| | LYON, France--It's back to school for Michelle Kwan. It's also back to work after losing at the Grand Prix Final where she learned some difficult lessons.
The American was beaten in the gold medal final by Irina Slutskaya, the Russian who has returned to the top after an off year in 1999.
| |  | | | Kwan finished second at the ISU Final. |
Slutskaya nearly quit skating last year when she failed to make the Russian team after coming second in the world in 1998. But she came back last month to take the Russian title over world champion Maria Butyrskaya last month.
Now Slutskaya has beaten two-time world champion Kwan and she did it with moves that no one had seen before in competition.
Slutskaya became the first woman to do a triple lutz-triple loop combination. Seconds later, she added a triple salchow-triple loop, earning a rare 6.0 for technical merit.
It was more than enough to hand Slutskaya victory and send Kwan back to California where she will resume classes this week at UCLA.
But on the ice, Kwan will also do some homework. She has to come up with something to challenge Slutskaya's triple-triples when the two meet again at the world championships in March in Nice, France.
"I know what I have to do when I go home is to push myself because the technical difficulty is getting stronger and higher," Kwan said. "I have to satisfy that demand."
Kwan has rarely performed triple-triples and always the simplest toe loop combinations.
The American said she had worked on more difficult combinations in practice but was not yet ready to put them into her programs.
"Now the other skaters are doing it and I have to push myself harder," Kwan said.
Slutskaya is not planning to rest either. She said she is thinking about another triple-triple combination.
"Why not?," she asked. "I think I can do it. It is a good idea."
The women's event was the highlight of the competition which brought together the top scorers in the four events from the six-meet series between October and December.
There also was a new format with the top skaters competing three times within 24 hours, the last round being a head-to-head heat for first and second. That eliminated others from challenging for the gold medal, even if they skated well.
Tim Goebel of the United States ended up with the bronze medal in the men's event, although he outscored Canadian Elvis Stojko, who lost to Evgeny Plushenko in the gold medal faceoff.
Goebel completed a quad salchow-triple toe loop combination twice but faltered on four other quad attempts.
The quad was the determining factor All six men tried it at least once. Yet only Plushenko did it successfully in all three phases of the competition.
Plushenko ended with a quad and eight triples including a quad-triple-double combination. That brought him a total of five 6.0 scores.
However his task was made easier when two-time world and European champion Alexei Yagudin or Russia withdrew from the event citing boot and foot problems.
The two split the six Grand Prix events but Plushenko beat Yagudin for the Russian title.
The pairs went to China's Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo.
Marina Anissina and Gwendal Peizerat, skating in their hometown, took the ice dance event, leading from start to finish. Anissina and Peizerat scored four 6.0s for presentation in a dramatic routine to "Carmina Burana."
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AUDIO/VIDEO
 ABC Sports interviews Michelle Kwan and Irina Slutskaya
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN
Irina Slutskaya's winning performance (Courtesy: ABC Sports)
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN
Evgeny Plushenko's quad-triple-double combination (Courtesy: ABC Sports)
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN
Anissina & Peizerat's winning performane (Courtesy: ABC Sports)
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN
Shen & Zhao perform a throw triple salchow(Courtesy: ABC Sports)
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN
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