No Mabees About This

Today's men's short program at the world figure skating championships produced a lot of storylines we might have expected to see.
France's Brian Joubert, a world champion in waiting for a few years now, lit up the ice in Tokyo like no other and seized control of the event with a powerful display. He seems ready to finally snare that elusive crown.
Joubert, by the way, was Kurt Browning's pick to win the thing. Granted, the four-time world champ has a bit of a vested interest in this — he became one of Joubert's choreographer's this year. But he's also in Japan as a TV analyst, and his prediction, it should be noted, was made with that hat on. He's also a guy whose opinion we generally tend to trust.
With 83.64 points in his pocket, Joubert holds nearly a four-point edge of Canada's Jeff Buttle, who's no stranger to the world podium. Ironically, when Buttle won his world silver two years ago in Moscow, it happened in part because Joubert imploded during his free skate.
Both, however, appear to be in sharp form this week. Buttle's 79.90-point score was also a personal best, but his French rival owns one key trump card — the quad-triple combination, which he landed with ease today.
That being said, Buttle seemed completely comfortable on the ice in Japan, a country in which he is a fan favourite and has a track record of performing well. It would be an utter shock if Buttle isn't wearing some sort of world hardware again by this time tomorrow.
Emanuel Sandhu delivered about what we've come to expect from him. The guy's got oodles of talent, and put it on display for most of his short program. But a fall on a triple Axel doomed him to an 11th-place standing. He skates clean, and we're putting him in the pot of podium contenders.
Here's the good news, though. With 69.42 points, Sandhu is only about five points away from being in the medal mix. And, as he showed a year ago at the Calgary worlds — when he rose from near-oblivion at the beginning of the week to a fifth-place finish — anything is possible with Sandhu.
And what to make of Christopher Mabee, the young lad from Tillsonburg, Ont., making his worlds debut? We suggested back in Halifax that, in winning the silver medal there and performing so well, he'd taken a big leap toward the big time.
But that might now be viewed as a mere baby step compared to what happened earlier today in Tokyo. As good as Mabee was in his short program at Canadians, he was even better on the world stage, all but floating his way through a fabulous performance. With 71.33 points, Mabee stands seventh, and well within reach of the podium.
Imagine the celebration back at the Mariposa School of Skating in Barrie, Ont., if Mabee joins his good buddy and training partner Buttle in bringing home medals from the other side of the world.
Some party that would be. No Mabees, er, maybes about it.