NAGANO, Japan - World champions Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford led after the pairs short program on Friday at the NHK Trophy figure skating competition.

Duhamel of Lively, Ont., and Radford of Balmertown, Ont., earned 71.04 points in their short program skated to Elton John's "Your Song." They are looking for a fifth straight victory on the Grand Prix circuit.

Alexa Scimeca and Chris Knierim of the U.S. were second at 68.43 and Xiaoyu Yu and Yang Jin of China third at 67.00.

"We had to fight through this," said Duhamel. "Our strength and training really showed today. We know we can do this program a lot smoother and we know if we want to be first against all the top teams we have to be better."

"There were a couple of little miscues that never happened before," added Radford. "But some quick thinking and we still pulled off a decent program."

Lubov Iliushechkina and Dylan Moscovitch of Toronto were fifth at 63.80.

In the men's competition, Olympic figure skating champion Yuzuru Hanyu set a record score in the short program.

Hanyu received 106.33 points to eclipse his own previous high of 101.45 at the Sochi Olympics.

Jin Boyang of China was second with 95.64, followed by Takahito Mura of Japan on 88.29.

Elladj Balde of Pierrefonds, Que., was 11th.

Satoko Miyahara of Japan hit all of her jumps to finish first after the women's short program with a score of 69.53 followed by Americans Courtney Hicks with 65.60, and Ashley Wagner on 63.71.

Mao Asada, making a comeback after a year off, was fourth with 62.50. Asada fell on her opening triple Axel and singled a triple Lutz.

Kaetlyn Osmond of Marystown, N.L. was eighth.

Skating to Chopin's "Ballad No. 1," Hanyu opened with a quad Salchow and a quad toe loop, triple toe loop combination. He also cleanly landed a triple Axel.

"At a certain point, I felt I had to include two quads in the short program," Hanyu said. "As the Olympic champion, I felt that it is necessary as I prepare for the 2018 Olympics."

Hanyu is looking for his first Grand Prix win of the season after finishing second at Skate Canada behind Canada's Patrick Chan. A win would secure him a place at the Grand Prix Final in Barcelona from Dec. 10-13.

As he did at the Cup of China, Jin cleanly executed a rare quad Lutz-triple toe loop combination to open his routine to "Tango Amore."

"I thought I could make a good performance," Jin said. "All of my jumps were good quality and I was able to do everything I practised."

The men's and women's program conclude on Saturday.

— With files from The Associated Press