Not on me 'ead, son

It should have been the climax of the world champions' skating routine - a one-handed lift high into the air. But it ended with Tatiana Totmianina crashing face-first on the ice.

As her partner Maxim Marinin hoisted her above his head he slipped. The audience looked on in shock as Totmianina's body bounced once before lying motionless for several minutes.

It happened when the 22-year-old Russian and her partner were performing at Skate America in Pittsburgh. Paramedics treated Totmianina on the ice before she was stretchered off.

Amazingly she suffered no serious injury and has been released from hospital. Scans, X-rays and neurological tests all proved negative. Now she says she can't wait to get back on the ice.

Her face bruised, but her confidence apparently intact, Totmianina said: "I'm not afraid of getting back on the ice. I want to go right now. My head is in pain, my body is in pain, but I don't really know what happened."

She said they had practised the lift many times. "Actually, it wasn't something unusual, but it wasn't successful," she added.

Marinin, 27, blamed himself for her tumble, saying: "It was a kind of technical mistake." But Totmianina's coach, Oleg Vasiliev, said it was not his fault, adding: "There are many reasons that could happen."