Get with the times, figure skater Yevgeny Plushenko urges

By Sonia Oxley

VANCOUVER (Reuters) - Yevgeny Plushenko was the only skater on Tuesday to nail the hotly-debated quadruple jump but even so he only gained a tiny lead over his closest rivals who by his reckoning are stuck in the 1990s.

The Russian has long said it should be impossible to win Olympic gold without the draining jump, which requires getting enough height and pace to make at least four mid-air rotations.

"Speedskating has new record times, biathlon has new times, short track has new times. I think we have stopped," he told a news conference after scoring 90.85 points for his short program to lead American Evan Lysacek by a slim 0.55.

"In the 80s there were doubles, then skaters were jumping triples, triple axels and then the quadruple.

"I did triples in 1994."

World champion Lysacek said he used to be a fan of the quad before injuring his foot.

"I used to really enjoy training the quad ... and I thought it was important for me to always try do it in competition ... until I broke my foot and then it became less fun to train and more scary," said Lysacek, who won the 2009 world title without it."

SLIM LEAD

Plushenko's slim lead shows that if the Russian had done a triple jump instead of a quad toeloop, he would have been considerably behind the American because Lysacek got much higher presentation marks.

It is a high-risk strategy, which Plushenko and third-placed Daisuke Takahashi of Japan have promised to adopt for Thursday's free skate.

"Without the quad it's not men's figure skating," said Plushenko.

The Russian, sporting a shorter-than-usual version of his bowl-cut at the front and long at the back haircut, said his huge jump had been powered by a banana.

"I'm on a diet ... because I need to lose weight," he said, rubbing his non-existent paunch.

"I ate a banana today ... I want to be a thinner skater."

(Editing by Ed Osmond)