On the evening of February 19, Beijing time, the figure skating project of the Beijing Winter Olympics ended the competition for the last event at the Capital Gymnasium. In the pairs free skating competition, the last Chinese "onion barrel" duo Sui Wenjing / Han Cong played well, winning the gold medal with a world record of 239.88 points.
In the final Winter Olympics figure skating medal table, the Chinese team ranked third in the individual medal table with 1 gold medal (tied with the French team), the Russian Olympic Committee team ranked first with 2 gold, 3 silver and 1 bronze, and the United States won 1 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze ranked second. The Japanese team won 1 silver and 3 bronze, and there was no gold medal in the account.
The Chinese team leads the new with the old
In this Winter Olympics, the Chinese team sent a total of 4 men and 4 women's teams of Sui Wenjing/Han Cong, Peng Cheng/Jin Yang, Jin Boyang, Wang Shiyue/Liu Xinyu and Zhu Yi. Among them, the women's singles young player Zhu Yi is participating in the Winter Olympics for the first time, while the pair skating female player Peng Cheng is the "elder of the three dynasties", and the other players are standing on the Winter Olympic field for the second time.
Judging from the results, the Chinese figure skating team has created a number of its own best results at the Winter Olympics.
In the team competition that began first, the Chinese team achieved the best result since the 3 Winter Olympics, entered the free skating competition for the first time, and finally finished fifth with 50 points. In Sochi and Pingchang, the Chinese team won the seventh and sixth places of this new project, respectively.
In the Chinese team's traditional advantage event double skating, Sui Wenjing/Han Cong short program ranked first, free skating withstood the strong pressure exerted by 3 Russian opponents, and finally broke the world record for the total score of the pair skating with a score of 239.88 points and won the gold medal. Peng Cheng/Jin Yang also played at a high level, finishing fifth after both the short program and the free skate, setting their best personal record at the Winter Olympics.
In terms of ice dance, Wang Shiyue / Liu Xinyu advanced to the free dance with 73.41 points in the rhythm dance, ranking 12th. In the free dance competition, wearing the competition costume inspired by "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains", they almost perfectly showed chinese culture and art forms to the world champions in the competition, and in the end, they scored 111.01 points in the free dance, with a total score of 184.42 points, ranking 12th, creating the best record in the history of the Winter Olympics of Chinese ice dance.
In the men's singles, although Jin Boyang failed to create the best result again after the last Winter Olympics, he showed a very good state in the team and individual 4 games, and finally set a personal season best with 90.98 points in the short program, 179.45 points in the free skating season, and a total score of 270.43 points, ranking ninth.
In women's singles, young player Zhu Yi did not perform well and failed to break into the free skating, which is also the first time in 20 years that the Chinese women's singles has missed the free skating of the Winter Olympics.
The Russian Olympic Committee team is still the strongest
The Russian Olympic Committee team, which won 2 gold, 3 silver and 1 bronze, is undoubtedly the strongest in the figure skating event of this Winter Olympic Games. It can be said that in addition to the men's single skating, they have no shortcomings now.
Women's singles is the strongest link in the Russian Olympic Committee team. At this Winter Olympics, Japan's Hanaori Sakamoto, who finished third, scored 233.13 points. On the premise that Sakamoto Hanori did not make mistakes, this is indeed a not low score, but it is far from the 255.95 points of champion Serbakova and the 251.73 points of runner-up Trusova. Even Valeeva, who was fourth with 224.09 points and missed the podium, was nearly 10 points ahead of fifth-place Higuchi Shinba, all of which was presupposed that Vallieva fell in the free slide due to the impact of the illegal drug incident.
It is foreseeable that for a long time to come, in the women's single skating event, the Russian girls will become the absolute kings.
In the pair skating event, the strength of the Russian Olympic Committee team should not be underestimated. Although Sui Wenjing/Han Cong eventually won the championship, the second to fourth combinations were all from Russia. Moreover, compared to the Tarasova/Molozov pair of veterans, Michelina/Gallamov and Boykova/Kozlovsky are all rookies emerging from this cycle. It can be said that once Sui Wenjing/Han Cong fades out, it will be impossible for other pair skaters to compete with the Russian Olympic Committee team in the short term.
In addition, in the ice dance competition, the Russian No. 1 combination Snitsna / Kassarpov also made significant progress, in this Winter Olympics, although they still lost to the French combination of Papadakis / Xi Zelong, only won a silver medal, but they are still the only combination in the Beijing Winter Olympic preparation cycle to win the French players in international competitions.
There are runners competing for gold and silver in other events except men's singles, and it is no wonder that the Russian Olympic Committee team was able to win the gold medal with a score of 74-65 in the figure skating team competition.
Difficulty becomes the weathervane
Why is the strength of the Russian Olympic Committee team so strong? Why can Chen Wei break through the siege of Japanese players to win the men's singles championship? How did the "Onion Barrel" combination snatch the gold medal from the 3 opponents of the Russian Olympic Committee team? In fact, the answer is very simple, that is, difficulty.
In the men's singles skating competition, Yu Yusei used the challenge 4A under great pressure, a jump that no human race has yet surpassed. Although it was not successful in the end, the 4A action was written into the referee's score list after the Winter Olympics for the first time.
In addition to Yusheng, many players participating in this Winter Olympic Games have also increased their difficulty to a certain extent. For example, most of the men's singles players have gone on the four-week jump, and 6 of them have used the difficult four-week jumping action of 4Lo (around the rear outer ring), 4F (around the rear inner point ice), and 4Lz (around the hooker) and successfully completed. The high difficulty of women's singles is more conspicuous in this Olympic Games, compared with the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympic Games no one challenged 3A (Axel three weeks jump) and four week jump, this time 6 players tried 3A, 3 players challenged the four-week jump, and many players successfully completed.
In addition, in the pair skating free skating competition, the Chinese duo Sui Wenjing / Han Cong used the only turn in the whole game for 4 weeks, which became a key part of their final victory.
Of course, difficulty is never the only criterion, in the women's singles skating competition, Trusova completed 5 weeks but still lost to Serbakova, who only had 2 four weeks, which also shows that performance is still very important for figure skating competitions.
With the end of the Beijing Winter Olympics, the next Winter Olympic preparation cycle is also about to open, for the Chinese figure skating team, how to eat through the rules, how to let the younger generation grow faster, how to make up for the shortcomings as soon as possible, are all problems that need to be solved urgently.