(Transcript from SBS World News)
As the glorious career of one figure skater was ending at the Sochi Winter Olympics, another was taking off with a stunning display.
This, as a brave attempt by Australian freestyle skier Russ Henshaw to win a medal ended with a crash landing.
Murray Silby reports.
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After the joy of Torah Bright's silver medal in the snowboard halfpipe on day five, there was some hope that Australia's second medal of the Sochi Games might come as quickly as day six in the ski slopestyle.
Those hopes were carried by Russ Henshaw.
Unfortunately for him, the new Winter Olympic sport of ski slopestyle was all about a trick known as the triple cork.
Three Americans completed it and medalled.
Henshaw didn't and finished eighth.
But having once been told he would struggle to walk again after a horrendous knee injury, Henshaw said he was proud of his attempt to land the tricks needed to secure a medal.
"I was fighting to get that last one around. I wish I'd gone a little bit faster because then I probably would have landed, but it is what it is. I didn't end up landing and as I said, I'm glad I had a crack at it and I can leave here with no regrets."
Americans Joss Christensen, Guss Kenworthy and Nick Goepper won gold, silver and bronze respectively.
Although drama is not a foreign concept for the figure skating competition, day six of the Sochi Games would have to be one of the more memorable.
It included 19-year-old Japanese superstar Yuzuru Hanyu breaking his own world record in the short program with a score of 101-point-4-5.
This is how the Channel 10 coverage saw the conclusion of his routine.
"Oh yes! Now we've got a competition on our hands. That was quite remarkable. The crowd was with him from the early stages there. Remember he holds the world record for the short program, which is 99.84. Could it possibly be the first ever 100 point short program? It's got to be close because I couldn't see anything wrong with that."
That shot Hanyu into the lead after the short program and ahead of the free program, which will be held on day seven, during which the medals will be decided.
But while Hanyu's career was taking off, another was shutting down.
Russian two-time gold medallist Yevgeny Plushenko had to face the disappointment of withdrawing from the short program and announcing his retirement after injuring his back during the warm up in front of his home crowd.
The 31-year-old, who says he's endured a dozen back operations during his career, was the 2006 Olympic individual gold medallis.
He also won gold during the teams event earlier in these Games and has previously won two Olympic silver medals.
He was hoping to become the first man to win five Olympic medals in figure skating and told Channel 10 he's disappointed his hard work was cut down by injury.
"It's difficult because all this season, especially after the surgery I work, work, work, skate, skate, skate for many hours. It's hard, believe me it's hard, but I'm happy because I have a gold medal here."
Germany has concluded its luge campaign at Sochi, satisfied with winning every event, including the relay, the fourth and final event on the schedule.
The relay is a new event at the Olympics and involves team members racing in men's singles, women's singles and doubles immediately after each other.
And given Germany won each of those events at these Games, it wasn't any surprise that the Germans also took out the relay to ensure a perfect four wins from four events.
Russia took out the relay silver and Latvia the bronze.
Frenchman Martin Fourcade has won his second gold medal of the Games, this time in the 20-kilometre individual biathlon, which combines cross country skiing and shooting.
Fourcade also won the biathlon pursuit title.
Australia's focus on day seven will be firmly fixed on reigning Olympic aerials champion Lydia Lassila.
Ryan Taylor, from Ski and Snowboard Australia, the national body for snow sports, says Lassila has recently performed in training a trick that no other woman has been able to.
"Just in the last couple of days she's completed a quad twisting triple somersault in training, being the first woman to ever land one of those jumps so she's certainly confident and jumping well."
If Lassila can defend her title she'll become the first Australian to win two gold medals at winter Olympics.
Three other Australians, Samantha Wells, Laura Peel and Danielle Scott will also compete in the aerials.
OLYMPICS MEDALS TABLE - COLLATED
Olympics medals table on Thursday (after six of six gold medal events):
Gold Silver Bronze Total
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Germany 7 2 1 10
Canada 4 4 2 10
Norway 4 3 6 13
Netherlands 4 3 5 12
United States 4 2 6 12
Switzerland 3 0 1 4
Russia 2 5 4 11
China 2 1 0 3
France 2 0 2 4
Poland 2 0 0 2
Austria 1 4 0 5
Slovenia 1 1 2 4
South Korea 1 0 1 2
Belarus 1 0 0 1
Slovakia 1 0 0 1
Sweden 0 4 1 5
Czech Republic 0 2 1 3
Italy 0 2 1 3
Japan 0 2 1 3
Australia 0 1 0 1
Finland 0 1 0 1
Latvia 0 0 2 2
Great Britain 0 0 1 1
Ukraine 0 0 1 1
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