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Russians break away from the pack scoring new world record

Photo by Matthew Stockman/Getty Images

Today, February 11, the pairs took to ice for the short program at the 2014 Winter Olympic Games. It has been a long awaited match up between Russians, Tatiana Volosozhar and Maxim Trankov, and Germans, Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy. It is expected that these two team will be contending for the gold and whoever falters will have to settle for the silver.

Tatiana Volosozhar and Maxim Trankov have had a fabulous season breaking records left and right, but then struggled at the Grand Prix Final where they were defeated by the Germans. Since then it has been unclear who would come out on top, but after today’s short program it seems quite obvious.

Volosozhar and Trankov came out onto the ice looking intense and focused as their countrymen cheered wildly for them. Though they did not have the abandon that we have seen from them in the past, they were still fantastic completing each element effortlessly, setting another new world record score of 84.17. With a gorgeous triple twist and a huge throw triple loop, Volosozhar and Trankov made it clear they they are on a quest for gold.

Trailing behind them by almost 5 points are the Germans, Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy. What should be concerning for Aliona and Robin is that they had an incredibly strong skate as well, but even with a solid skate the Russians still have a sizable lead. Going into the free skate, Savchenko and Szolkowy will have to not only skate their best, they will have to nail their planned throw triple axel if they really want to fight for that gold, otherwise they should begin to prepare themselves for a silver.

It will all come down to the free skate which will be held tomorrow, February 12, so be sure to tune in as medals will be awarded.

Pairs short program standings:

1. Tatiana Volosozhar/Maxim Trankov RUS - 84.17
2. Aliona Savchenko/Robin Szolkowy GER - 79.64
3. Ksenia Stolbova/Fedor Klimov RUS - 75.21
4. Qing Pang/Jian Tong CHN - 73.30
5. Meagan Duhamel/Eric Radford CAN - 72.21
6. Kirsten Moore-Towers/Dylan Moscovitch CAN - 70.92
7. Cheng Peng/Hao Zhang CHN - 70.59
8. Vera Bazarova/Yuri Larionov RUS - 69.66
9. Marissa Castelli/Simon Shnapir USA - 67.44
10. Vanessa James/Morgan Cipres FRA - 65.36
11. Stefania Berton/Ondrej Hotarek ITA - 63.57
12. Maylin Wende/Daniel Wende GER - 59.25
13. Paige Lawrence/Rudi Swiegers CAN - 58.97
14. Felicia Zhang/Nathan Bartholomay USA - 56.90
15. Andrea Davidovich/Evgeni Krasnopolski ISR - 53.38
16. Nicole Della-Monica/Matteo Guarise ITA - 51.64
17. Miriam Ziegler/Severin Kiefer AUT - 49.62
18. Narumi Takahashi/Ryuichi Kihara JPN - 48.45
19. Stacey Kemp/David King GBR - 44.98
20. Julia Lavrentieva/Yuri Rudyk UKR - 44.30