MOSCOW — Toronto’s Patrick Chan stumbled to second spot at the Cup of Russia Grand Prix figure skating event Saturday.
Tomas Verner of the Czech Republic went from third to first to capture the gold medal.
Chan led after a solid short program that saw him land a quad. But in the long program, he fell on his quad attempt and on two tries for triples.
“I felt really good going in,” Chan said during a conference call afterwards. “Of course I was the last skater, which is a challenge on its own, but I did everything that we planned I would do and was well prepared and felt good.
“Sometimes you just go out and things don’t click and you just don’t land the jumps the way you want to and that happens. Overall I was really pleased with myself to be able to recover from the quad and move on. That’s something I’m going to take from this competition.”
Chan said he felt confident heading into the quad attempt Saturday.
“I went into it as I do in practice,” he said. “I thought about my key words, staying over my legs and being really balanced and remembering where to step.
“Sometimes you just have a little hesitation and that’s just a lack of experience. I mean, it’s only my second time doing it in competition in a long program. It’s all a learning experience.”
Chan and American Jeremy Abbott were ahead of Verner heading into Saturday’s free skate. But both fell repeatedly and neither managed a quadruple jump.
Verner didn’t attempt a quad but stayed on his feet, although he stepped out of two axels. His crowd-pleasing program to Michael Jackson music was marked by a soaring open triple lutz and a fast triple-double-double cascade late in the program.
In women’s competition, Miki Ando of Japan rocketed from fifth after the short to take the gold ahead of her compatriot Akiko Suzuki in second.
After a clean short program, Myriane Samson of St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que., fell on two jumps to finish eighth. It was her first overseas Grand Prix assignment.
“When you fall on those jumps in competition it just means more practice,” said Samson. “I need to keep doing them until it becomes more automatic.”
In pairs, Russia’s Yuko Kavagut and Alexander Smirnov easily took the gold with tightly synchronized spins and long throws. Japan’s Narumi Takahashi and Mervin Tran took silver and Americans Amanda Evora and Mark Ladwig were third.
Paige Lawrence of Kennedy, Sask., and Rudi Swiegers of Kipling, Sask., scored 154.67 to finish fifth.
Russians Ekaterina Bobrova and Dmitri Soloviev won the ice dancing, followed by Nora Hoffman and Maxim Zavozin of Hungary and Russia’s Elena Ilinykh and Nikita Katsalapov.
Alexandra Paul and Mitchell Islam of Barrie, Ont., withdrew due to a rib injury to Paul suffered earlier this month in training.
The couple was eighth after Saturday’s short program.
“At this point in the season, the best thing for me is to take a week or two off and fully recover,” said Paul. “We had modified for the short program and most of the elements in that didn’t bother me at all. In the free dance that wasn’t the case.”