Michal Březina during a free ride on American skates.

John David Mercer, Reuters

Unlike the short program, Březina included all revolutions in the intended square salchow, even though the output was not perfect. He handled the first half of the Bryan Adams music program at a steady pace, in the second half there were other small mistakes. He only jumped a double flip, struggled to leave the Rittberger, and had no time to complete the final spin.

He scored less than a point in freeriding than at the start of the season in Norwood, a suburb of Boston, which was the fifth best score of the night. He constantly attacks Jimmy Ma’s fifth, but the American remains 65 hundredths ahead of him.

The king of the last few seasons, Chen, was far from championship form even in freeride. Instead of two of the five planned four jumps, he only included their double variant and, compared to the interrupted short program, he only progressed by one place. The Japanese Shoma Uno stayed ahead of him and especially the 2019 World Cup bronze medalist Zhou shone.

After the explosion of this year’s World Championships, where he did not qualify for the free races, he had to adjust his form to the additional Olympic qualification in September in Oberstdorf, and it was known that he was currently in ahead of others. Driving with five four jumps without significant errors, he confirmed the lead after a short program and won by almost 25 points.

The sports pairs race was dominated by Russians Yevgeny Tarasov and Vladimir Morozov. The competition for women and couples in Las Vegas will culminate today.