Estonian skater Niina Petrõkina came seventh in women’s singles at the ISU World Championships in Prague, Estonia’s best-ever result at that level.
Fellow Estonian Nataly Langerbaur placed 20th.
Petrõkina, who was crowned European champion for the second time in a row in January and was also seventh overall at February’s Milano Cortina Winter Olympics, brought her long and fatiguing season to a close with a free skate (second round) score of 134.98 points.
The short program and free skate combined earned her 202.27 points, and although her personal best is nearly 14 points higher, several competitors made mistakes, Petrõkina’s score ultimately lifted her to seventh place— as noted, the best result in Estonia’s history at the World Championships.
Petrõkina, 21, had placed 11th after the initial short program on Wednesday with a score of 67.29 points, while Langerbaur’s 56.56 placed her 21st. The top 24 in the short program qualified for the free skate, meaning both Estonians went through, with the free program held in reverse order of score, putting Langerbaur in the first cohort to take to the ice Friday evening, Petrõkina in the third.
Japanese star Kaori Sakamoto in her swansong world championships was in the lead after the short program.
Petrõkina’s previous highest place at world championship level had been the 8th spot she took in Montreal two years ago, so she improved on that by one position even with a lower score.
“I don’t want to lie: it was quite hard,” Petrõkina said post-event. “My muscles don’t work as well as they should anymore, but I tried to pull myself together until the end. I still tried to enjoy it, because this is the last competition and the last time I performed this program for the audience. I’m very happy that after the injury I managed to show myself so well until the end of the season. I’m very satisfied that I didn’t make any major mistakes,” she went on.
Petrõkina had undergone Achilles tendon surgery last year.
“Physically, you could see that she was pushing, but she had no strength left,” added coach Svetlana Varnavskaja. “Still, she completed everything — there were small errors, but no falls and, as we say, no ‘butterflies.’ Of course, you always want the scores to go up, but the most important competitions this year were the Olympic Games, and there we showed a good level. The season has been long and exhausting, and at this competition it was clear that physically she was no longer in as good shape as at the Europeans and the Olympics.”
Langerbaur earned 105.62 points for her free skate, just over five points below her PB and giving her 162.18 points overall, as noted, bumping her up one place after the short program to 20th.
Langerbaur’s PB of 165.85 was set two and a half years ago.
“Today I felt calmer than before the short program,” said Langerbaur, “I already had a good feeling in training and was able to trust the work done there during the competition, switch off my mind, and trust my body. I’m satisfied with today’s performance—I did my job properly. The World Championships experience is powerful—the arena and the audience… it’s something extraordinary. Such a large crowd is a first for me. There were even more spectators here than at my first Worlds,” the skater went on.
Coach Irina Kononova was pleased too. “Overall, I’m definitely satisfied — after all, it’s the best score of the season. There were some mistakes, and points were deducted for them. At first, she was a bit nervous, which led to small errors, but in the second half of the program she became calmer and fought until the end,” she said.
Sakamoto shone brightly, improving her personal best by more than two points with a total of 238.28 and winning her fourth and last world title. Silver went to her compatriot Mone Chiba with 228.47 points, while the bronze was claimed by Belgium’s Nina Pinzarrone with 215.20.
The Figure Skating World Championships in Prague run until Sunday.
All eyes in Estonia will be on the men’s free skate today from 1.35 p.m. Estonian time, as Aleksandr Selevko, who took a bronze “small” medal after Thursday’s short program in Prague, takes to the ice.
ERR’s Sport portal is carrying his performance live here.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte
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