By Lori Ewing
MILAN, Feb 14 (Reuters) - Sitting in the leader's chair, Mikhail Shaidorov watched one contender after another falter, each mistake sharpening the sense of an upset unfolding, the realisation dawning that the Olympic title was shifting, unmistakably in his direction.
The 21-year-old from Kazakhstan delivered the performance of his life to win the men's figure skating title at the Milano Cortina Olympics on Friday -- a colossal upset in an event that many believed had been all but decided.
Skating to futuristic opera-pop song "Diva Dance" from the 1997 film "The Fifth Element," Shaidorov scored 198.64 points for 291.58 overall -- and ultimately the Olympic title.
American Ilia Malinin had utterly dominated every event for over two years, including last year's world championships where he clobbered silver medallist Shaidorov by more than 30 points.
But Shaidorov, who had begun the night in fifth place, opened with a massive triple Axel, quadruple Salchow combination.
"I planned this content even before the Olympic Games, for me it was important to enjoy what I was doing and show good skating show what I learned throughout the years," he said.
"My first combination is my signature move and unfortunately for several competitions I couldn't really do it, but tonight the stars aligned."
From then on, things shifted rapidly as Shaidorov's score went up, reshaping expectations and putting him firmly in the running for a podium place.
And then he watched as one-by-one Italy's Daniel Grassl, Adam Siao Him Fa of France, Yuma Kagiyama of Japan, and then Malinin faltered.
Malinin wrapped Shaidorov, who was still in awe of the upset, in a congratulatory hug.
"I told (Malinin) that for me it was unbelievable to be sharing the same ice with him," Shaidorov said.
"When I was watching Ilia skating, I was surprised because usually his skating is excellent and he demonstrated throughout the season. But ice is slippery and I don't know what exactly happened to him."
Shaidorov's Olympic gold carries a profound emotional weight for Kazakhstan, not only as the country's first of these Games, but only the second ever in Olympic figure skating for the nation of about 20 million people.
Denis Ten was the country's trailblazer in figure skating, winning Olympic bronze in 2014, but he was stabbed to death by two robbers in 2018 in a parking lot in Almaty. He was only 25.
It was a loss that devastated the skating world and left a void in Kazakhstan's sporting identity.
"I think Denis Ten influenced not just me but all figure skaters in Kazakhstan," Shaidorov said.
"He opened the doors for many figure skaters in Kazakhstan, including myself, and I hope that this gold medal will open new doors for new generations of Kazakhstani children who will know that sky is the limit."
Shaidorov's victory stands as both a sporting breakthrough and a poignant continuation of the legacy Ten never got to finish.
(Reporting by Lori Ewing; reporting by Valentina Za, Elvira Pollina, Agnieszka Flak; editing by Pritha Sarkar)
