MARSEILLE, France -- Yuzuru Hanyu took the lead with an electrifying performance in the short program on Thursday to stay on course for a fourth straight Grand Prix Final figure skating title.In perfect rhythm to the funky sounds of Lets Go Crazy by Prince, the Olympic champion brought the crowd to its feet at the Palais Omnisport, as he earned his season-best score of 106.53.This program cant be completed without the audience, Hanyu said through a Japanese translator. When I got out on the ice this morning I felt really comfortable. I feel like my body was well rested.Two-time former champion Patrick Chan of Canada was second, and defending two-time world champion Javier Fernandez was third after sloppy errors.Although Hanyu had to slightly correct a landing on his opening quad loop, he was clean on his quad salchow and triple toe loop. Even coach Brian Orser was dancing along to the routine beside the rink as the crowd got increasingly louder.Hanyu was probably the only one not totally impressed.My skating skill can still be improved and I can improve my jumps, he said.Chan, a three-time world champion, put some pressure on him with his season-best score of 99.76.I felt pretty happy about todays performance, said Chan, also a two-time Olympic silver medalist. Its my first good short program internationally for a long time.But Fernandezs bid to upstage Hanyu at the Final after finishing runner-up in the past two years looks like a long shot.The Spaniard just about recovered from a fall on his quad salchow and fell again on his flying sit spin to score 91.76.I wasnt happy for sure, more than one mistake this time, he said. We just have to go back to practice to find out what is going on with this short program. When I go to competition there are always mistakes. I just have to keep myself strong for the free program on Saturday.A comeback has precedence: At the worlds in April, he clawed back a considerable deficit on Hanyu to win.The Americans lagged behind, Nathan Chen in fifth place and Adam Rippon in sixth.I was at the Final last year as a junior skater, he said. Its a huge step for me and its cool to be competing with these top-level skaters. Im excited.Rippon admitted to being nervous.Its great to be here. Its a bonus, he said. I want to put out good performances. I got the crowd on their feet today, so thats what my main goal was. Im trying the least amount of quads, so my focus is to skate well overall.Russians Evgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov nailed all of their jumps for a season-best 78.60 to lead the pairs.We have managed to skate at the same level we trained for, Morozov said. Hopefully we can keep that trend going into the free program.They are ahead of Yu Xiaoyu and Zhang Hao, who also scored a season best, 75.34. The Chinese pair is working well in its first season, having won the Cup of China in Beijing last month.Canadians Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford have a lot to do to win back the title they lost to Russians Ksenia Stolbova and Fedor Klimov last year. Duhamel and Radford were recent winners at the NHK Trophy in Sapporo, Japan, but the two-time world champions are in third place here with 71.44 points after Duhamel made a couple of errors.She put one hand on the ice landing slightly awkwardly on a triple lutz, and fell over backward on the throw triple axel.Well, it wasnt the way I wanted to have my birthday go, said Meagan Duhamel, who turned 31 Thursday.Radford was also dejected.Were trying some really difficult elements, the triple Lutz and the throw triple axel, he said. Its frustrating because they were really good in practice, but theyre not transferring into the performance and today they werent even close. Were going to have to review this when we get home.It proved to be a tricky night for the Canadians, with Julianne Seguin and Charlie Bilodeau in last place with 60.86. They fell once each. Bilodeau fell back on the triple salchow, and Seguin tumbled forward on the throw triple lutz.Natalia Zabiiako and Alexander Enbert of Russia skated with elegance to the melancholic sound of Georgi Sviridovs Snowstorm but a lack of technical difficulty put them in fifth (65.79) behind Chinas Peng Cheng and Jin Yang (70.84). Nike Vapormax Baratas . Reigning world champion Eve Muirhead of Scotland opened with a 12-2 rout of Winnipegs Jennifer Jones in a battle of teams bound for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Comprar Nike Vapormax Baratas . After a first half in which he thought "the lid was on the basket," the Toronto Raptors coach watched his squad mount a second half surge to defeat the Cleveland Cavaliers 98-91. http://www.baratasvapormax.es/ .com) - Christian Ponder will get another chance to prove himself for the Minnesota Vikings, with head coach Leslie Frazier announcing Wednesday that the struggling quarterback will start this weekends game against the Green Bay Packers. Vapormax Baratas España . In Europe, top teams seem to be largely happy with their squads after spending nearly $1 billion in the off-season. And although English league clubs are unlikely to splash cash in January, Arsenal and Chelsea could be tempted to strengthen their squads with new strikers. Nike Vapormax En Oferta . The third-ranked Ivanovic, who won the event in 2008 and 10, served five aces and broke Wickmayer, also a former winner in 2009, five times. "The result looked easier than it really was," Ivanovic said. Nari Contractor c bottom b Davidson, day three, India v Australia, Kanpur, 1959.The first recollection about this match is I dont how I got those 74 runs in the second innings. In that match, 40 wickets fell, of which 22 [23] batsmen never got into double figures -- it was that bad a wicket. That was a damp-ish pitch; every day in the morning something from the bottom would come up.The East stand had a partition -- on one side were the men, on the other side were the ladies. Somebody would throw something from one end and the other section would respond in the same way. That jhagda [quarrel] was going on all the time.Alan Davidson was fast-ish and was a left-arm bowler. When he would bowl over the wicket, he would come and spin the ball, and it would go over here [the head] and hit you here [points to the chest]. One strategy that I would adopt was I would stand outside the leg stick. Because the ball was coming in so sharply, once it pitched on middle and leg I knew it was going to go on this side [outside leg]. I got out before lunch [on the third day].I rank this innings as my best because it helped my team beat Australia for the first time since 1947. There was [danger of bodily harm] because of which we didnt know what to do. One ball would go over the head while the other one would stay low. That innings required a lot of concentration. Every ball you said [to yourself] you survived. Suppose I point a gun at you and say I am going to shoot at you any time, what will you do? It was like that. Richie [Benaud] and Alan Davidson bowled beautifully.The most tragic part or comic part of the innings was when I was on 74. Alan Davidson was bowling over the wicket from the far end, and he bowled a legbreak which was a little short. I hooked it with all my might -- it could not have been a more perfect shot -- and as soon as the ball hit my bat I said to myself four runs. But here, Neil Harvey, who was fielding [a little] far at short leg, turned to save himself and the ball got caught between his bottom.Richie Benaud, from the leg slip, said,, Neil, hold on, hold on and plucked the ball out of his bottom! The ball was slowly coming down, and Neil never even moved to try to catch it -- he knew he might touch it and the ball might fall; it was caught bottom, bowled Davidson! I could not move from the crease for 10-15 seconds out of disbelief.dddddddddddd[I didnt feel it was a match-winning knock] at that time as the Australian innings was to come next, and we hadnt done very well either. They had to get 225, which you dont expect this Australian team not to get. There were not many verbal incidents, but [for] a little abuse here and there. Everybody was very tense, but the only thing we were told was fielding had to be tight and every catch had to be taken.It was a tight series, but they were the better side. But to beat Australia for the first time was a great achievement. In the evening, three or four of us met in a room and had a drink, but there were no celebrations. We had to catch the train at 7.30 in the night, so we were packing and running about. Back then, we did not have our return reservations to come back to Mumbai. As a matter of fact, one or two of us spread the bedding on the floor and slept on the first-class. This win gave us that push, but slowly that slope downwards started till we beat England in India in a series for the first time in 1960-61.The best tribute I got was at the end of the series from Richie Benaud after the Kolkata Test, that at that stage I was one of the finest opening batsman in the world. I was friendly with Alan Davidson, Neil Harvey, Richie Benaud and Normal O Neil. We had a dinner together at my place during the Bombay Test.Innings toh reminisce hota hi nahin [I dont reminisce these knocks]. Only four of us from that team -- Abbas Ali Baig, Bapu Nadkarni, Chandu Borde -- are still alive. Who else will remember? What baffles me even after all these years is how Neil Harvey caught me!As told to Arun Venugopal ' ' '