|
Cohen squeezes past Slutskaya in women's figure skating
(Reuters)
Updated: 2006-02-22 10:27
TURIN (Reuters) - Irina Slutskaya's bid to become the first Russian to win
the women's figure skating title at the Winter Olympics hung in the balance
after she was left trailing in second place by Sasha Cohen on Tuesday.
Cohen finishes in
the women's short program during the Figure Skating competition at the
Winter Olympic Games. [Reuters] | The American
performed a dazzling short program to score 66.73, just 0.03 more than the
Russian favorite going into Thursday's free skate.
Japan's Shizuka Arakawa was lying third.
Slutskaya is unlikely to get too flustered as the lead held by Cohen is
negligible under the new cumulative-points scoring system.
"I am happy. I skated well. This is a competition and sometimes things don't
go as you'd like them to," said Slutskaya, the silver medallist from four years
ago.
"Everybody thinks about (me making history) but not me."
If Slutskaya wins on Thursday, Russia will become the first nation to sweep
all four figure skating titles at the Games.
Cohen, second behind Slutskaya at last year's world championships, looked
nervous as she skated on the ice to perform the last short program of a long
evening. She hardly acknowledged the crowd, thick with U.S. flags.
Once she had landed her first two jumps performed to a medley of Russian folk
music, she started smiling, when she landed the next one, her shoulders relaxed
and she swung through the rest of her routine with ease.
When she finished, she punched the air and cried, "Right on!" before skating
around the rink to receive deafening applause.
As she saw her marks flash on the scoreboard, it gradually dawned on her that
she had scored high enough to challenge the top field.
When she was announced as being in first place, she leapt in the air with one
arm raised, a huge smile across her face.
|
