World figure skating championships: US teen Chen hits record six quads to win gold
American quad-jumping prodigy Nathan Chen hit a record six quads to win men's gold in the world figure skating championships on Saturday. The 18-year-old from Salt Lake City was the only skater in the final group to stay on his feet, blowing away his rivals with a winning margin of 47.63 points.
His free skate to "Mao's Last Dancer" by Christopher Gordon earned him personal best scores of 219.46 points for the free skate and overall total of 321.40. "I wanted to redeem myself here," said Chen whose Olympic challenge had come unstuck in the short programme before rallying to fifth in Pyeongchang.
And it also allowed him to nail the record for the most quad jumps landed in a free skate - after not being credited with one of the six he achieved in the Olympics. "I'm really happy that I was able to do it (six quads) again," said Chen.
"I did six quads at the Olympics and they weren't perfect, they weren't perfect here too, but I'm going to keep working on that." Japan's Shoma Uno took silver despite falling three times in the free skating final, scoring 273.77. Mikhail Kolyada, 272.32, also fell twice but took bronze as weary skaters struggled in the final event of the season.