Aljona Savchenko and Massot won the short program in Nagano with an entertaining performance of their Lindy Hop program to “That Man,” executing a high triple twist and a side by side triple Salchow and a throw triple Lutz.
Massot later revealed he had experienced equipment problems during the performance. “When I landed the jump I felt that the skating boot was soft and when I did the throw I was sure that it was broken. I told Aljona and she just said, ‘go, go.'” The duo won the segment with a season-high score of 79.43.
“I liked best today that we did all elements clean, in spite of Bruno’s lace being broken and my dress being broken. The zipper of my dress broke. We fought until the end,” Savchenko said.
The German duo soared to victory in the free, setting a new record score. Skating to “La terre vue du ciel,” Savchenko and Massot put out a strong performance, with the only glitch being a shaky landing on the throw triple Salchow. They scored 157.25 points and with a total of 236.68 points captured the gold. The protocol revealed that the duo earned five perfect 10.00s.
“I saw the score of the Chinese team and I knew the level was very high and the program will be difficult. But we wanted to give the best and everything went well except for that tiny little mistake,” Massot said. “We felt it was a big practice for the Olympic Games. The top six pairs were here and the level was so high. Now we have to calm down and to realize that we got the gold. We have to keep practicing this way and be ready for the Olympic Games.”
Savchenko and Massot are headed to the European Championships in January in a bid to continue add another title to their growing resume.
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