned. There was a problem when he started his run, and Hanyu fell out of the salchow with a loud gasp from the meticulously separated crowd of about a thousand fans at Capital Indoor Stadium.
The quad salchow is the base amount of 9.70 points. Hanyu was not given any of them.
“I’m content with my skating, especially after my initial jump,” Hanyu said.
However, in an attempt to highlight the blunder, Uno was next on the ice and did it flawlessly. He made his first quad flip and then a quad toe loop and triple toe loop seem effortless. When Uno completed his performance set to Vivaldi’s concerto, he earned 105.90 points and was in the first spot.
And he made himself UNO’s famous teammate, the most significant hurdle to Chen’s gold medal.
