From the plane to the ball: Boikova and Kozlovsky won in the USA after a hard flight from Japan

Russian champions Alexandra Boikova and Dmitry Kozlovsky successfully competed at the doubles tournament in Norwood (USA), significantly outperforming all competitors in terms of the sum of the short and free programs. During Saturday's rental, our athletes again performed a unique quadruple throw for modern figure skating, but this time with a mistake — Alexandra landed the element on two legs, although she avoided falling. This is the second gold of the Russian duo in two weeks, having previously won the "challenger" in Tokyo. But this time Alexandra and Dmitry scored five points less against the background of fatigue and jet lag. However, this will not prevent them from returning to the Grand Prix series in Helsinki in two months, where they have already received an invitation from the organizers.

New program

After returning to the international arena, our skaters have already won their third gold medal at "challenger" level tournaments. One title was earned by singles player Vladislav Dikidzhi, two by the duo of Boikova and Kozlovsky, who accomplished a real feat by traveling from Japan to the East Coast of the United States without going home. After a hard road, our athletes did not look as fresh in Norwood as in Tokyo, but this did not prevent them from confidently winning an unusual tournament where only pairs competitions were presented. This is a rather strange decision on the part of the organizers, given the crisis of this figure skating discipline. However, the Americans pursued a specific goal: to give competitive practice to their new duets. As a result, the hosts took second and third places, losing only to the obviously stronger and more experienced Russians.

"Alexandra Boikova – Dmitry Kozlovsky in Norwood showed a new free program on modern musical interpretations of the theme "Carmen" staged by Eteri Tutberidze and Daniil Gleikhengauz. The skaters rolled back the program with a quadruple salchback, which was performed with the second element (the judges minced the ultra-si). We jumped a combination — triple salchow + double axel, solo triple toe loop, did a twist to the third level, supports to the fourth, ejection — triple flip, todes of the 3rd level. All the elements of the interesting and complex new program were executed quite confidently, Sasha landed the quadruple throw on two legs. The athletes scored 61.93 points for technique, 66.34 points for components," the Russian Figure Skating Federation said in a statement on its official website.

Despite the fact that the Russians, competing in a neutral status, were the undisputed favorites of the Norwood competition, the organizers were technically not ready to award them. When the medalists reached the podium, there was a hitch for about a minute and a half. As a result, the public never heard the ISU anthem AIN, a wordless piece of music commissioned by the IOC in 2024 specifically for neutral athletes. After an awkward pause, a sound fragment from the free program of the Russians was played in the arena.

"They had some problems, either the track wasn't downloaded in advance, or they didn't find this music, we still didn't understand," Boikova commented on the incident in an interview with Sport24. "But they turned on our free version, and we weren't upset at all. We were all warmly welcomed: they shouted "well done" from the stands while the anthem was not playing, and the athletes (and then all the spectators) began clapping to the beat of our free skate. Everything went very well, although it turned out to be funny.

The first one will go: Dikiji will perform at the Grand Prix stage in China

He will appear on the main ISU series after the ban from Russian athletes is lifted.

Awaiting a visa

In the short program, the wards of Stanislav Morozov and Eteri Tutberidze almost lost to the representatives of Armenia Karina Akopova and Nikita Rachmaninoff. The former Russians, who did not shine last season, unexpectedly outperformed our duo in terms of technical evaluation, losing only in components. Many expected a sharp fight on Saturday, but Karina and Nikita could not keep up the pace and fell to fourth place (176.51 points in total), passing the Americans ahead. Boikova and Kozlovsky were credited with a quadruple ejection, but without a bonus. However, the advantage of our athletes over all competitors was still huge. Well, in general, it is clear that the "challengers" are not the level of this star couple. However, our athletes simply had no other way to get to the Grand Prix after the cancellation of the rating.

In the two winning tournaments, Alexandra and Dmitry mostly competed with themselves, remembering the sensations of international starts and testing new programs. The reaction of experts to them is still mixed, especially to the short soundtrack from the movie "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever", staged in Canada. However, there may be an element of addiction here. In addition, it is still unclear how our athletes will look against the background of the foreign elite of pair skating. Perhaps the Grand Prix stage in Helsinki will give an idea of this, where the Russian duo will meet with World Cup medalists Leah Pereira and Trent Michaud from Canada, as well as European Championship medalists Maria Pavlova and Alexei Sviatchenko from Hungary.

The Russians were invited to Finland as the first substitutes after the refusal of the French Louise Erhard and Mattis Pellegris. However, there is still no certainty that Boikova and Kozlovsky will be able to avoid visa problems. Firstly, they appeared in a Ukrainian letter demanding the annulment of their neutral status. And secondly, the Finnish government is one of the most anti—Russian and may well go along with the principle of blocking entry to our athletes even on a "Schengen" issued in a more loyal European country. However, the experience of other types shows that it is possible to overcome the visa barrier. For example, not so long ago, it was done in Poland by canoeists and speed skaters. However, one of the conditions here is the absence of hype around the upcoming starts, which is unrealistic in figure skating.

— Is it important for us to win? Are you kidding? Sure. Why are we going to competitions? — Kozlovsky said after the tournament in Japan in an interview with Channel One. — Let's be honest: many people say that they ride for the sake of clean rentals. But in fact, we skate for the sake of winning. You won, it's in history. And no one will remember how you rode in a week. We compete for awards of the highest standard, and every athlete, I think, somewhere inside wants to win. We clearly understand what we are working on. We have received feedback from our trainers, from other specialists who are in our ecosystem, so to speak. The route is marked, and this is the most important thing.

The Finnish Grand Prix stage will be held from November 20 to 22 in Helsinki.