Ross Miner won the bronze medal at the Junior Grand Prix Final in Tokyo, Japan, with a personal best 196.09 points. The title went to China’s Yuzura Hanyu (206.77) while China’s Nan Song (204.99) took the silver medal.
Performing a Tango themed program, Miner finished fourth in the long program, faltering on the landing of the triple Lutz and doubling an intended triple Salchow. Among the highlights of his program were the triple flip-triple toe combination and the solo triple flip, which received a 1.20 grade of execution.
Miner’s combination spin with change of foot and two other spins received a Level 4 rating, helping him to 125.24 points for the free program. His straight line step sequence received a Level 3.
Richard Dornbush finished fourth overall with 191.80. While he did not perform a triple Axel in the short, doubling his attempt at the jump, it was two triple Axels, one in combination with a triple toe, in his free skate that helped him to a personal best 132.45 points, which ranked him third.
With a personal best performance in the free skate (121.47), Grant Hochstein claimed fifth place with 187.92, his third personal best mark of the competition. Although he opened with a nice triple Lutz-triple toe, he fell on his next element, a triple Axel, and also received a downgrade, costing him a few points. He recovered for a triple flip-double toe-double loop, triple loop, triple Salchow and a triple Lutz-double Axel sequence, all elements that received a positive grade of execution.
Hochstein had a Level 4 spin, two Level 3 spins and Level 3 steps.
In the pairs competition, Britney Simpson and Nathan Miller, the only Americans to qualify, improved from seventh following the short program to sixth overall with 128.62. The medals went to: China’s Wenjing Sui and Cong Han (160.45), who were first in the short and free; Japan’s Narumi Takahashi and Mervin Tran (145.80), who were second in the short and free; and China’s Yue Zhang and Lei Wang (137.19), who were fifth in the short and third in the free.
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