Pinoy third in short program in Winter Youth Olympics

MANILA, Philippines - Michael Christian Martinez, the first Filipino to join the first Winter Youth Olympic Games held at Innsbruck, Austria last Jan. 13-22, did an excellent performance which took him to third place in the short program and seventh in freeskate or final round.

With his feat in the men’s division figure skating competition, Martinez became the world’s seventh best men’s figure skater coming from a country that does not have winter and abundant ice skating rinks.

The first Winter Youth Olympics was participated in by approximately 1,100 athletes from 60 countries. Michael competed in the men’s figure skating division together with 16 of the best figure skaters from four-season countries and was the only Filipino bet coming from a tropical country.

Despite the sub zero temperature in Innsbruck during the first day of competitions, Martinez finished third in the short program, beating other high-level figure skaters from Germany, France, Japan and Korea. The first and second places went to the Olympic powerhouse skaters – Yan Chan of China and Efremenko Feodosi of Russia, respectively.

On the third day of the Winter Youth Olympics, Martinez competed in the free skating event wherein he scored 97.25 pts. In his Facebook account Martinez said he was nervous and was not able to focus on his free skating program since he did not have the advantage of having his coach right beside him during the competition proper. Due to a limited budget, his coach was left behind in the US.

Nevertheless, Martinez landed seventh among 16 skaters, winning over the skaters of Ukraine, France, Italy, Switzerland and Finland among others. Again Yan Chan of China topped the free skating competition with a high score of 132.8 pts. Followed by Uno Shoma of Japan with 115.63 points.