Plushenko's trip won't cost much

But with the new experimental scoring system being used in the Grand Prix final, Russia's two-time world champion was not only alive after splattering his opening quadruple toe-triple toe, he was leading Canada's Emanuel Sandhu and US champion Michael Weiss going into tonight's free skate at the World Arena.

The cumulative point system, which likely will replace the traditional 6.0 next year, was a huge advantage for Plushenko, who still has the world's most impressive technical and artistic package. When the final tally went up, he'd piled up 78.25 points to Sandhu's 75.55 and Weiss's 73.33.

"I feel like an idiot that I fell," said Plushenko, who's chasing his fourth Grand Prix title in five years despite skating on a torn right knee cartilage. "I'm 100 percent ready for this competition and I landed the quad and the triple axel in the warmup.

"I don't know what happened."

Neither Sandhu nor Weiss, who both benefited when Canada's Jeffrey Buttle pulled out with a stomach flu an hour before the competition, was griping about experimental scoring.

Sandhu was only here because Tim Goebel pulled out this week with skate problems and France's Brian Joubert, the first alternate, chose not to come.

"This is sort of a good karma thing and an early Christmas present," Sandhu said.

And Weiss, who'd been in bed with the flu himself for nearly a week, was happy just to remain upright for the duration. "I was worried that I would have trouble getting through the program," said Weiss, who didn't attempt a quadruple jump and barely held his triple axel and triple lutz.

Not as fortunate was defending women's champion Sasha Cohen, who later crashed on her opening triple lutz-double toe combination and ended up second (60.80) behind Japan's Fumie Suguri (62.02), the two-time world medalist, and just barely ahead of Ukraine's Elena Liashenko (60.54).

Cohen, who was fourth at the Olympics and the last two world championships, finished atop the women's standings of the six-event Grand Prix circuit, winning Skate America, Skate Canada, and Trophee Lalique in France. If she can rally in tonight's free skate, she'll be the first American to repeat since Tara Lipinski in 1998.

If she holds on, Suguri would be the first Japanese women's champion.

In pairs, China's Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo, the two-time world champions, piled up a healthy 66.00-62.96 lead over Russia's defending titlists Tatiana Totmianina and Maxim Marinin with a crisp skate that included a spectacular throw triple loop.

In ice dancing, Russia's Tatiana Navka and Roman Kostomarov took an impressive step toward inheriting the title vacated by countrymen Irina Lobacheva and Ilya Averbukh by winning the original dance (65.18) by more than five points ahead of Tanith Belbin and Benjamin Agosto (59.81), who have an excellent chance at becoming the first US couple to win a medal in the event. . . .

The World Skating Federation has filed a federal lawsuit against the International Skating Union, charging that figure skating's ruling body has tried to improperly maintain a monopoly over the sport by threatening to punish anyone who helps the WSF.

The WSF, which was formed last spring in the wake of the ISU's controversial reforms after last year's Salt Lake judging scandal, unsuccessfully lobbied the International Olympic Committee to recognize it as skating's international federation.

"We allege that [ISU president] Ottavio Cinquanta, fearing a new democratic organization and fighting to protect his autocratic control of the sport and its lucrative television contracts, responded by threatening to `blacklist' or banish anyone connected with the WSF," acting president Ronald Pfenning, a former ISU official from Hyannis, Mass., said in a statement yesterday. An ISU spokesman said that the federation would have no comment.