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Evgeni Plushenko tries to go to Olympic Games · 2009-12-24 19:05
Figure skating championship of Russia starts in country's second capital Saint-Petersburg. The best Russian figure skaters will be chosen due to the competition. Moreover some of them will get "tickets" to the national team and will fight for medals of European championship and Olympic Games in Vancouver.
Evgeni Plushenko's demonstration will be in the center of everybody's attention. Evgeni is the 2006 Olympic champion. He retained from figure skating some years ago. So, Evgeni Plushenko has experienced himself as a businessman as well as a deputy and a father since there.
But Russian men figure skating is in great crises nowadays. So, Evgeni Plushenko decided to come back to sport and to represent Russia in next Olympic Games in Vancouver in 2010. By the way, there is no the only leader among men in the world figure skating today. It was one more force to make Evgeni come to the ice.
Sergey Voronov and Artem Borodulin will be the main Plushenko's rivals in the championship. Voronov demonstrated confident skating in China this year finally taking 220,39 points. But Borodulin also is ready to go to the Olympics.
Nevertheless the fighting in pair skating and ice dancing will be even more sharp and interesting. There are several great couples in Russia who may take "bronze", "silver" and even "gold" in European championship as well as in the Olympics.
In pair skating the struggle will be held between Yuko Kavaguti/ Alexander Smirnov and Maria Mukhortova/ Maxim Trankov. The first pair won Russian championship two years in succession, but experts say that Maria Mukhortova and Maxim Trankov may have revanche. They won Gran prix series in France and were the second in Canadian series. So, they were better than Yuko Kavaguti and Alexander Smirnov in the final, Russian Vesti informs.
The stubborn fighting was waited in ice dancing among the world champions Oksana Domnina / Maxim Shabalin, and the champions of Europe Yana Khohlova / Sergei Novitsky. But on the eve of the competition the second pair left the contest because of Sergey's injury. So, Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin will compete with Ekaterina Rubleva/ Ivan Sheffer, young pairs Ekaterina Bobrova / Dmitriy Soloviev, Elena Ilinih / Nikita Katsalapov.
The weakest presentation will be among women. After Irina Slutskaya's retirement, there are no strong skaters. Experienced Alena Leonova, who won the competition in Finland, will compete with young skaters Polina Shelepen, Adelina Sotnikova and Lisa Tuktamisheva.
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