Xen

Is it bad that I'm imagining his kuyashii face at the +3 GOEs for the stsq3?

You know what is amusing about that number 6? I wondered a bit and checked the numbers for the men who have won olympic figure skating men's singles gold on wikipedia. Of the 20 men, 6 occurred the most (5 of the 20 men bdays added to 6) whether as 24 or 33 (Yuzu and Evan both have 33). After that the second highest occurrence were 3's, 5's and 7's (at 3 men each). 2's occurred twice (both being 11's), and all other numbers only had 1 lone occurrence.

Boy's got options, other than just TCC. We could have: - spirals in a line, with Misha and Boyang - ice dance with Misha - Han Cong, you're up for it right? Or would Bruno offer to help? - Alex Shibutani maybe, since he and the Shibs get along so well? Are we sure Valentia and Ondrej are not invited?

We can always try to petition for official sanctioned m/m and f/f ice dancing and pairs competitions. Besides, he already has a partner in Misha, though I hear there might be competition in Boyang?

Fans' relationship (and issues) with Yuzu- the definition of a problematic, dysfunctional relationship?

He can go stand in the middle of the ice and sing for all I care. He can even sing off-key, we can auto-tune it later so he has a perfect singing voice.

He might have a bit of pain, but I think those smiles are genuine today. He's back on ice, 2nd OGM (most important goal) accomplished, no one came close to touching his WRs, PM Pooh gets to see olympic practice rink ice with him. The world is in peace. =)

Oh， it's okay. Don't worry, better to voice it out somewhere. Nah, he looks like he's having a normal practice RT. Just staring hard and sternly at his exit edge. =)

He looked like he wasn't happy with the landing, but not really in pain. That was a nice edge, but a bit too curvy compared to his normal landings. Let's not imply pain everywhere and everytime he skates okay? The boy says he's happy to be skating, let's just cheer him on.

Uh guys, let's not get too depressive. Javi's devoted many years of his life to skating. Right now, give him some time to catch up on the rest of this thing called life. He might want to stay a year or 2 in Spain, get stuff done for skating in Spain (lots of work), you know he's also at an age where he might be looking into marriage and getting a family started. But once that settles down, he might still go back and apprentice under Brian. There's also the possibility he might still go back to Toronto from time to time, just not in a permanent basis, so there's no point to maintain a year-long apartment lease. Who knows, he might start a brother/sister rink in Spain with TCC?

Um....*goes and starts looking at linkedIn and everything* does video games art director count?

Boyang should not, and I hope the Chinese Fed actually does something since Beijing 2022 is next. But checking protocols, the CHN judge gave the highest scores which were automatically thrown out, and the scores other judges gave were all clustered together anyways, with none really deviating far from the final average. So like it or not, US, Boyang got fourth, and the CHN judge scores didn't even factor much. @Eclair: thank you for the head's up but I did go ahead and watch it. I was highly amused by the actions of the US judge they mentioned, and IMO, that judge deserves some scrutiny. If the ISU wants to inspect the US judge, TSL episode spilled all the tea. And much as the judge supports the sport of figure skating, the scores indicate that the judge supports the sport of figure skating for the US and for US's benefit only. More so than anything else. The most informative part of that episode was the clip of Brian coaching jump exercises at the end. As a skater I found those pretty instructive. =) The emphasis on jumping out, how to keep edges for the lutz. I'm going to try them next practice. =) The technical aspect of the axels was interesting for me, but I find all those speculations about Nathan really annoying. I could be wrong, but if Brian and Tracy got a letter from Boyang and Nathan at the same time, my guess is that they would take Boyang. It seems Brian and Tracy like taking on diamonds in the rough types - guys who haven't maxed out. I know this will be an unpopular opinion, but I think Nathan is close to maxing out, very very close. He's almost hit a TES cap (he's just missing the 4A), and judges are already raining PCS and GOE candies on him. On the other hand, Boyang is far further down on PCS, still has a 4F to try out and his 4Loop isn't stable, doesn't get a lot of GOE candies either, and have at least made indications he wants to improve on PCS. Another interesting possibility is Shun Sato, who would be quite a comrade maybe to Gogolev @LadyLou: you know, I think Vincent might have done the job with a little more emotion. But whether Nathan actually enjoys skating is something up in the air for me. He might, but I'm not sure if he's at a point where he can easily express it either. If we factor in that maybe he didn't really want to do the music, then, that would explain why the long felt flat.

Did this over in the Men's thread for the Olys I think. What is amusing is if you check through the male gold medalists throughout recent history, starting from Karl Schafer, men's generally only got their first Olys gold at their 2nd Olys attempt. The exceptions to that have been Dick Button, Ilia Kulik and Yuzu. With Dick Button I'm not sure how many senior seasons he had, since I'm not sure how the system worked then, plus the impact of WWII. But for Ilia Kulik and Yuzu both, they were in their 4th season in seniors in their first Olys. If this pattern holds, and exists for reasons such as stamina, ability to handle nerves or maturity in general, regardless of technical upgrades, then it was most likely that none of the quadsters could have beat Yuzu this time based on that pattern. The closest threat would have been Shoma, because the other threat was Boyang (and not likely to have the PCS for it).

I'm on board with that banner. Or since we know now that Yuzu does take some poohs home, we toss some android poohs with AI programming that look attractive enough for him to take home. And then we commence the android poohs operation-each time he tries to get out of bed if there is the slightest hint of injury or sickness, the poohs will "wake up" and hold him down in bed. We have enough people with programming background to pull it off.

Question guys, when saying he doesn't have plans for 2022, was it a sincere look, or something similar to the look he gave about "for now I'm not going to put a 4Lz in my program" over the summer? Serious question, the boy says he's "not decided" a lot of times when he's freakin' decided. Well, I must say I'm all for Yuzu running the ISU at some point. That's what Ulrich Salchow did, if I'm not mistaken. Won a couple and then went ahead and ran the thing. I do fondly recall Dick Button roasting the ISU in some speech, where he mentioned the last time the ISU stood up for figure skaters was when the president was a figure skater, and they stood up to soviet block judging. And of course, now there hasn't been a single figure skater as an ISU president for a while. Who knows, ISU might need a figure skater to save it from itself again. As for Brian's reveal of Nessie and harness jumping: - We knew for a while right? But yeah, poor Brian's hair, it seems like his main job is to ensure Yuzu gets what he wants efficiently. So while Pooh might be Prime Minister, Brian and TCC seems to be the rest of the court chancellors and advisors. - Harness training: for a lot of the harder jumps, having a harness helps, but it would be most beneficial to help cushion falls and ensure that the skater doesn't get severely injured when trying new jumps. So if Yuzu has managed to land Nessie without much additional help from the harness guy, then he's probably okay. Granted, I'm scared, because to get Nessie, he has to either rotate significantly faster, or increase his airtime significantly. Not sure which is safer to be honest.

@fireovertheice: Okay, I've managed to force myself to rewatch Nathan's LP from fancam, and went even better-I grabbed my mother (who actually did practice ballet) to sit down and watch with me and discuss. To begin my discussion, I would prefer that people actually go check out the wikipedia entries on both the story of Mao's Last Dancer (movie and book), and the entry on Li Cunxin, the dancer. To preface my analysis and explain my conclusion, I might need to explain a bit about the 1950's and the cultural revolution. If you want to skip the political/history stuff, skip to the end as I'll do the backstory in spoiler tags. To me, the music cuts and the story of Mao's last dancer itself, is a story of hope and triumph against despair. Where for the dancer in the story, ballet was transformative, and a savior against the dark circumstances of his life. That's the overarching theme I get from the music. For Nathan's performance, my question for him would be, "Is figure skating for you, what ballet was for this protagonist?" Or even, "Can you comprehend and express what ballet was for this person?" And in reply to that, no, in that performance, I don't think Nathan showed that he understood the music, nor the program, and least of all the idea that ballet was the lone hope for that dancer. When watching with my mother, she only liked that one lone 4 Salchow that he landed. The rest she said, he looked like he'd fall at any time. About 30 seconds in she even said, "This guy can't possibly have gotten on the podium." She also commented that his body is too stiff, and voiced absolute surprise that he ever did ballet. Then flat out said, "Must not have been a good dancer then." Both of us thought there was a disconnect with the music-she thought the choreography wasn't good. According to her, he kept the same pace, the same mood regardless of how the music changed. When the music is soft and expansive, he didn't relax nor extend himself to match the softness. This is in great contrast to skaters like Yagudin, Plushenko, whose movements (even if not pretty) were in sync with the mood of the music-they engage and pull you in for the ride. When the music hits a climax pace, Nathan's pace didn't change. In her words, "The music is pushing you to a climax, and your mood does hit the climax, but then you watch him and the mood deflates like a popped balloon and you want to ask him why are you so nonchalant." As for the soft, melodic sections, his movements didn't match that- pity for the lone spread eagle, there were a couple places where an ina bauer, inside spread eagle which is less taxing, or a spiral would have done wonders. But that might tire him out for the jumps right? But the jumps themselves, also had times where they were discordant with the music, especially during the softer sections as his jumps do not have good flow. Never mind the soft knees and arms needed. Personally, if it had to be skated at this Olys cycle, I think the program may have been more fitting for Yuzu, Jason, Boyang even. I don't think Nathan at this time in his life, views skating the way the dancer viewed ballet to express the music to the full. I'll just end with this line my mom gave, as her general impression of the piece: "There are 2 types of ballet dancers. First type of dancer is someone who really likes it, and even when they are having a bad day, that passion comes through and makes up for any deficiencies in their technique that day. The Second type of dancer is someone who picked up ballet for various reasons, whether just following someone's footsteps, or because it pays the bills or something, when they are careful and focusing they can do well, but when they have an off day there's nothing there. He (Nathan) seems to be having an off day, and he is the second type of dancer." So scoring wise: -SS, TR: 8.25 -IN, PE, CO: 7.75, 8.0, 8.0 Total: 40.25, aka 80.5 for the LP PCS. Fair enough?

He looked so proud of himself for catching that reporter who could speak Japanese. ...knowing what we know now, Brian, you lied so well for the sake of your boy.

I heard the CHN judge is under investigation, while US judge is not? Guess someone wants a pewter medal? And the order from the CHN was flipped on Boyang and Nate, but most of the others are right (and even gave Vincent higher placements). @fireovertheice: I honestly don't want to watch Nate's programs again, so for Nate I'll just go based on my impressions from watching him. My opinion is that Yuzu deserved to have broken his WR in the SP, again. This was a better SP than the ACI one, and the points in TES should be fairly similar, with a higher PCS here. I would have been more than happy to toss him a 49 at least (maybe with tears in my eyes I would have given him a 50), because it was the best SP that night. Of course, given how things are, I'd likely end up under investigation (because I'd be the CHN judge!) for giving 10's. Personally, I think Nate received higher PCS than his programs merited, especially in the long. I initially thought he only got 82.77 PCS in the long, and thought that sounded about right (turns out I was wrong). Boyang I thought was a bit underscored in the PCS department. Despite his error, I would have been okay with giving him about a 2 points higher in PCS in the long, this time he really did try to sell the long. I'm still in shock at the PCS they gave to Patrick- only about 90 in the long? Error or not, I thought he would have been around 94.

And some say he doesn't dominate....

Uh, probably not. Guys, really? Have some sympathies for Brian's hair! (and mine too...)

It's been about 2 days (?) since he won, and I've yet to fully process it. How does one return to normalcy after this? Anyone? Help?

He could maybe still do shows as part of rehab- only be MC and rink-side commentator this time! I bet TV ratings would sky-rocket, and he'll have fulfilled the wishes of fans and his sponsors!

Guys....what if next season, they have a ghana hot chocolate CM with both Yuzu and Shoma. We already know Yuzu dumps a lot of sugar into his hot chocolate, what if he teaches that to Shoma. Would Shoma have sufficient sugar tolerance for it? I'm seriously wondering what CMs are going to come out this summer (he can do that with his ankle rehab). What is a new practical household item that he may endorse?

First practice. The troll practice.

From this I think we can kind of piece together his state of mind. He started his rehab thinking he could get back to 100%, but that took a lot longer than initial diagnosis. Well after not improving 1-2 months off ice, he tries to get back in shape, things worsen (bone inflammation) and that's when he starts getting the dark thoughts he mentioned such as "what if I have to retire now without my OGM." Of course his body may not have fully cooperated since it was now used to not landing quads, being bent for 2-3 hours per day (my kneecaps were in pain when I fully started back ice skating). Then he finally gets this diagnosis from the doctor telling him this is as good as his ankle will be, his thoughts crystallize and he goes back to training, on and off ice in earnest (maybe around early Jan for this), and that is how he ended up in PC and got his OGM. So now, we know he needs more than 2 months of full rest to recover, and if he skips worlds and shows this summer, he's got around 6 months before next season starts. He can get a full look at his ankle, knees and full right leg to see what happens. He also has those 2 months experience so he knows how to keep himself in good shape. He mentioned biking being one way to keep his muscles fit. And I remember a lot of female skaters do pilates and yoga as part of off-ice training. Yuzu has tons of options. =) When there is a will there is a way. As for reactions-there were a couple of colleagues whom I don't think watch figure skating, ping back at me "Your Yuzuru Hanyu defended his OGM title, congrats. "