Deniss VASILJEVS (LAT) | Men Short Program | ISU World Championships | Boston 2025 | #FigureSkating

Well, he's a magical skater, can be vulnerable on the jumps. We wish him all the best. What a great way to start this penultimate group. They're wonderful. Denis Vasilievs from Latvia. The music, Helix. THEY SING IN LATVIAN Triple lutz, triple toe. Oh, down on the triple axel, can you believe it? He is phenomenal, isn't he? The concept of the programme, just brilliant. And I love everything about it, but there was that one mistake and it's so crucial. And I'm not dead sure it was fully rotated either, the triple axel. That may be the reason he went down. Right leg got away from him, didn't really get over the right foot. But if it was short of rotation as well, that's going to really, really hurt. Denis is such a fan favourite and for good reason. He's so easy to like. It's so easy to enjoy watching him skate. He really has everything that the judges are looking for to award him high component marks. He has multi-dimensional movements. He's expressive and projects his flow and power and speed is all so great. But you're right, he downgraded his technical content here to go clean and unfortunately, that was not the case for Denis today. He is receiving an under-rotated call on the triple axel with the fall deduction, only being awarded 3.84 points for that element when he would normally get over eight. Start from the beginning though. Here's the triple flip. Perfectly done. Into his combination triple lutz. Nice lift into the air, reach back, triple toe. All spins and step sequence awarded a level four. One spin still being reviewed. Here's where the problem was. Forward inside bracket into the triple axel on a lean in the air. It is under-rotated and not able to hang on to it. It's so difficult, isn't it? If you don't make the rotation, it's difficult to get out of it. And this Denis signature spin, done so well, but he needed to be clean today. He did indeed, yeah. They look like they're sat on a bus, don't they? Okay. What does he need? He needs 85 to go into the lead. He's not gonna get it. Could he get into the 80s? He'd love to if he can. Not quite, 79.99. It's not too bad. He's in fifth place. Remember, we've got a lot to go. We've still got 11 skaters to go and it is fifth place. No reaction.