{"id":73590,"date":"2016-04-03T04:32:58","date_gmt":"2016-04-03T08:32:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=73590"},"modified":"2025-01-12T20:28:20","modified_gmt":"2025-01-13T01:28:20","slug":"canadas-duhamel-radford-win-gold-world-figure-skating-championships","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2016\/04\/03\/canadas-duhamel-radford-win-gold-world-figure-skating-championships\/","title":{"rendered":"Canada\u2019s Duhamel and Radford win gold at world figure skating championships"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">What words could possibly describe the most amazing moment of your life? <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/thankyouUniverse?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#thankyouUniverse<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/nevergiveup?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#nevergiveup<\/a> @Worlds2016 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/cKJ4IjFzLA\">pic.twitter.com\/cKJ4IjFzLA<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Meagan Duhamel (@mhjd_85) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mhjd_85\/status\/716627718352347136?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">April 3, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>BOSTON \u2013 In the final few seconds of their gold-medal skate, when she was soaring high above Eric Radford&#8217;s head, Meagan Duhamel was already celebrating.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t even think I was saying words. I was just like \u2018Yeahhhh!\u2019\u201d Duhamel said with a wide smile.<\/p>\n<p>The Canadians captured their second consecutive world pairs title in emphatic fashion Saturday, and by the time they hit their final lift in front of a roaring TD Garden crowd, \u201cI knew it was over, I knew we had done enough,\u201d Duhamel said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen we hit that very last position, I heard her scream, and it just brought a little smile to my face,\u201d Radford added. \u201cWhen you can have those little bursts of a moment in the middle of a program, it\u2019s surreal.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Skating to Adele\u2019s \u201cHometown Glory\u201d and dressed in matching deep blue, the Canadians landed both their quad throw Salchow \u2013 the only skaters in the competition to do so \u2013 and side-by-side triple Lutzes en route to a clean program, earning a personal best 153.81 points. They scored 231.99 overall.<\/p>\n<p>The jam-packed crowd in the 17,565-seat arena rose to its feet as Duhamel and Radford knelt on the ice in a long embrace. In the kiss-and-cry, as they awaited their marks, they gleefully held up oversized likenesses of their faces.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEric\u2019s always the calm to my storm at the end of really great skates,\u201d Duhamel said. \u201cBut he is just as excited as I am.<\/p>\n<div style=\"position:absolute;left:-99195px;\"> buy cialis super force online <a href=\"https:\/\/azpsych.org\/general\/october\/html\/cialis-super-force.html\">https:\/\/azpsych.org\/general\/october\/html\/cialis-super-force.html<\/a> no prescription pharmacy <\/div>\n<p>\u201d<\/p>\n<p>China\u2019s Sui Wenjing and Han Cong, the leaders after the short program, won silver with 224.47 points. Germany\u2019s Aliona Savchenko and Bruno Massot took the bronze with 216.17 points.<\/p>\n<p>Lubov Iliushechkina and Dylan Moscovitch of Toronto were seventh while Kirsten Moore-Towers of St. Catharines, Ont., and Michael Marinaro of Sarnia, Ont., were eighth.<\/p>\n<p>The pairs gold was Canada\u2019s only medal at these world championships.<\/p>\n<p>Later Friday, Gabrielle Daleman of Newmarket, Ont., was ninth in a women\u2019s singles event won by 16-year-old Russian Evgenia Medvedeva.<\/p>\n<p>The back-to-back golds for Duhamel and Radford marks the first time Canada has had repeat champions in pairs since Barbara Wagner and Robert Paul won four straight from 1957 to \u201860.<\/p>\n<p>And their victory came after a frustrating season that at times appeared destined for world championship disappointment. They had utterly dominated pairs last season, but by their own admission they wandered into this season \u201cfloating around,\u201d aimless.<\/p>\n<p>Their perfect streak ended with a second-place finish at the Grand Prix Final. They had a less-than-great skate at the Canadian championships. There were times, they said, that they wondered if they\u2019d done all they could in the sport. They arrived in Boston as \u201cunderdogs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt feels great because it\u2019s difficult not to doubt yourself when everyone else has that expectation of you,\u201d Radford said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou work so hard, and that frustration, it hurts you so deeply, and it just feels so good when it all comes together,\u201d Duhamel said. \u201cAnd I can\u2019t keep anything inside me, I was waiting for him to put up that last lift, because I was just going to explode.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They did an about-face after the Canadian championships, following a particular meeting with their choreographer Julie Marcotte. Like flicking on a lightswitch, \u201cit really was like a change in one day,\u201d Radford said.<\/p>\n<p>Duhamel and Radford teamed up in 2010 after each failed to qualify for the Vancouver Olympics with their previous partners. Their first world championships, in 2011 in Moscow, was memorable because Duhamel badly broke Radford\u2019s nose during a lift in their short program, soaking his shirt in blood. They went on to finish seventh.<\/p>\n<p>They\u2019ve maintained a steady march up the global standings ever since, and won world bronze in both 2013 and \u201814.<\/p>\n<p>Iliushechkina and Moscovitch, meanwhile, scored 199.<\/p>\n<div style=\"position:absolute;left:-99195px;\"> buy periactin online <a href=\"https:\/\/azpsych.org\/general\/october\/html\/periactin.html\">https:\/\/azpsych.org\/general\/october\/html\/periactin.html<\/a> no prescription pharmacy <\/div>\n<p>52 for their program to Rachmaninov\u2019s Symphony No. 2.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was a bit of work but a lot of fun,\u201d said Moscovitch. \u201cWe did a great job of working our way through the program. We kept our focus on the choreography and enjoyment of the program and that really pulled us through.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Moore-Towers and Marinaro of Sarnia, Ont., scored 190.90 in their first world championships as a team.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith two personal best performances here it sets us up well for next season,\u201d said Moore-Towers. \u201cI\u2019m thrilled.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Daleman scored 195.68, a huge 53-point improvement over last season, and afterward the 18-year-old fought back the tears.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s just tears of being proud,\u201d Daleman said.<\/p>\n<div style=\"position:absolute;left:-99195px;\"> buy prevacid online <a href=\"https:\/\/azpsych.org\/general\/october\/html\/prevacid.html\">https:\/\/azpsych.org\/general\/october\/html\/prevacid.html<\/a> no prescription pharmacy <\/div>\n<p> \u201cLast year was not a good year for me at all\u2026 so I\u2019m so proud of how far I\u2019ve come, what I\u2019m able to do and now I know I can be with the top skaters, and now I\u2019m just going to go home, push myself even more and get ready for next year.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Medvedeva scored 223.86 to capture the gold, while American Ashley Wagner won silver with 215.39, and another Russian teen Anna Pogorilaya was third with 213.69.<\/p>\n<p>Alaine Chartrand of Prescott, Ont., was 17th.<\/p>\n<p>Daleman admitted to feeling nauseous with nerves all day, but the moment her music started, the nerves disappeared.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs soon as I heard the first beat of my music, no one was there, there was no judges, no audience, just me on the ice, doing what I love, and what I do every day,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Chartrand fought back tears for a different reason. The 20-year-old skater who was so solid in winning the Canadian championships had two shaky programs in Boston.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI should have more confidence than I do,\u201d she said. \u201cI was really disappointed after the short, hoping to come back with a strong long program, something like I did at nationals. I know I can do that, I did that so often. I just didn\u2019t feel that same level of comfort.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BOSTON \u2013 In the final few seconds of their gold-medal skate, when she was soaring high above Eric Radford&#8217;s head, &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":73591,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1482,44],"tags":[9636],"class_list":["post-73590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-sports","tag-cp","mauthors-lori-ewing","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73590","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73590"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73590\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":283029,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73590\/revisions\/283029"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}