Winter Olympics: Plushenko storms to free skate gold

TURIN - Yevgeny Plushenko performed a pulsating free skate today to win the men's title at the Winter Olympics, keeping alive Russia's chances of completing an historic sweep of all four figure skating gold medals.

The overwhelming favourite, a silver medallist four years ago, outclassed world champion Stephane Lambiel by a huge margin of 27.12 points to become the fifth consecutive Russian or Soviet man to win the crown.

After skating an almost perfect programme, Plushenko did not punch the air in victory or roar with pleasure but sagged his shoulders in exhaustion as the tension poured off.

As hordes of fans yelled "Rus-si-a", he made the sign of the cross on his chest, kissed his wedding ring and touched the ice and kissed his hand in respect to the arena where that elusive gold was won.

Lambiel claimed Switzerland's first Olympic medal in the event for 58 years with a score of 231.21 for silver, while Canada's Jeffrey Buttle finished third.

Plushenko brought a roaring crowd to their feet with a display full of drama and daring skills.

The first competitor among the medal contenders to take to the ice, Plushenko nailed 12 jumps, including seven in combination, to surpass Lambiel with a personal best total of 258.33.

He began with a quadruple-triple-double jump combination before flying through the rest of his Godfather routine to surpass Lambiel.

Plushenko looked supremely relaxed as he watched the remaining competitors skate through their programmes and when the final scores were in just smiled contentedly, waving at the camera, shaking hands with his coach and hugging his teammates.

With Plushenko carrying an 11.62 advantage over Lambiel into the free skate, the Swiss knew he had to produce something special but his gamble to include two quadruple jumps in his programme backfired as he stumbled on the second attempt.

Tatiana Totmianina and Maxim Marinin began Russia's gold run at the Palavela rink by capturing the pairs gold on Monday.

- REUTERS