Amber Glenn triumphed over neck discomfort to outshine her fellow U.S. world champion, Alysa Liu, securing victory at the figure skating Cup of China in Chongqing for the second consecutive year on Saturday. The U.S. national champion, Glenn, grabbed her neck post her free skate routine, where she managed to recover from a slightly unsteady triple toeloop landing early on. Initially positioned third after Friday’s short program, Glenn had to patiently await Liu and Japan’s Rinka Watanabe to finish their free skates to determine her final placement. Liu slipped to the second spot with a total of 212.07 points due to an unstable triple flip landing, while Watanabe barely held onto the podium, dropping to third after achieving only the fifth-best score in the free skate.
Expressing her elation, Glenn described feeling “incredible” and expressed her excitement at both her and her teammate securing the top two spots on the podium. Despite being a two-time world championship medalist, this marked Liu’s first time on a Grand Prix event podium.
In the men’s competition, Japan’s Shun Sato clinched the Cup of China title for the second consecutive year by flawlessly executing three quadruple jumps in his free skate, accumulating a total score of 278.12, maintaining the lead over Italy’s Daniel Grassl with 269.43. Kazakhstan’s Mikhail Shaidorov secured 262.67 points after stumbling on his final jump.
World champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates seized their maiden Cup of China victory after six attempts, scoring a total of 208.25 to outperform their U.S. counterparts Emilea Zingas and Vadym Kolesnik, who scored 202.27. The third spot went to Evgeniia Lopareva and Geoffrey Brissaud of France with a score of 196.60.
Georgia’s Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava claimed the pairs gold with a score of 217.24, while Italy’s Sara Conti and Niccolo Macii secured second place and China’s Sui Wenjing and Han Cong, the 2022 Olympic champions who recently returned from retirement, settled for third.
The Cup of China marks the second of six regular season Grand Prix events leading up to the final in December, serving as a crucial test for skaters eyeing medals at the upcoming Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics in February. The ISU Grand Prix series will head to Saskatoon next for the Skate Canada International event commencing on October 31.