Evgeni wins
Gold in Paris

Totmianina & Marinin
win Silver Medal

Nov. 15, 2003

vgeni Plushenko won his first Lalique title, and Tatiana Totmianina & Maxim Marinin won Silver at Trophee Lalique in Paris.

Two-time World Champion Plushenko skated to Gold by reeling off a quick succession of jumps, including an impressive quadruple-triple-double jump. It was his second Grand Prix win of the season.

He also showed two combination spins and intricate footwork in his program entitled "Tribute to Vaclav Nizhinski", which is dedicated to the famous Russian ballet dancer. Plushenko scored 77.84 points in the element score. He received 81.10 points for his program components and 158.94 points overall for his free skating.

"I'm fine with my skate", Plushenko said. "I finally did two triple Axels and the quad-triple-double combination. I didn't skate so well at Skate Canada."

Kevin Van Der Perren of Belgium finished second and Michael Weiss of the United States was third.

The biggest upset at Trophee Lalique came in the pairs competition when the favored Totmianina & Marinin slipped to second place behind China's Dan Zhang and Hao Zhing. Marinin had been sick prior to the event, which cut down on their practice time. The World Silver Medalists ran into some trouble at the beginning of their "Cotton Club" program when they both fell on the side by side triple Salchows dropped them to second after leading after the short program.

Americans Tiffany Scott and Philip Dulebohn finished third.

"I think this was the worst we've ever skated", Marinin said. "I had fever and I couldn't skate at all for three days. So we had only three days left for our preparation, and it wasn't enough."

Trophee Lalique was a scoring event for Totmianina & Marinin.