micaelis

I guess I must have missed something. I didn't think Yuzu was going to do ice shows this summer in order to fully recover. So he is going to do the shows, which means the producers must be paying top money to have him. As always he's the unofficial headliner. When's the last time Yuzu was not the last introduced in the opening of an ice show? Has to be ancient history.

I'm not Japanese but I'm aware of the importance of this, not simply because it is the present emperor's 30th anniversary as Emperor but also that it is his last. On the 30th of April he will be abdicating the throne (due to age, his idea) and his son will ascend to it. Thus this anniversary is very important and it's quite an honor for Yuzu to be invited to contribute to this volume. I'm certain most of the messages will be thanking him for his service and wishing him well for his remaining years and each will have it's own additions. Yuzu might thank him for any special attentions he (the emperor) may have given to the reconstruction effort and other measures of support and perhaps also to the two times he met the emperor (the emperor's garden party) after his two Olympic victories. As with all things Yuzuru it will be well thought out and totally sincere.

Spare Us, Please!! In any case I don't think it's even possible for a fellow who shows no trace of beard and who, as far as I've been able to see went from boyhood through adolescence to manhood without a single zit. What's his secret? (PS, I almost did myself since most of the time with me during those years I was without blemish, so it is possible).

For those wondering about Patrick's declaration I have to admit that this came to me as second-hand information. I can't cite when and where he is said to have made the statement. I will say, however, as I look at the field of up-and-coming skaters in Canada it is clearly evident that Stephen is the one who the skating establishment there feels holds the most promise. Everyone is worrying about growth spurts and such although my information says he's already gone through one with nary a problem (at least none to be seen in his skating). Young male skaters are not inevitably going to be sidetracked by their suddenly growing bodies. I see no evidence of such happening to Yuzu as he moved from boyhood to manhood. In any case the good folks at TCC were made super-aware of the problems of adolescent explosive-growth through their experiences with Nam and they took those experiences to heart and are making sure they are ready for anything Stephen's maturing body might throw at them.

I can see him signing perhaps those five big winners but I can't imagine Yuzu, as determined as he is to be genuine, signing an additional thirty-five hundred items. The signatures, however, might be the contest authorities' means of saying this is a Yuzu-approved operation.

The best testimony to that is Sochi. Yuzu was never satisfied with his victory there. He knew that he went gold because of the high margin he carried over from his short program and the fact that he made less mistakes than others in the long. That's why he so much wanted a 'clean' win at PC, which he did receive and so was satisfied. Yuzu is always his tenth judge and he is just as hard on himself as the other nine are although he's honest and knowledgeable about his self-criticism, unlike the other nine.

Not Yale. Oxford!

So the season is done and Stephen Gogolev now looks forward to his second (and presumably last) season on the junior circuit. He started out great by taking gold in his first JGP qualifier but then faltered in his second, ending in fifth. He just missed making the JGP Final but was listed as first alternate. Another skater dropped out and so Stephen was in and went and stole the show (as his exhibition song says) by becoming the youngest ever to win the JGP Final, eclipsing the record held by one Yuzuru Hanyu. He shone at the senior level in the Canadian national championships and if he hadn't popped his first jump he would have gone gold. He had to settle for silver, which isn't bad for a lad who had just turned fourteen and was skating against some individuals who were twice his age. At worlds he was not able to live up to expectations and ended up in fifth. Still, not bad. Looking at his skating in Zagreb I did not see the sort of conviction he had earlier in the season. In some ways I think it might be his having to go back to his junior level program after the far more challenging program he had at the Canadian championships. In short, I think he was bored with it and it showed. Next season, though, he will not be one of the crowd. This current season was far more successful than most junior level male skaters might expect their first season of international competition. The Stephen Gogolev achievements are now being widely touted and he is now being regarded as amongst the elite of the junior ranks. When in the 2020/21 season he ascends (as expected) to the senior ranks you can be sure that he will be on every male competitor's radar. Stephen will begin his senior level competition as a force to be reckoned with. He will be facing a lot of pressure then and it's fortunate that he trains in the same facility as Yuzuru Hanyu does. Yuzu can certainly provide Stephen advice on how to deal with such pressure although the pressure on Stephen will be qualitatively different from Yuzu's. Yuzu is an iconic figure in Japan, far transcending his image as a figure skater. Stephen will be simply an immensely talented figure skater who is Canada's best hope for golden glory in coming years. Patrick Chan has already declared Stephen as his successor. Those are big boots to fill but so far Stephen has shown the maturity to handle the situation.

Notions of masculinity are essentially culture-based. There is no universal notion of what comprises a man. In the 18th century it was not deemed unmasculine if a man shed tears when experiencing an excess of emotion of any sort so that one could talk of tears of joy (we've see those from Yuzu on several occasions), for instance. The same goes for clothing styles. In earlier centuries men were quite often as gaudily dressed as the ladies and even today in Japan a man is not seen as effeminate if he is wearing an extremely colorful kimono and the traditional Japanese tattoo is actually an attempt to engrave a kimono on a person's body. American notions of masculinity are actually many, depending on which part of the populace one is examining. On one end is the red-neck 'good ol' boy' image predominating in the more rural parts of the country and on the other hand the notion of the cultured gentleman found in the cities and amongst the highly-educated. There are many variants between those two extremes. What we see, however, is the fact that notions of masculinity are generated by specific cultures and sub-cultures and are not genetically generated. As far as Yuzu goes, going by his behavior through the years, I don't think he's all that sexually-motivated. He's never had a girlfriend, and his friendship with the Spanishly-straight Javi is one that is more of the sort that arises between fellow-soldiers than one erotically-generated. What we can say about Yuzu is that he wears his emotions on his sleeve. He doesn't mask them and while he can be the playful fellow we saw in those vids of him and others just playing around after practicing for a gala performance, he can also be the dignified young man we saw when he was presented with the People's Honor award. That was a situation where he realized the truly great honor being bestowed on him. He acted accordingly and without artifice. He WAS the dignified young man at that ceremony. It wasn't a mask put on for the occasion. So, yes, Yuzu really doesn't seem to orient his likes and dislikes around notions of masculinity. Just look at his admiration for the obviously heterosexual Eugenie Plushenko and the very obviously gay Johnny Weir. The issue for Yuzu is a non-issue and the Scott Hamiltons of the world will just have to live with that.

The Planet is down. Woe is me! What can I do to help the situation? Absolutely nothing. I'm at the mercy of the Internet gods. My solution. Go to bed and sleep on it. Wake up! Planet is back. It's amazing what a good night's sleep can do.

It seems to me that even Yuzu would never have said he's unbeatable. He's been beaten often enough to know that. Unlike Dick Button who so dominated men's skating back then that the contest essentially was for 2nd place, Yuzu lives in a time when men's skating worldwide has great depth with a number of skaters being seen as likely podium placers. What Yuzu does have is a focus that enables him to assume he'll medal and what color depends on how the other skaters do. He knows that NHK 2015 and GPF 2015 were for him a perfect storm (just look at the margin of victory there). He can't count on that. I don't think he targets individual skaters as he's putting together programs but instead, I think, he targets himself. Trying to put together something that if he skates clean he'll do better than he's ever done before, thus the backloading of spins and step sequence and such in Otonai which allowed him to skate a program where music and motion were about as tightly bound as you'll ever see in figure skating. He took a chance in putting his jumps early and it did pay off. Yuzu knows that he is beatable but that he can take steps that make beating him a very tall order. Even now I don't think any skater is training to beat Nathan. Nathan does not have anywhere near the track record Yuzu has. He's still the one to beat and it's my bet that Yuzu is trying to beat himself as much as any of his competitors.

We''ll know how serious he is if he stays away from the ice shows. He doesn't need the income so the primary lure for him is getting up close to his fans and not being worried about gathering points. By not going with immediate gratification (something he rarely does except when earphones are involved) he can get himself totally healthy, figure out exactly where his physical limitations are now and put together programs that challenge his limits but don't go too far in doing so. If he's going with all new programs (he has the time if he's not doing ice shows) he can be prepared to wow the world. Jeffrey and Shae-Lynn are already probably at work if he's going for new stuff. For an exhibition I wish he'd tackle Misha Ge. That fellow has been wanting to put together something for Yuzu for ages.

I can see exactly where you're coming from and I think by pointing to myself I can come up with an analysis of the situation here. I'm very much into classical music. This is going all the way back to when I was entering puberty and my tastes began to develop. Initially all my interest in was orchestral music but as more resources became available I began educating myself and getting knowledge of the initial orchestral (and essentially Beethoven and later orchestra) repertoire. I discovered opera and went into it in a big way, though initially Wagnerian opera. Over the decades I extended my range of styles and genres but in the last ten years or so I've ceased exploring. I've come to recognize my limitations in terms of likes and dislikes. I can say there are few modes of classical music I truly dislike - twelve-tone, experimental, and aleatoric are the prime examples. Those are types of music I maintain are not really music and the fact that interest in them is waning indicates the general classical public is of the same opinion. I feel justified in my dislike of them. By and large chamber music, art song, orchestral music before Beethoven, baroque opera seria, the list can go on and on - those are types of classical music that don't interest me. I don't, however, claim they are not substantial in themselves. In other words, I admit they are great types of music but just not to my taste. In so doing I recognize not the limitations of those musical types but rather recognize the limitations of my particular tastes. The type of skating fan being discussed here is a type that dismisses Yuzu's achievement by claiming his is not true skating. The more appropriate response would be to say that they just don't find Yuzu's skating to their taste. The skating fan who says that is a true fan of the sport. The fan who dismisses Yuzu is one who would be still stuck back in the days when Dick Button was tearing up the ice. Dick Button himself has gone beyond his own accomplishments and respects and admires Yuzu for his accomplishments. In summary I would say that the difference between those ultra-conservative fans and the true fans of figure skating is that the one faction actively dislikes and dismisses what Yuzu does while the true fans respect Yuzu's accomplishments but admit he's not quite to their taste.

Bravo! Right on! As I said in a recent post, I feel strongly that Yuzu has to get into the mindset he had when he was working his way up from being 'an up and coming skater' to being King of the Mountain. I think his problem of late was he was still psychologically defending his status as number one. He may not have consciously thought that way but he was essentially playing a defensive game. He has to recapture that special fire that led him upwards to victory at Sochi (and also GPF 1 and WC 1). He has to recognize that he's not in the situation he was in during those four seasons leading to PC. He's down below and looking up. Recapture that early fire, take into account the injury factor, and then I think we'll see a Yuzu we haven't seen since before Sochi.

To all those who have wished me a happy birthday I thank you very much. Despite my physical weakness my mental faculties remain as sharp as ever and I can honestly say that is the one part of me that I most fear of failing. I want to thank the forum as a whole also for providing me a place where I can exercise both my writing talents and my intellectual skills. I try to make my posts here as articulate and thoughtful as possible and the forum gives me an opportunity to come to know, as far as it is possible in a venue like this, a group of people who give me a means to reach out and communicate with others about topics that I share with them. That is far different from working in isolation on the novel I've been doing or listening to classical music (A nearly lifelong passion. I ended up with a PhD in English but I started as a music major). The internet is my link to the world outside my room and the Planet has given me my most valuable link to a body of living, breathing people.

I fundamentally agree with you but I would also add another element that must be taken into account as far as how Yuzu proceeds in the future - the injury. For the second season in a row he has been forced to sit out much of the season because of an injury. We know Yuzu is intelligent, very intelligent in fact, and the fact that virtually identical injuries have dealt him two radically shortened seasons means he's undoubtedly looking at whatever significance they might hold for him. As 4Nessie said, he has to get back into fighting mode. And I think he has to have programs that reflect that. Except for LGC his competitive programs in recent seasons have had a meditative quality to them. He has to get back to dramatic, over-the-top programs like POTO and RJ1. He has to get back to that fire he had when he was working his way from the ranks of 'promising young skaters' to his breakout season, 2013-14. True, he had real focus after that season when he was on a mission to capture a second Olympic gold, but that pursuit was one conducted from his position as the number-one-ranked men's skater. Psychologically I think he needs to get back to the mental set where he was working to do the stuff that enabled him to be ranked number one and to keep that ranking. The important element that has to be taken into account as he once again works to earn that number one ranking is the fact that he now knows he is physically fragile. He's in his mid-twenties now, not his mid-teens and things begin happening physically once one reaches that age in which one can be seen to have a fully mature body. He's past that point now. It's downhill from now on out so he has to keep that in mind. True, the physical fitness he has is hardly that of a man looking at his declining years. Old age comes on very slowly at first, accelerating after one's first half-century. He has many years left for him but these injuries tell him that he is not invulnerable and that what he could do easily and with little thought of the consequences a decade ago is not now possible. I think that message has gotten through to him, witness receiving his gold medal while on crutches in Moscow this season. It was symbolic of the fact that he now knows not only that certain things CAN happen, but that certain things now DO happen. I have been writing the above looking back at my own life. I turn 72 today and my health is such I can't be confident I'll reach 73. Until some four years ago I went everywhere on my bike (I've never had a driver's license), cheerfully going ten miles or so without any real worry. Then my health took a sudden downturn and since that time I've been unable to use my bike. In fact nowadays I spend most of my time in a wheelchair. I've become very much aware of how things can go wrong with a body I'd spent decades never particularly worrying about. Things can go wrong rapidly and I think that is something that is perhaps finally dawning on Yuzu. Two years in a row his right ankle has sabotaged his season. He has to be trying to figure out how to minimize the chances of a repeat or ways to minimize something else happening. How he goes about it I can't say but I'm sure that even more than a 4A trying to get a handle on how to skate to his max without injuring himself has to be Yuzu's top priority right now. He overcame the primarily mental effects of the earthquake. I'm sure he'll do the same here, but the solution, when it comes, might be as surprising to him as to everybody else once he implements it.

Just wondering if the judges were harder on Yuzu because they didn't want to be seen favoring the 'home-town hero'.

Yuzu knows how to skate 'safe', although his skating safe is a lot more risky than others. That's simply because he's a better skater. He skated safe at PC and took gold. He'll do the same here. His back is against the wall and those are the times when the 'absolute champion' emerges. As for the ladies' results, I don't think Yuzu feels himself responsible there. I remember a documentary from way back where Yuzu was talking with the owner of a small restaurant and the fellow was telling Yuzu he should not skate for all the people of Japan or for the survivors of the quake. He should skate for himself and from Yuzu's reaction and later developments in that documentary apparently Yuzu took that advice to heart because evidently that was the point where Yuzu realized that by skating for himself he was doing exactly what was needed for his part in the quake recovery. As much as Yuzu might feel concern about the lack of Japanese on the ladies' podium he is not going to try to compensate for that by putting extra pressure on himself. No! Yuzu will do what that restaurant owner said - He'll skate for himself.

Thank you. My oversight.

Everybody, let's not have the funeral before the body is dead. Yuzu's been down before. In every occasion in the past where he's been down he's come back , not always to a win, but he always improves. I can't remember a single instance when his free skate was worse than a bad short program. He's got fourteen points to overcome. That's wide but not insurmountable. Nathan is not as all-powerful as his fans would like everybody to think. He's as vulnerable to gravity as everybody else. That he's on top right now is hardly unprecedented. (What is unprecedented is Jason in second. Has TCC been that good for him?) What will motivate Yuzu is not his desire to win but his desire for perfection. Yuzu will be at his best when he puts his energies towards skating perfectly and puts the competitive element on the back burner. Johnny Weir once said, several seasons ago, "Nobody can beat a perfect Yuzuru Hanyu." It was true then. I'm positive it remains true today.

Two things to think about - 1) Nathan is capable of incredible meltdowns - SP at PC -- 2) Yuzu's capable of big comebacks - 2017 Helsinki For me the big surprise is Jason!!

I don't know if this is known but the ISU will stream all of the competition and the gala for countries that don't have broadcasters contracted to cover the competition.

And that was due to the disastrous collision in Shanghai. Because of the nature of the injury there I feel he must have been physically recovered but his focus was still way out of focus, thus the 4th place finish at NHK 2014. Weeks later focus was returned and having qualified for the Grand Prix Final by the smallest fractions of a point in his free skate he skated what, considering the circumstances, I consider his most brilliant skate ever and blew away the competition. If he hadn't fallen on an attempted triple lutz late in the program he would have almost certainly set a new free skate record (he did do that the next season, twice as a matter of fact). Looking at the difference between the NHK and the GPF that season is like looking at two different skaters.

Actually I'm not surprised. I remember reading some years ago where a person who is one of the editors of the Oxford English Dictionary, which is the standard reference work for researches in the English language, stated that the English language has more double entendres than any other language on earth, a large portion of the of the kind we call 'off-color'. That's not surprising when one realizes also that the English language has more words than any other language on earth, mainly due to its unequaled ability to absorb words from other languages.

I have been spending some time in the last few days looking at Yuzu videos where he's not skating, but rather being interviewed or even being part of some light-hearted video stunt. This particular video gives a clear evidence to me why Yuzu is so popular in Japan. It has to do with accessibility. Not accessibility in terms or physical proximity but accessibility in terms of Yuzu relating to the vast Japanese public, skating fans and non-skating fans alike, in terms of the full range of human situations and emotions. Yuzu in so many videos shows a range of responses that are much beyond the range of most athletes when asked questions. The average athlete will mouth some pious platitude or cliche, giving an answer he/she expects is the correct, expected one. Yuzu, however, can be very thoughtful and careful in articulating answers where he wants to clearly communicate the depth of his response. On the other hand he can be lighthearted and playful, even capable of self-mockery at times. It's his range of responses in many different situations and the sense of genuineness he communicates in the responses that make him so popular. It's a good thing he doesn't have political interests because if he were a politician with that ability to communicate he would be formidable. In any case Yuzuru Hanyu the athlete occupies the position he does because he is on one hand the legendary skater who has dominated not only men's skating but all of figure-skating these last few years. On the other hand because of his many outreach activities for the recovery and his own struggles with injuries he has become the legendary survivor for so many Japanese. His struggles reflect their struggles and that has given him a link to the Japanese general public that few, athletes and non-athletes alike, can duplicate. As I see it, for the Japanese general public Yuzu is not merely the complete skater but the complete human being. Few public figures achieve such a profile and the fact is that Yuzu knows that and sees the responsibility that such a position engenders. The one thing that can be said about Yuzu over these years since the earthquake is that he never shirks from what he thinks is his duty. Borrowing a phrase from the English poet Geoffrey Chaucer, Yuzu is 'the parfait gentle knight'.