Americans ruled the day at the Four Continents figure skating meet in Gangneung, South Korea, yesterday while Canadians continued to miss spots on the podium.
Canada dominated the Four Continents last year, when it was held in Hamilton, but this year, for the first time, Skate Canada did not send its best team.
Ben Ferreira of Edmonton slipped to fourth place overall after finishing second in the men's short program earlier in the week. Evan Lysacek of the United States won, overtaking short-program leader Li Chengjiang of China, who made several mistakes in the long program. Li finished second, followed by Daisuke Takahashi of Japan.
Ferreira turned out of his triple Axel and missed two other triple jumps, but gained the second best presentation scores behind Lysacek.
Americans swept the dance event as U.S. champions Tanith Belbin, who is Canadian-born, and Benjamin Agosto won easily. U.S. silver medalists Melissa Gregory and Denis Petukhov and the team of Lydia Manon and Ryan O'Meara took the two other medals.
Russian-born Petukhov will be sworn in as a U.S. citizen in Chicago on Tuesday, allowing him to represent the United States at the Turin Olympics next year. Because Belbin will not attain her U.S. citizenship in time for Turin, Gregory and Petukhov will probably be the top U.S. dance team at the Olympics.
Canada sent two dance teams to their first major senior international competitions, but they left a lasting impression. Lauren Senft of Vancouver and Leif Gislason of Winnipeg finished fifth overall, moving up from eighth in the compulsory dance to fourth in the free dance with a routine choreographed by Lithuanian stars Margarita Drobiazko and Povilas Vanagas.
Senft and Gislason earned the second best technical marks in the free dance, behind Belbin and Agosto, the only team at the event ranked in the top 10 in the world.
Another young, promising dance team, Mylène Girard of Repentigny, Que., and Bradley Yaeger of Ottawa, finished sixth overall, earning better presentation marks than Senft and Gislason. They had the fourth best technical marks in the free dance.
Girard and Yaeger had been in ninth place after the compulsory dance, but finished fifth in the original dance, ahead of Senft and Gislason.
Shawn Sawyer of Edmundston, N.B., ranked third in Canada, finished sixth in the men's event yesterday.
Lysacek didn't need a quadruple jump to win, with his only glitch coming with a step out of his second triple Axel.
Li, the 2001 Four Continents champion, landed a quadruple-triple combination, but scaled a planned quadruple Salchow down to a triple. He seemed to tire at the end and complained of boot problems before the event.
Takahashi won the bronze after falling hard on his opening quadruple toe loop.