Javier Fernandez, a skater with duende, has transcendent triumph

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BOSTON - There was a transcendent performance at the 2016 World Figure Skating Championships.

It came not from Japan's Yuzuru Hanyu, the man who had been doing otherworldly stuff all season, but from Javier Fernández, the defending champion whom Hanyu had overshadowed.

His was, simply, the greatest free skate in the history of the world championships, whether you judge it by the point total or the total package of jump difficulty, entertainment quality, competitive courage and stylistic sass Fernández showed Friday night before a near-sellout crowd at TD Garden.

The best way to describe it is with the Spanish word duende. No matter that the word has no exact translation but has come to connote ideas like passion, magnetism, inspiration and guts that add up to an intangible sense of genius.

That -- all of it -- is what Fernández embodied on another step in the improbable journey that has taken a 24-year-old from a country with no figure skating tradition to consecutive world titles and four straight European championships.

On top of that, the second title came on a night when Fernández challenged himself to try the most difficult program content of his career despite a right heel inflammation that made it impossible to practice productively the past two days. He thanked the event's medical team for the treatment, including an ultrasound, that made it possible for him to skate at all, let alone give a performance for the ages.

Fernández had three flawless quadruple jumps, one in a quad-triple combination, with two getting the highest possible Grades of Execution (GOEs) one can achieve. He did two triple axels for the first time in one of his three-quad free skates. He gave a presentation of Frank Sinatra's Guys and Dolls so pitch-perfect, in interpretation and skating prowess, that 26 of his 45 component scores were perfect 10s.

"I actually don't know how I did it," Fernández said. "Sometimes it doesn't matter what happened before."

It didn't matter that Hanyu, the Olympic champion and Fernández' training partner under coach Brian Orser, had a seemingly insurmountable lead of more than 12 points after the short program, when the Spaniard fell on one jump and the Japanese skater missed topping his world record score by less than half a point.

"Before skating, I knew I had a chance to win but that I had to do a clean program, and I did," Fernández said.

A combination of Hanyu's flawed skating and Fernández' brilliance allowed the Spaniard to win by more than 19 points, 314.93 to 295.17. Fernández' free skate score, 216.41, is the second highest ever, behind only Hanyu's 219.48 from this season's Grand Prix Final.

Hanyu put his hand down on the landings of two jumps, a quad and a triple, fell on a second quad and had four negative GOEs. He looked lifeless at points in his 4 minutes, 30 seconds on the ice.

The 2014 Olympic and world champion now has finished second to Fernández at the world championships the past two years.

"I can't explain my feelings," Hanyu said. "I am really tired and really happy for Javi. But I am really sad for my long program. I want to do it again."

China's Boyang Jin slogged his way into third (270.99), becoming the first Chinese man to win a world medal, when three-time world champion Patrick Chan of Canada fell apart to finish eighth in the free skate.

As has happened in the past, the judges still were overly generous to Chan, and that cost the United States a third men's spot at the 2017 World Championships. Chan wound up fifth overall, 2.31 points ahead of Rippon. Had their places been reversed, Rippon and Max Aaron (eighth) would have had the requisite total (13) to keep the third spot.

In a bittersweet touch, Rippon, Aaron and Grant Hochstein (10th) all had career-highlight free skates and gave the United States three men in the top 10 for the first time since 2005. (This was the eighth time the U.S. had three men's entrants in that span.)

The revelation of the week was world championships rookie Mikhail Kolyada, 21, of Russia, who did two clean programs -- with a successful quad in each -- to finish fourth, just three points behind Jin.

In the end, though, it mattered little what anyone but Fernández did. The man from Madrid was a winner with duende. It is rare and hard to define but wonderful to recognize.

(This article originally appeared on icenetwork.)

U.S. ice dancers keep piling up world medals

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BOSTON - In “Fix You,” the Coldplay song ice dancers Maia and Alex Shibutani chose for their free dance this season, the lyrics speak of trying your best but not succeeding and being stuck in reverse.

It was the perfect anthem to describe the previous four seasons of an ice dance career in which the Shibutanis have succeeded at going forward once again.

The surprise world bronze medalists of 2011 became what seemed like almost predictable silver medalists behind Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron of France Thursday night at TD Garden, capping a comeback season in which the siblings from Michigan earlier won their first national and international titles.

"We have had an interesting journey," Maia Shibutani said.

Last year’s silver medalists, Madison Chock and Evan Bates, took the bronze to give the United States two ice dance medals at the same worlds for just the third time ever.

It also happened in 2011 (gold-bronze) and 1966 (silver-bronze.)

After a 20-year medal drought from 1985 until 2005, four different U.S dance teams have won medals in 10 of the last 12 seasons.  That includes two world titles (and the 2014 Olympic gold) by Meryl Davis and Charlie White.

The French team’s second straight world title also represented a comeback, as Papadakis still has headaches from the August concussion that nearly ruined her season.  It happened on a practice fall while doing footwork.

“It was two months before I was skating normally,” she said.  “I had big headaches and trouble focusing.  I still have headaches but nothing that bothers me on the ice.”

Papadakis and Cizeron won both the short and free dances for a comfortable winning margin of 6.01 points.  Chock and Bates were 2.66 behind the Shibutanis, the first ice dancers to win world medals five years apart.

"Our career has definitely been unique," Alex Shibutani said.  "We never thought about such a gap between medals.  We just kept putting one foot in front of the other."

Gracie Gold shines brightest amidst glittering skates at worlds

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BOSTON - Much has been made of the U.S. ladies' nine-season medal drought at the World Figure Skating Championships. But it also had been five seasons since a U.S. skater even won one of the small medals given to the top three after the short program.

So Gracie Gold ending the second of those fruitless stretches was an achievement of no small significance. That she did it by finishing first Thursday afternoon at TD Garden when the skating quality was higher and deeper than it has ever been at a world championships was of even greater consequence.

"I can kind of see the light at the end of the tunnel that, maybe, the drought is ending," Gold said.

She and teammate Ashley Wagner, who sits fourth after a career-best score, now have four minutes of Saturday's free skate to show that the light is not coming from the oncoming train that has derailed U.S. hopes since Kimmie Meissner and Sasha Cohen finished first and third, respectively, in 2006.

The way both skated Thursday -- and the scores each received in a competition that was as good as it gets -- makes it seem likely this will be the year that almost anything can happen, even if the standings are so close from first to sixth.

Gold had a career-best 76.43 points, giving her a margin of 2.45 over surprising Anna Pogorilaya of Russia (73.98), who avoided the bone-jarring falls for which she has become notorious.

Evgenia Medvedeva of Russia (73.76), who has won each of her competitions this season on the way to worlds, and Wagner (73.16) were just a whisker behind Pogorilaya.

Gold, the reigning U.S. champion, had the highest technical and component scores. Wagner was second in components, an encouraging sign.

This was the Gold that coach Frank Carroll has long been waiting to show up at a major championship.

"A magical moment," she said.

She fought for the opening triple lutz that had, in her own words, left her "flummoxed" at the U.S. championships, then added a triple toe for a big combination and commanded the ice for the final two minutes of the 2-minute, 50-second program. Gold put her hands on her head with a look of joyous disbelief when it ended.

"She skates so consistently, day in and day out (in practice), that when she doesn't, it's maddening," Carroll said. "The long program, she better do the same thing, or she's dead."

Skating next to last in the 38-woman field, Gold was not able to see any of the captivating stuff that preceded her. The final eight, including Gold and Wagner, did programs with no major error.

Earlier, their teammate, Mirai Nagasu, also had a memorable performance, spoiled only by an under-rotation on the second jump in her triple-triple combination. Nagasu, subbing for the injured Polina Edmunds, placed 10th with 65.74 points, but the crowd gave her a deserved reward with a roaring, pulsating standing ovation.

Nagasu had been the only U.S. skater to be in the top three going into the free skate at a world championships since 2006. She was first after the short in 2010 before dropping to seventh.

In her three previous worlds, Gold had placed ninth, fifth and eighth in the short.

"I'm just a piece of the puzzle, but it looks like we (the U.S.) are in pretty good shape this year."

Gold, Pogorilaya and Wagner had positive Grades of Execution throughout. So did seventh-place Rika Hongo of Japan and eighth-place Gabrielle Daleman of Canada.

Medvedeva saved her program after a clumsy landing on her opening jump made her scratch that planned combination. She made up for it with a triple-triple barely 10 seconds from the end.

Japan's Satoko Miyahara, the reigning silver medalist, was exquisite as always but good enough only for sixth after an edge problem on her triple flip.

And Gold, 20, was clearly better than them all. Think about that. She was struggling to wrap her mind around what she had done, about beating such formidable efforts by the others.

"It's validating," she said. "It really means a lot. I don't know if it has really sunk in yet, the gravity."

Gold could see the potential for such splendid skating from the practices the three U.S. ladies shared with the three Japanese skaters. She also has had a first-hand view the last few years of how good the Russians can be.

"There have been practice days when we all have been throwing down clean (free skates)," Gold said. "That's a worlds when, if you're in the top 10, you're an incredible skater."

Like Mao Asada, for instance. Imagine if the three-time world champion from Japan could have nailed the triple axel the way she had in practices instead of falling on it as she did in the short program. Asada wound up ninth (65.87).

Wagner could laugh about her fall, when her feet got tangled and she wound up on her rump as she started to celebrate her performance.

"It just shows I am human after a superhuman skate," she said.

Wagner had finished 11th, eighth, fifth, seventh and 11th in her previous short programs at worlds. Her best overall finish is fourth, in 2012, after the eighth-place short.

"[The free skate] is definitely the tougher part for me," she said. "(But) a great short program isn't going to do anything for me in the long program."

Wagner's was among so many great short programs. This was a day when the magic filled the arena for much longer than only Gold's moment. 

(This article originally appeared on icenetwork.)