Sale, Pelletier win world pairs
Jamie Sale and David Pelletier were crowned world pairs champions after skating the performance of their lives in Vancouver on Wednesday.
The Canadian champions, who paired up only three years ago, delighted the sellout crowd at General Motors Place with the most passionate original program of the competition.
"It was awesome," said an elated Sale, who immediately embraced Pelletier before exploding with unbridled joy at centre ice.
"I was calm. I really tried to enjoy each moment.
"It can be overwhelming, but I used the love from the crowd to be in a state of love in the program."
Sale actually singled a side-by-side double Axel late in the skate, but any technical deduction -- their lowest mark was 5.6 -- was offset by superior presentation marks.
They are the first Canadians to win world pairs medals in seven years.
"This is the best day of my life," Pelletier said.
Sale, a native of Red Deer, Alta., and Pelletier, from Sayabec, Que., came into the free skate in third-place, trailing the slick Russian duo of Elene Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze and the exacting tandem from China, Xue Shen and Hongbo Zhao.
Berezhnaya and Sikharulidze secured the silver medal after taking home the gold in 1998 and 1999.
They were prohibited from competing last year after Berezhnaya ingested a cold remedy and failed a drug test.
"Not really, but it was good," Sikharulidze replied when asked if it was their finest effort of the season.
Shen and Zhao, silver medallists in 1999 and 2000, earned the top technical marks of the evening, but lacked artistic impact.
"We skated very well, in spite of the pressure of skating last," Zhao said. "We managed to cope with the pressure, but we were still not able to convince the judges.
"We would like to know how we can convince them. This is our third worlds medal and it's probably the most emotional one.
"We really wanted to win. When we finished our program, we knew that our performance was the most demanding technically."
Veterans Kristy and Kris Wirtz of Delson, Que., ignited the arena with an inspired skate and finished eighth overall.
They ranked 14th following a disastrous short program on Monday.
"We were really embarrassed and kind of humiliated with our performance the other day so we said, `Let's do this for ourselves,"' Kristy Wirtz. "We proved we're not quitters," added Kris, whose lone mistake was a wobbly landing on a solo triple Salchow.
"It was great, awesome. It's easier when you're in 14th because there's no pressure.
"The most pressure we felt was that we didn't want to suck again. We were ten times better than what we showed the other night.
"We proved that to ourselves tonight."
The Wirtzes, who are married, were seventh in 1996, sixth in 1997, seventh in 1998, sixth in 1999 and 10th last year.
The victory by Sale and Pelletier means Canadians have now reached the medal podium in 20 consecutive world championships.