THE CANADIAN PRESS
TURIN, Italy — Tanith Belbin and Benjamin Agosto of the United States had a narrow lead over Isabelle Delobel and Olivier Schoenfelder of France, and Canada’s Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir were in fourth place after the opening phase of the ice dancing competition at figure skating’s Grand Prix Final on Friday.
Kingston, Ont.-born Belbin and her American partner got 63.64 points for their folk-country original dance, while the French couple received 63.29.
Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin of Russia were third with 62.31.
Virtue, from London, Ont., and Moir, from Ilderton, Ont., got 61.14, Jana Khokhlova and Sergei Novitski of Russia had 58.30 and Nathalie Pechalat and Fabian Bourzat of France were sixth and last with 57.73.
The top four were in the same order that they were in at the conclusion of the 2007 world championships in Tokyo, where they finished third through sixth.<
Daisuke Takahashi of Japan grabbed the men’s singles lead by getting 84.20 points for his short program. Former world champion Stephane Lambiel of Switzerland got 83.80, Americans Evan Lysacek and Johnny Weir, had 79.70 and 74.80, respectively, Kevin Van Der Perren of Belgium got 72.83, and Patrick Chan of Toronto was was sixth and last with 68.86.
Yu-Na Kim of South Korea, who trains in Toronto with coach Brian Orser, earned the best women’s short-program score of 64.62, and Caroline Zhang of the United States was second with 61.82. Carolina Kostner of Italy got 59.86, Yukari Nakano of Japan 59.78, American Kimmie Meissner 59.08 and Mao Asada of Japan 59.04
The meet includes the top six point-getters in each of the four disciplines from the International Skating Union’s six-meet Grand Prix series. Medal winners will be decided Saturday.