Mikhail Kolyada, who hasn’t competed since March of 2019, is the leader of the men’s event after the short program at the third stage of the Cup of Russia series.
The 25-year-old former World and European bronze medalist Kolyada changed his coach to Alexei Mishin before the season, after having worked with Valentina Chebotareva since the age of five. He landed his opening quad toe loop-triple toe loop combination; a clean short program technique-wise, with a good triple axel and triple Lutz, earned Kolyada a large total score of 101.72 points.
Reigning European and Russian National champion Dmitri Aliev hung on to his first quad Lutz attempt, albeit a slight under-rotation. Although there were reports that he would perform a simplified routine, the 21-year-old successfully landed a quad toe loop-double toe loop combination, as well as a triple axel. He received a total score of 94.01 points and is currently second.
2020 World Junior champion Andrei Mozalev fell on his opening quad flip, which he under-rotated anyway, but landed the following quad toe loop-triple toe loop combination. The 17-year-old added a triple axel and earned a total score of 90.66 points for third place.
17-year-old Ilya Yablokov opened his short program with a triple flip and a triple axel. A quad-less but artistic presentation with impressive spins earned the young athlete a total score of 82.27 points, enough for fourth place and over twenty points ahead of the next skater.
Results:
- Mikhail Kolyada – 101.72
- Dmitri Aliev – 94.01
- Andrei Mozalev – 90.66
- Ilya Yablokov – 82.27
- Artem Lezheev – 62.03
- Maxim Vakarin – 59.97
- Vladislav Katichev – 48.50
