SAINT JOHN, N.B.—Cleopatra will have to wait.

The free skate program Kaetlyn Osmond was dying to debut here, in defence of her Skate Canada title, has been deferred due to sudden injury.

Seventeen-year-old Osmond woke up Saturday morning with severe soreness in her right upper thigh.

“I was hoping it was just some sort of cramp,” Osmond told reporters, just as the women’s long program — won by 15-year-old Russian Julia Lipnitskaia — was about to begin at the Harbour Station arena. “So I showed up for practice (at 9.20 a.m.) hoping it would feel better with a little bit of loosening. But when I got on the ice, I could barely put any weight on my leg. Trying to do choreography, it was really painful.”

Treatment made no difference.

Osmond and coach Ravi Walia made the decision — not that there was any other option — to pull the plug on Skate Canada 2013.

“I’m obviously disappointed that I won’t be able to do my long proper,” said Osmond. “My long program is my favourite program. That’s the one I wanted to show everyone.”

After Friday’s short competition, Osmond was back in fifth spot, far from medal territory though still best among the three Canadian women participating. It does not appear this current trouble — Osmond vaguely referred to her hamstring as the point of irritation, not in the bone, not even in the muscle — had anything to do with the underwhelming short program effort. But similar pain has erupted before in that area, though usually subsiding after a few hours.

“It hasn’t done that this time. It’s an injury I’ve had before, a few years ago. Sometimes it comes back, but usually not this badly.”

Neither is this problem related to the bone-stress injury that flared in Los Angeles, where Osmond was training in August. She was put in a walking cast for three weeks and only started practising jumps again — mere singles — in late September.

Rebounding well from that injury, however, has given Osmond reason to feel optimistic about overcoming this setback. “We’ve already having a recovery plan, starting on Monday.”

Osmond’s second Grand Prix assignment is Cup of Russia, a month from now.

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“I’ll be ready for the rest of the season.”

Earlier, Canadians Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford finished third in pairs, behind the winning Italians, Stefania Berton and Ondrej Hotarek, and Chinese runners-up Sui Wenjing and Han Cong.