{"id":16865,"date":"2014-02-15T04:02:16","date_gmt":"2014-02-15T04:02:16","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2014-02-15T04:02:16","modified_gmt":"2014-02-15T04:02:16","slug":"First-Japanese-wins-figure-skating-men-s-GOLD--All-Asians-on-podium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/?p=16865","title":{"rendered":"First Japanese wins figure skating men’s GOLD – All Asians on podium"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yuzuru Hanyu made it difficult on himself before coming through to win Japan’s first gold medal in Olympic men’s figure skating Friday night at the Sochi Games.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not only did Hanyu fall on his opening jump, a quad salchow, but he also crashed on his third, a triple flip.<\/strong> That left plenty of room for Canada’s Patrick Chan to skate through to the top of the podium, but he made three errors in a watered-down program to finish second.<\/p>\n

Canada has never won the event, either.<\/p>\n

Kazakhstan’s Denis Ten, the world silver medalist, won bronze in Sochi in a final that was a two-man showdown between Hanyu, now the first Asian man to win a title at these Games, and three-time world champion Chan.<\/p>\n

Neither performed close to his peak on a second consecutive night of competition.<\/strong> Most skaters appeared fatigued, particularly at the end of their 4 1\/2-minute free skate routines. It was one of the sloppiest men’s Olympic programs in memory.<\/p>\n