China's Shen and Zhao Lead After Pairs Short Program

Well, the pairs who were expected to contend for the gold medal at the Vancouver Olympics did not disappoint tonight in the short program.  Fewer than three points separate the top three pairs, which means that every single movement matters tomorrow night in the free skate.  China's Shen and Zhao were the absolute best tonight and set an International Skating Union scoring record with their 76.66.  They are followed by Germany's Savchenko and Szolkowy and Russia's Kavaguti and Smirnov.

The American teams had fairly solid programs but did not score very high.  Amanda Evora and Mark Ladwig were clean and are in tenth place, while American National champs Caydee Denney and Jeremy Barrett had a doubled side-by-side jump, which cost them a lot, they are down in 14th spot.

It wouldn't be an Olympic pairs competition without questionable judging, and tonight the judges did not disappoint.  Canada's Dube and Davison had a fall on side-by-side jumps and did not perform the program as well as they can, but still managed to stay in the top six pairs.  Russia's Maria Mukhortova and Maxim Trankov had a fall as well and appeared to be overmarked, but I honestly would have placed them ahead of Dube and Davison, so at this point none of those scores make sense.  Luckily, the Vancouver Olympic website provides the judging breakdowns, so I'll take a look.

(UPDATE:  A quick look at the scores shows that Dube and Davison scored a lot higher in program components than they have in other international events this season.  It's hard to compare different events because there are different judges, but even in this competition, I find it surprising that the judges found them only about four points behind Shen and Zhao and three points behind Savchenko and Szolkowy and Kavaguti and Smirnov as far as components. The team also received some...robust grade of execution points.  At first I thought Mukhortova and Trankov were scored high, but the Dube and Davison score threw me off.  I would have placed M&T ahead of Dube and Davison).