Led by Anastasia Mishina/Aleksandr Galliamov, Russian pairs swept the podium at the ISU World Junior Figure Skating Championships on Thursday.
Apollinaria Panfilova/Dmitry Rylov claimed the silver medal while overnight leaders Polina Kostiukovich/Dmitrii Ialin settled for the bronze. It was the fourth podium sweep by Russian pairs at Junior Worlds after 1985, 1986 and 2018.
Anastasia Mishina and Aleksandr Galliamov of Russia rose from third to first place on Thursday 2019©International Skating Union (ISU)
Mishina/Galliamov opened their performance to the “Master and Margarita” soundtrack with a high triple twist and throw triple flip. Mishina then fell on the back end of the triple Salchow-Euler-triple Salchow combination, but the pair recovered to hit a triple toe, throw triple Salchow as well a difficult lifts and spins.
The ISU Junior Grand Prix Final champions scored 121.72 points and totaled 188.74 points to pull up from third place. Mishina’s gold in Zagreb means she now has a complete set of World Junior medals, with bronze from Sofia in 2018 and silver from 2016 in Debrecen with her previous partner Vladislav Mirzoev.
“We were third after the short program, but that actually pushed us to skate with more emotions and cleaner in order to move up in the standings,” Galliamov said. Mishina added: “I didn’t think about my mistake, I forgot about it right away.”
Apollinaria Panfilova and Dmitry Rylov achieving a season's best score in Zagreb 2019©International Skating Union (ISU)
Panfilova/Rylov delivered a smooth and elegant performance to the “W.E.” soundtrack by Abel Korzeniowski that was highlighted by beautiful triple throws and three level-four elements. The team from Perm achieved a season’s best with 120.26 points and accumulated 188.17 points overall.
“I am in shock about the silver,” Rylov said. “I thought we’d get the bronze like in all the other competitions.”
Panfilova said: “We’re working with our choreographer in Perm and we do dance on the floor. The emotions in the program come with the music and with the feeling for the music.”
Kostiukovich/Ialin produced a triple twist, throw triple loop, triple toe and four level-four elements in their routine to “Xotica”. However, Kostiukovich fell on the throw triple Salchow and the triple Salchow was called underrotated.
Polina Kostiukovich and Dmitrii Ialin let slip their overnight lead on Thursday 2019©International Skating Union (ISU)
The 2018 World Junior silver medalists scored 113.28 points and slipped from first to third at 181.59 points.
“Being in the lead didn’t affect me,” Ialin said. “I knew we had a job to do and we tried to do our best, but unfortunately not everything worked out.”
Kostiukovich, who was celebrating her 16th birthday on Thursday, said: “It was a huge experience for us, it was our second Junior Worlds. We got the silver last year and now the bronze so hopefully next year we can win the gold.”
Feiyao Tang/Yongchao Yang (CHN) finished fourth on 168.77 points with a solid performance except for Tang’s fall on the triple toeloop. Sarah Feng/TJ Nyman (USA) moved up one spot to fifth (162.90 points) while Laiken Lockley/Keenan Prochnow (USA) dropped to sixth (159.54 points).
The ISU World Junior Figure Skating Championships 2019 continue Friday with the Junior Ladies Short Program and the Junior Men’s Free Skating. The ISU World Junior Figure Skating Championships will be available to watch at https://www.isu.org/figure-skating in certain countries.
For more information, full entry lists and results please see the event website and the official website. Follow the event on social media using the hashtags #WorldJFigure and #FigureSkating.
