Another representative of the Russian school conquered the Italian ice in Bergamo. Anastasia Gubanova’s triumph in the Lombardia Trophy Challenger was joined by her colleague from the Georgian national team, Nika Egadze. Tutberidze’s student won silver, showing the best result of her entire career in the free program, as well as earning a record number of points in two programs.
In addition, Nika demonstrated the best technique and was the only one to achieve three quadruple jumps in the free skate. Japanese skater Yuma Kagiyama took gold only thanks to his cosmically high components.
Eteri Tutberidze personally shared the student’s triumph in his first competition of the new season. Even though the Russian national team’s skating trials were approaching, she found time to travel to Italy with Nika.
Eteri appeared at the international start
Nika Egadze is 21 years old, she was born and started skating in Georgia. However, the more seriously she thought about a career as a figure skater, the more evident it became that training conditions in her homeland were far from her ideals. At the age of 15, he and his mother moved to Moscow, where, by a happy coincidence, he ended up in Eteri Tutberidze’s group.
For a long time, Nika remained in the shadow of Eteri’s other protégé, Maurice Kvitelashvili, who also competed under the Georgian flag. After an extremely difficult last season, Maurice announced his retirement. He was long and fruitful, so he quietly said goodbye to the competitions. But Nika suddenly became Georgia’s main hope in the men’s singles category. And this despite the fact that he has not yet distinguished himself with great results and stability. At the last World Championships, Egadze placed 29th after the short program, failing to qualify for the free skate. He then mastered a triple Axel, made a mistake on the quad, broke the combination and ruined one of the rotations.
Nika Egadze
Photo: Valery Sharifulin/TASS
In this context, the burden of responsibility that fell on him after Maurice’s departure seemed unbearable. But the summer preparation seemed to be as fruitful as possible: already in the first tournament of the new season he showed significant progress and climbed to the podium.
Although, perhaps, his success was inspired by Eteri Tutberidze, who unexpectedly accompanied him to the Lombardia Trophy. Still, this is not the main start, and the Russian national team’s skating trials are less than a week away. The probability of seeing Eteri in the Bergamo stadium, at first glance, was close to zero. But he considered it necessary to support Nika and motivate him to fight.
The result exceeds any expectations! Nika pulled herself together and finally declared herself on the international stage.
The last World Championship was unsuccessful for Tutberidze’s singles:
The failure of Tutberidze’s pupils at the World Championship! One is beyond arbitrariness, the other is outside the top 20
He took a risk in the first tournament of the season
In the short program, Nika skated to the popular composition “Ave Maria” among skaters. The majestic melody, coupled with the look of the strict coach behind the side, clearly helped him perform well. At first he fell from a quadruple Salchow, but the annoying mistake didn’t bother him and then he completed the cascade quadruple toe-triple toe with no problem. He also landed his triple axel cleanly and with a sense of accomplishment he made it to the end of the long set.
By the way, Nika was one of the two participants who risked two quadruple jumps in the short. The second is the native of St. Petersburg Georgy Reshtenko, who plays in the Czech Republic. But he was much less lucky than Nika: he made a butterfly on the triple axis, for which, according to the rules, he was nullified and fell on the first jump of the waterfall, thus losing the most expensive item.
Most single skaters were limited to a quadruple, which not all of them conquered, and some skated without any ultra-c.
After the short, Nika came in third place with a score of 78.75 points. She ahead of the American of Russian roots Andrew Torgashev (86.41 points) and the Japanese Yuma Kagiyama (91.47 points).
Former Russian Gubanova won the tournament for Georgia:
He did everyone! How former Russian Gubanova won the Lombardy Trophy despite a fall
Egadze won the technical free skate
Getting bronze at the Lombardia Trophy would already be a great result for Nika Egadze, but she raised the stakes even higher. On the free show, set to another achingly familiar music for all fans, Roxana’s tango, she confidently landed three quadruples in a row: a quadruple toe loop, a cascade of a quadruple Salchow and a triple toe loop, and a second quadruple Salchow. . This is a real breakthrough for him: she has never achieved three quadruples before. And here – miracles!
But seriously, of course there is a lot of work and perseverance behind this. Nick is great.
After a set of quads, he did a triple and double axle sequence and took a short break in the rotation and step sequence. True, I did not have time to fully regain strength and fell from a solo trixel in the second half of the program. At that moment, somewhere overboard, Tutberidze probably shook his head. But, as you know, Moscow was not built immediately: poor performance will prompt Nika to work even harder and will not allow her to relax on the wave of success.
Nika Egadze
Photo: Toru Hanai/Getty Images
In the “kiss and edge” zone, Eteri was in a good mood. It was clear that the grades would be good. The judges really didn’t skimp: they didn’t add any under-rotation or unclear edges and gave it 164.60 points. This is Egadze’s best result in the free program in her entire career! With a total score of 243.35, she also set a personal record.
And the best thing is that the skater beat all his opponents in the free technique, for which he scored exactly 92 points. For comparison: Japan’s Yuma Kagiyama, who took gold, scored 82.71 points for his technique, and bronze medalist Andrew Torgashev of the United States scored 72.59 points.
Andrew, by the way, didn’t spin a single quad in the free program, and Yuma only turned one. And in general, the quad parade in the men’s free program of the Lombardia Trophy, oddly enough, did not take place. Apart from the student Tutberidze, only the Czech Georgy Reshtenko jumped three quads, but he made mistakes on all of them.
Nika Egadze
Photo: Toru Hanai/Getty Images
In fact, Nika could have made a fortune with this “challenger”, but her Achilles heel so far remains choreography and artistry. She now relies on a technique and the components are sunk. Kagiyama surpassed him only thanks to the second score: 91.41 compared to 73.60.
So, according to Tutberidze’s orders, after returning from sunny Italy, Nika will have to continue working. There are new beginnings and challenges ahead, which, I want to believe, she will definitely be able to cope with.
