1962 World Figure Skating Championships

and Otto Jelinek and Pavel Roman

The World Figure Skating Championships is an annual figure skating competition sanctioned by the International Skating Union in which figure skaters compete for the title of World Champion.

The 1962 competitions for men's singles, ladies' singles, pair skating, and ice dance took place from March 14 to 17 at the Sportovní hala ČSTV in Prague, Czechoslovakia. The Figure Skating World Championships in Prague were originally planned for 1961, but were cancelled due to the crash of Sabena Flight 548, which killed everyone on board the plane, including the entire US figure skating team.

East Germany participated in the World Figure Skating Championships for the first time.

This competition is best remembered for Donald Jackson's come-from-behind victory in the men's event with a tour-de-force free skating that included the first triple lutz jump ever landed in competition as well as a triple salchow jump and 20 other double and single jumps, including jumps in opposite directions and jumps with variations in arm position or delayed rotation. Jackson received 7 perfect 6.0 scores for this performance.

Prague hometown favorites Eva Romanová / Pavel Roman won the dance event - breaking the British domination of this discipline - and Canadians Maria Jelinek / Otto Jelinek were the winners in the pairs. As children, the Jelineks had defected from Czechoslovakia with their parents after the post-war Communist takeover, and there were significant fears for their safety in returning to their home country. The "official" story that had been circulated at the time of the previous year's planned competition was that they were merely of Czech descent. The Jelineks' chief competitors, 1960 runners-up Marika Kilius / Hans-Jürgen Bäumler, were forced to withdraw from the competition after colliding on side-by-side jumps during their program, and the silver medal was won by Lyudmila Belousova / Oleg Protopopov.