BOSTON — Canada’s Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford defended their pairs world title Saturday, coming from behind with a near-perfect free skate.
After the high of winning their first championship last year, Duhamel and Radford struggled to find their focus for much of this season, frustrated by uneven results. But they recaptured their form just in time for worlds, and in front of what felt like a home crowd Saturday, Duhamel landed a throw quad salchow.
“It wasn’t as easy as last season was for us,” Radford said, adding, “We’re just proud of ourselves to go out there and do this performance at the world championships.”
China’s Sui Wenjing and Han Cong, who led coming into the long program, had to settle for their second straight silver after two mistakes Saturday.
Five-time world champion Aliona Savchenko of Germany, skating at worlds for the first time with new partner Bruno Massot, won bronze.
Duhamel and Radford scored a personal-best 153.81 points for 231.99 total.
In the closing moments of their performance to Adele’s “Hometown Glory,” the crowd was screaming — and so was Duhamel from high up in the air — on their final lift. The program ends with both on one knee, and they didn’t wait to stand up to embrace. When they finally rose to their feet, Duhamel hopped up and down on her skates, still somehow bubbling with energy after a draining long program, while Radford stared back in disbelief.
“It was the most surreal experience,” Duhamel said.
The Chinese led by 2.67 points after the short program, seeking their first world title. But Sui fell on the throw quad salchow and did a double instead of a triple on their side-by-side salchows.
They received 143.62 points for 224.47 total.
Savchenko and Massot earned 141.95 points for 216.17 total. He used to compete for France, and they teamed up two years ago but had to wait before they were eligible to represent Germany.
Americans Alexa Scimeca and Chris Knierim dropped from seventh to ninth after several mistakes in their long program.
