Pairs Skaters Marissa Castelli & Simon Shnapir Place 9th; Felicia Zhang & Nate Batholomay in 12th at Sochi Olympics

Pairs Skaters Marissa Castelli & Simon Shnapir Place 9th; Felicia Zhang & Nate Batholomay in 12th at Sochi Olympics

Marissa Castelli and Simon Shnapir show off their perfect sit spin during the Figure Skating Pairs Free Skating at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics held at Iceberg Skating Palace on Wednesday night (February 12) in Sochi, Russia.

The U.S. National champs took 9th place at the games with a score of 187.82. Teammates Felicia Zhang and Nate Batholomay stood strong at 12th with 167.21.

“We weren’t too worried about the placement coming in here because we’re a fairly new team,” Felicia shared with press after their skate. “We just competed in our first Olympic Games and we handled the pressure really well.”

So who took gold? Russia’s Tatiana Volosozhar and Maksim Trankov were the clear winners, followed by teammates Ksenia Stolbova and Fedor Klimov in second. Third went to Germany’s Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy.

China’s Qing Pang and Jian Tong (who are retiring after Sochi) placed 4th and Canada’s Kirsten Moore-Towers and Dylan Moscovitch had a breathtaking performance, earning them 5th.

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Credit: Matthew Stockham, Clive Mason, ; Photos: Getty
Posted to: Felicia Zhang, Marissa Castelli, Nate Batholomay, Simon Shnapir