Canada’s Lajoie and Lagha win silver at ISU Junior Grand Prix

LINZ, Austria – Marjorie Lajoie of Boucherville, Que., and Zachary Lagha of Greenfield Park, Que., won the silver medal with a personal best international score in ice dancing Saturday to conclude the second stop on the ISU Junior Grand Prix figure skating circuit.

Sofia Shevchenko and Igor Eremenko of Russia took the gold with 158.70 points to edge the Canadians, second at 153.70. Another Russian couple Eva Kuts and Dmitrii Mikhailov of Russia were third at 142.79. Natalie D’Alessandro and Bruce Waddell of Toronto moved from fifth to fourth at 135.42.

It was the third career Junior Grand Prix medal for Lajoie and Lagha, fourth at the world juniors last season. Despite the result and score they didn’t seems particularly pleased with the performance.

‘’The presentation was good but there’s a lot of work to do at the technical level,’’ said Lajoie. ‘’One of our elements did not count and the whole performance in general was a bit of a battle for us. Basically it wasn’t an easy day but we camouflaged it well.’’

In pairs, Russians were 1-2-3 led by Polina Kostiukovich and Dmitrii Ialin with 180.59. Gabrielle Levesque of Bridgewater, N.S. and Pier-Alexandre Hudon of St-Roch-des-Aulnaies, Que., were eighth.

‘’It’s already a big improvement on last season,’’ said Levesque. ‘’We were pleased with how we rebounded from a disappointing short program. We need to work on our consistency in our jumps and throws for the next event.’’

The Russians were 1-2 in the women’s event won by Alena Kostornaia. Emma Bulawka of Kelowna, B.C., posted the eighth best free skate to climb from 11th to ninth overall.

The third stop on the circuit is this Thursday to Saturday in Kaunas, Lithuania.

Full results: ISU JGP Cup of Austria 2018