Finlandia Trophy 2024: Dominant short program helps Kagiyama Yuma hold on to win after "worst program this season"
Kagiyama Yuma claimed back-to-back Grand Prix victories and guaranteed himself a spot in the Final despite a shaky free skate, while France's Kevin Aymoz and Italy's Daniel Grassl soared up in the rankings to wrap up the podium.
Figure Skating
Kagiyama Yuma secured back-to-back Grand Prix victories at the 2024 Finlandia Trophy, guaranteeing himself a spot in December's Final, but the mood in the kiss-and-cry area on Saturday (16 November) was anything but celebratory.
The Japanese figure skater was visibly shocked as he sat down after a free skate riddled with popped jumps and step outs, so unlike the man who celebrated a dominant victory at the NHK Trophy a week ago. Kagiyama had earned 194.39 points for that skate – a stark contrast to the 159.12 that flashed up on the scoreboard after his free program in Helsinki.
In the end, it was his strong lead in the short program that helped him to hold on to the top spot, with a 263.09 total, despite finishing fifth in the free skate.
"It is the worst program that I have done this season and I regret not having brought my best to you today," a disappointed Kagiyama said to the spectators through an interpreter when his victory was confirmed.
The two-time Olympic silver medallist popped his opening quad flip to an audible gasp from the audience and put his foot down on the quad Salchow that followed. While Kagiyama seemed to regain his composure with a strong quad toeloop-triple toeloop combination, it proved short-lived as he missed the next combination and stepped out on a triple Axel.
Cheers from the crowd spurred on Kagiyama as he went into his final step sequences, uncharacteristically low on energy and expression, to finish the program.
Kevin Aymoz of France and Italy's Daniel Grassl completed the podium.
"I won the competition but it didn't go well and I will continue to work hard to do my best," Kagiyama added in the post-skate press conference.
"My goals for the season is to win all the competitions coming up – Grand Prix Final, Nationals and other competitions. I made mistakes today but I don't want to make the same mistakes again."
Aymoz seals Final berth, Grassl rebounds for podium
The emotions in the kiss-and-cry were completely different to Kagiyama's for runner-up Aymoz who was elated when his strong free skate put him high up in the rankings. Third after the short program, the French skater had said on Friday that he would try not to let the pressure of potentially qualifying for the Grand Prix Final, which will be held at his home rink in Grenoble, get to him in a "stressful" free skate.
But from the start it looked like it might have, with the Frenchman falling on his opening quad toeloop and then spinning out of a second. However, Aymoz put together a fantastic second half recovery in his routine, landing clean jumps the rest of the way for a free skate score of 174.02.
When he saw it meant a total of 259.15 and a podium finish – and likely qualification for Grenoble – he leapt out of his seat in the kiss-and-cry, a giant smile on his face replacing what had been a look of anguish and worry.
"I had to prove to myself I could get up and when I fell on the quad toe, I was almost felt like, 'Yes, now I have another chance to prove to everyone that I can get up'," Aymoz said afterwards. "It was a stressful event and I was panicking because I really wanted to qualify for the Final at home in Grenoble.
"Ten months ago, I wanted to stop skating," the Frenchman added. "I was not doing anything in skating. Step by step I came back and now I'm so proud to skate for myself first.
"My goal for the season was just to survive one competition at a time, first Skate America and then Finland, so now I feel like the Final is almost the easiest event of the season. When you go to the Final, it's already a small victory so I'll be happy to go. The goal is to keep going, fight through the mistakes and do my best."
Grassl, meanwhile, made up for a disappointing short program in which he was sixth by delivering a strong 'Billy Elliot' ballet-inspired skate. The Italian was only marked down for a quarter under-rotation on a quad in an otherwise impressive performance, belying the fact he missed the entirety of last season.
He scored 180.64 points in the free skate for a total of 258.55 points, just 0.6 behind Aymoz to finish third. His result, added to a second-place finish last week at the NHK Trophy, means Grassl is on the verge of securing qualification for the Final too in his first season back on the circuit, having missed all of 2023/24.
"The Final was really not my goal this year because I only started to train in July," he said. "I [originally] had just one Grand Prix, so having two and having a medal in both, it's the first time for me and also very surprising because I would never have imagined it. If someone would have told me in July, 'You will medal in two Grands Prix' I would have told him he's crazy.
"After a difficult period last year I'm happy I'm finally coming back."
Japan's Tomono Kazuki, who had been second following the short program, produced an error-strewn free skate in which he popped two jumps and fell on another, tumbling down to sixth position overall.
Meanwhile, the Republic of Korea's Cha Junhwan, who was seventh after the short program on Friday, withdrew from the free skate citing injury. It ends the 23-year-old's hopes of making next month's Grand Prix final, although he told Olympics.com he has a busy season planned including the World University Games in January and Asian Winter Games in February.
Finlandia Trophy 2024 men's final results
- Kagiyama Yuma (JPN) 263.09
- Kevin Aymoz (FRA) 259.15
- Daniel Grassl (ITA) 258.55
- Yamamoto Sota (JPN) 249.91
- Lukas Britschgi (SUI) 246.70
- Tomono Kazuki (JPN) 238.41
- Aleksandr Selevko (EST) 214.15
- Vladimir Samoilov (POL) 205.47
- Camden Pulkinen (USA) 195.18
- Makar Suntsev (FIN) 180.48
- Valtter Virtanen (FIN) 166.25
Cha Junhwan (KOR) WD (77.33 short program)