Pang and Tong hold on to lead to lift pairs crown

PANG Qing and Tong Jian maintained their overnight lead to lift the pairs title at the World Figure Skating Championships in Turin.

 

SECOND WORLD TITLE: China's Pang Qing and Tong Jian fail to match their world record free skate from Vancouver, but ease to the world title in Turin (Getty Images)

The Chinese duo are the undisputed masters of the free skate, having set the current world record with their effort of 141.81 points at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver last month.

And after storming into the lead with a season's best 75.82 short program on Tuesday, there seemed little doubt Pang and Tong would recapture the title they won four years ago in Calgary.

The Chinese duo struck silver behind compatriots Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver last month, but with their teammates retiring for the second time after the Games, the door was open for Pang and Tong to go one better in Turin.

But with the gold medal theirs to lose, the Chinese duo were far from perfect, losing timing during a spin and a triple toe-loop.

Rather than making up ground on the leaders as they were in Vancouver, Pang and Tong were defending their lead and looked uncharacteristically shaky throughout.

But the difficulty of their program ensured they kept their noses ahead as they were awarded the top score of 136.11 to take their overall score to 211.39.

Germany's defending champions Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy did their utmost to scoop a third consecutive title as they made up for an error-strewn short program with a near-flawless free skate of 135.22.

And while their overall score of 204.74 wasn't enough to displace the Chinese pair, it did promote them above Russia's Yuko Kavaguti and Alexander Smirnov who finished third on 203.79.

And Szolkowy admitted their performance had been the perfect antidote to their disastrous short program.

"We're obviously happy to win the silver medal," said the German.

"We were both really disappointed after our performance in the short program but we were much better in the free skate.

"We just told ourselves to enjoy skating and made sure we smiled. That performance really came from the heart."

Great Britain's Stacey Kemp and David King finished 16th overall, matching their result from Vancouver last month.