Niina Petrõkina in 2nd at European Championships in Tallinn, before home crowd

Estonian figure skater Niina Petrõkina set a new personal best in the women's short program at the ISU European Figure Skating Championships being hosted in Tallinn, trailing leader Anastasiia Gubanova (Georgia) by just 0.05 points ahead of the free skate stage.
The European Figure Skating Championships kicked off in Tallinn Wednesday, the first time in three years the Estonian capital has hosted the event, with the pairs short program.
The event, at the Tondiraba Ice Hall in Lasnamäe, features competitors from 34 countries, with both minor and major medals up for grabs.
Petrõkina, 20, was making her return to competition at the home championships after recovering from a fractured fibula and facing challenges with consistency.
Other top contenders include Gubanova, Lara Naki Gutmann (Italy), Kimmy Repond (Switzerland), and Nina Pinzarrone (Belgium).
On the day, the Estonian delivered an almost flawless performance in taking short program silver, successfully landing a triple Lutz-toe loop combination, a triple Axel, and a triple flip.
The judges awarded her 68.94 points, surpassing her previous PB of 68.00, set at the 2023 World Championships, and meaning that she enters the free skate event in second place.
Petrõkina, still processing the shock of being in second place, took a moment to reflect on her performance at the European Figure Skating Championships in Tallinn.
"I'm very emotional right now, I need to calm down a bit," she told ERR shortly after finishing her routine.

She still had some self-criticism lined up, however.
"I just realized that I'm in second place – I'm shocked! The performance wasn't actually all that great because when I looked at the protocol, I saw that one of my spins was only rated at level two. I counted nine or ten revolutions—I don't know what happened there though, and there's still work to be done."
In the plus column, Petrõkina said she was pleased with her clean triple Lutz-toe loop, triple Axel, and triple flip, the latter in particular.
"I haven't executed it cleanly in a long time—there's always been some mistake in the protocols. But this time, I did it cleanly. We also changed the first jump—earlier in the season, I was doing a flip-toe loop, but now I did a Lutz-toe loop because I feel more comfortable with the Lutz. It went well," Petrõkina went on.
"This time, I took my nerves with me. Usually, I try to calm myself down and lower my anxiety, but this time I pulled myself together and skated with the nerves. I know that I'm prone to getting nervous. It went well today—I managed," she added.
The skater says she plans to ease her nerves before the free skate stage by going for a walk and socializing with friends.
However, immediately following Petrõkina's strong performance in the short program, Georgia's Gubanova took to the ice, and narrowly surpassed Petrõkina with 68.99 points, securing first place by the slimmest of margins.
Neither Pinzarrone nor Repond managed to outscore them—Swiss skater Repond earned 68.68 points, while Pinzarrone scored 66.80.
Gutmann placed fifth with 63.79 points, followed by her compatriot Anna Pezzetta (62.73) and France's Lorine Schild (62.47).
Romania's Julia Sauter also surpassed the 60-point mark with 61.96 points.
German duo take lead after pairs' short program
Meanwhile, in the pairs short program, German duo Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin took the lead.
Hase, 25, from Berlin, and her Russian-born partner Volodin, who have been skating together for two and a half years, earned 71.59 points for their performance on Wednesday.

In second place were the 2022 European champions, Italians Sara Conti and Niccolò Macii, who scored 68.52 points.
The Hungarian team of Russian-born skaters Maria Pavlova and Aleksei Sviatchenko currently holds third place with 65.88 points.
The championships continue today, Thursday, with the men's short program and pairs' free skate. The women's free skate event is on Saturday.
The official event site is here.
Editor: nders Nõmm, Andrew Whyte