Russia’s Team Paradise emerged victorious on Saturday at the World Synchronized Skating Championships in Helsinki, Finland.
Finland, though, managed to land both Marigold Ice Unity and the Helsinki Rockettes on the podium with silver and bronze, respectively.
Team Paradise led the field after the short program and scored 147.26 points in the free skate for 234.38 points overall and the gold medal. They skated to “Die Fledermaus” (The Bat) by Johann Strauss.
“This victory is very important to us,” Paradise team captain Anna Shkurdai commented via the ISU. “When we took this music, we realized it wasn’t going to be an easy task. It is indeed a very well-known movie and music in Russia and in the rest of the world and we tried to bring across the atmosphere of a ball the best way possible and I think we did that.”
A slim margin separated silver and bronze, as Marigold Ice Unity finished with 228.70 points and the Helsinki Rockettes earned 228.61 points.
“We feel very happy about the final result and the crowd was just amazing. We’ve never skated in such an atmosphere,” Marigold team captain Sofia Ahti said, despite her team’s fall in the artistic line element.
The U.S. had two teams in the field. The Massachusetts-based Haydenettes finished sixth with 216.54 points and the New York-based Skyliners finished in eighth with 204.06 points.
“We feel amazing,” Haydenettes team member Sarah Checkosky said via U.S. Figure Skating. “The crowd was really into it even more so that yesterday. I think right when we hit our ending pose, we knew that we hit everything we wanted to. We are really happy with it.”
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