micaelis

Beginning with Shoma. Yes, he is hungry and he knows who is the one at the top he needs to topple, and it isn't Nathan. He is a complete skater of sorts but his range of expression is limited. At the same time we have to remember that Shoma's first seasons at senior level were actually better than Yuzu's first seasons at roughly the same age. On the other hand his rise to the top has been halted by an immovable object named Yuzuru Hanyu. Finishing ahead of Yuzu has to be Shoma's fiercest dream. On to Stephen. Stephen is ten years to the month younger than Yuzu who began skating senior level in the 2010-11 season during which he turned sixteen on 7 December 2010. That means that Stephen is eligible to skate senior level in the 2020/21 season during which he turns sixteen on 22 December 2020. The 2013/14 Olympic season was Yuzu's fourth season on the senior level, making the 2023/24 Olympic season Stephen's fourth on the senior level where he will be at age nineteen, the same as Yuzu was at Sochi. Now, in comparison to Yuzu at age 13 Stephen has much to learn, primarily, as you pointed out, in the stuff between jumps. Yuzu, who is near at hand, definitely knows what to do between jumps and there is no better model to be found on the surface of this planet right now. Brian has acknowledged that Stephen is technically advanced, so Stephen doesn't need to learn any new jumps (incidentally I think Stephen is Yuzu's greatest threat to beat him in landing a 4A) so these next years Brian can concentrate on Stephen learning the stuff between the jumps. Stephen's success depends on his innate ability there (nowhere near Yuzu's) and convincing (to the judges) choreography. Ahead of him right now are the growing pains. For this Brian can call on his experience with Nam and also, we have to assume, his experience with Yuzu, who was sixteen (and presumably still growing) when he came to TCC. In all this we should not eliminate Yuzu's input. He can, in many ways, be a big brother to the ten years younger Stephen (if he isn't already) and, giving Yuzu's generous nature, potentially a source of advice as Stephen commences international competition. Actually I think because of Yuzu's longevity at TCC he might be becoming a de facto member of the coaching staff there, someone to whom the official coaches might turn when in need of an outside opinion on various matters. We have to remember that while Yuzu is just 23, with Javi gone, Yuzu is the senior trainee there (although only eight days older than Jason Brown). I think above all Yuzu is a role model for the other skaters in how he handles his success. I can barely imagine how it must feel to the other skaters at TCC when he is on the ice when they are. It is at those times they can see how a champion handles himself away from competition and what we know of his humility and generosity is right there front and center. Which brings me back to an earlier assertion that Yuzu probably already sees Stephen as a future credible competitor. We must never underestimate Yuzu's intelligence. He is an athlete both in matters of the body and matters of the brain and he has had many years to observe Stephen's development as a skater (they both came to TCC at roughly the same time). I have no doubt that Yuzu, even while recognizing Stephen as a future foe, still will not be reluctant in doing what he can to help Stephen in his skating. We must not forget that Yuzu does not want weakened opposition on the ice. He wants those he skates against to be skating their best when they lose to him.

The 2017 GPF was actually won by Shoma. Shoma was given a 1 point time penalty at that competition (shades of Yuzu's SP at the Helsinki worlds 2017). Nathan's lead was less than a point so if Shoma had not been given that technical penalty he would have won the GPF.

About Denis Ten, his days are over, IMO, since he didn't even make the cut at PC to advance to the FS. As far as Yuzu's rivals right now I think it's Shoma who's likely to carry the day if they're looking for completeness (although next to Yuzu he and virtually everyone else is still skating novice-level). Actually the skater I'm most concerned about we don't have to worry about until the 2020/21 season. That will be Stephen Gogolev's first season on the senior level and he is now almost certainly Canada's greatest hope for Olympic gold in Beijing. I know he has growing pains in his near future but he's been training with Brian about as long as Yuzu has and he's had plenty of opportunity to see how Yuzu does things and right now he's actually able (according to Brian) to do all the quads except the axel, putting him a step ahead of Yuzu there. I would think Brian has already been prepping Stephen (both physically and psychologically) for the challenges coming up as he continues to grow. Brian remembers the problems with Nam and is likely taking his experiences there and applying them to Stephen. What he can't teach Stephen, however, is Yuzu's phenomenal sensitivity to music of all kinds, something that is largely genetic (one of the reasons I think Yuzu given a couple of inches and training since age five would have him a world-class danseur today). While everyone has been thinking that Boyang would take the place of Javi at TCC (something which now, according to the Japan Times, is not going to happen) I think Stephen is already probably evolving into that role, since I've seen a couple clips of Yuzu training with Brian and observed Stephen in the background on the ice. In short they're not strangers to each other and probably haven't been for years. As to how the judges treat Yuzu in comparison to his competitors one should keep in mind that Yuzu is figure-skating's cash cow right now. He fills the seats and they are not inclined to go too strongly against that enormous and impassioned fan-base of his. In fact I think their worst nightmare is what will happen when he retires from competition. Take into account when looking at the challenges facing Yuzu in these next seasons leading up to Beijing (assuming he's decided to try for a threepeat) that the rules changes are almost tailor-made for Yuzu. He will benefit most from them since the PC points now become much more significant in terms of the final score. Some of his competitors, I am sure, are now scrambling to acquire those basic skating skills Brian had drilled into Yuzu when he first came to TCC and which are now automatic for Yuzu. It's the depth of those skills and Yuzu's ability to remember total body detail in the programs choreographed for him that make him able to skate programs much more densely choreographed than those of his rivals. As for others at TCC and their effect on Yuzu, it is actually the reverse we are probably looking at. Jason is there now to acquire more polish, it would seem, but I think also he wants to see how Yuzu is able to integrate his technical prowess with his artistic aplomb. Jason's successes so far have been almost entirely based on his PC elements. While that is not his stated reasons for the move to TCC I think he really wants to be there to see how Yuzu goes about achieving what he achieves. Very few people on the Planet here, however, have commented on what effect Zhenya will have on Yuzu, and also his effect on her. While the official spin has been that Zhenya moved to TCC to have greater autonomy as to the music she skates to and the choreographic content, I think she also made the move to be able to see Yuzu at work on the things that make him the most phenomenal figure on the ice right now and possibly ever to be on the ice. He's the Wizard of Oz and Zhenya wants to see the man behind the curtain. I really do think it would set the figure-skating world on end if the two of them were to put together an exhibition program. The tabloids would go nuts but since it is well known that Yuzu lives essentially like a medieval monk, they would be well-placed to debunk any speculation.

What Yuzu is doing, by my understanding, is not lying but rather dissimulation, which involves giving others just enough true information to lead them to false conclusions. The ability to dissimulate is a very desirable trait when engaged in high-level bargaining of almost any sort. It's what separates the truly skilled from the abject amateur. Yuzu over the years has shown himself quite capable of it, the most recent being his Olympic performance where because of how he skated the general impression was that by using only two different kinds of quads he was skating carefully to avoid reinjury, making everyone think he was quite recovered from his NHK fall. The truth came out in later interviews where he admitted that he was on pain-killers when on the ice at PC.

Fortunately for her she was on the right spot on the podium.

It's likely that every Japanese winter games medal holder past and present and also every summer games medalist from the past will at some point be running with the torch in hand. There will also be Japanese from every walk of life included, those chosen to reflect favorably on the particular place in which their segment is. For Yuzu the question is exactly where his segment would be. My guess is that it will be somewhere in the Sendai area, perhaps the route used for his two victory parades, although it might instead be a segment involving Ice Rink Sendai. The real question is who will light the torch. Unless he is competing in the Tokyo games my money would be on Kohei Uchimura, Japan's gymnastics version of Michael Phelps (Phelps is in my view the odds-on favorite to light the torch at the 2028 Los Angeles games). Yuzu's segment will be a real challenge to handle because you can be sure that he will probably garner the biggest crowd of observers anywhere in Japan and crowd control will be a real issue.

It's interesting seeing Yuzu here standing in a perfect ballet fifth position. I wonder how much ballet he's had over the years.

I did a quick calculation and came up with how many US dollars that would be - just under a quarter-million, which isn't small-change for a fairly small operation like Icerink Sendai. I wonder also how many Yuzu paraphernalia may be sold at the rink because I'm sure it has become one of the biggest tourist draws in Sendai. This is only speculation on my part but I would not be surprised if upon Yuzu's retirement from competition the rink is renamed after him. Despite the fact there have been other prominent figure skaters involved with the rink in the minds of the public at large this is Yuzu's home-rink. It might also be the rink he chooses to use if he decides to take up a coaching career.

Is it possible to get the videos from NBC if you aren't a cable subscriber. I stream all my TV on my computer and have a Vizio 43-inch 4K as my monitor. I certainly would like to see those vids.

I agree with you that scoring is important to Yuzu, as he is still a competitor. What I was trying to say was that Yuzu might be developing strategies in his programs that are as intent on showing what skating can do and still get the points to win. The new rules going into effect, in my thinking, actually should give Yuzu distinct advantages, considering the strictures against backloading and the shortening of the FS. I just think that Yuzu will be more willing to depend on getting his points through GOE and PCS rather than base value. His base value will be high enough to be competitive but not so high as to make it more difficult to skate a better than clean program. I guess we''ll just have to wait and see what he debuts this coming season.

I'm surprised at how few people here have picked up on Yuzu's earlier declaration that he would skate what he wants and explore possibilities. I interpreted it as that he will form his programs with an eye on the aesthetics and such and let the scoring take care of itself. He has declared that he wants a 4A and that seems to be his most overt objective right now. But I get the feeling that with his earlier remarks about freeing himself from routine programs that he has become a man on a mission, someone bent on showing the figure skating establishment and the rest of the world just what figure skating in its totality can deliver. I hope he succeeds and if he does what everyone is expecting as the norm come Beijing might not be what they are foreseeing right now. If anybody can revolutionize the very basic approaches to figure-skating that prevail right now it would be Yuzu. He has the temperament, the skill, the creativity and the determination to accomplish that task.

Should Yuzu stay in Europe between his two GP events? I'd say 'yes'. He'll have no trouble finding a rink to train on. Any rink on his list would almost be willing to pay him to skate there (just joking). The issue is can he train without Brian or Tracy? He did it once before (though I can't remember when) where he trained in Japan rather than going back to Toronto. Brian had given him a training regimen which he followed. We have to remember Yuzu is so self-motivated and self-critical that he can carry off something like that. I know one thing is probably going on right now - the toy retailers in Moscow and Helsinki are ordering in as many Pooh items as they can get. Another thing - Moscow and Helsinki skate authorities are planning on extra numbers of flower-kids to clean up all the Pooh stuff they know will follow Yuzu's performances. Yet another thing - skate authorities in those two cities are looking to strengthening security measures there. Yuzu is an athlete where security issues are real. He's an athlete who literally has rock-star status and nobody wants anything bad to happen on their turf. As for hotels in those cities, I think a fair number of the bookings there were not from Yuzu fans but Japanese journalists. At least they didn't have to spend precious minutes trying to figure out whether they could afford it or not and when Yuzu is concerned and lodging is an issue, mere minutes can be the crucial difference between having a room and 'no room at the inn'.

To those who corrected me on the 'no sparkles' issue, I concede. I went to images of those costumes but they weren't close enough for me to see. Mea culpa.

He didn't have sparkles for POTO2 and both shirts (dark and sky-blue) for PW. There might have been more but these are both that first suggested to me. POTO2 is, in fact, my favorite of all his costumes. As for POTO2, he did have a fair amount of gold fabric, just no sequins or rhinestones.

Actually I think he does touch those silver medals. They're to remind him of unfinished business.

This is the only forum in which I actually participate though I have lurked on a few others over the years. What converted me from a lurker to a satellite was the fairly high level of discourse this forum achieves quite often and the overall civility that it practices. I have been caught out a couple of times by the moderators here but after looking at the situation from their point of view I felt they had been justified in taking the action. In fact it is the diligence of the moderators that I think keeps this forum from turning into just another 'worship-the-hero-and-bash-everyone-else' site. They keep things on topic and away from topics that can so easily turn this into Trolling-Central. As far as negatives on Yuzu, I think there are times when Yuzu is actually less than perfect. The thing is that those times are far less numerous than they are for the rest of us humans and that's why we admire him so. In the course of the seven decades of my life there are only a handful of individuals whom I have admired without reservation. Yuzu is the latest in that pantheon and the only one currently alive and the only one involved in athletics. I think all of us here can say that Yuzu is not above all criticism but we keep things in perspective. We can criticize elements of his costumes, elements of his skating (there's so little to criticize there, however), elements of his personality (do I hear 'headphones' anybody?), in short there are many areas where we critique Yuzu (most often in a joking sort of way) but nobody here has anything less than total respect for Yuzu as a person, a person whose ability to overcome the many obstacles he's encountered in pursuing his dreams and succeeding in realizing his ambitions is a model for us all. In fact we deal with two 'cores' when dealing with Yuzu, that physical 'core' which enables him to jump so superbly, but also that spiritual core which enables him to 'live' so superbly. All our lives would be poorer if there had been no Yuzu and for that all I can say to Yuzu is 'arigatou gozaimasu'.

Just think what would happen if everybody was judged by the Yuzu standards. You'd have some skaters ending up with negative scores.

This is why I think Yuzu was chosen to receive the People's Honor Award. It's not just for his skating excellence, but also for the services he's done to those recovering from the 2011 quake/tsunami. With the very dramatic picture of him fleeing the rink on which he was skating as the earthquake threatened to bring down the building, that symbol has linked itself indelibly into the national psyche. Add to it the symbolic significance of his win at Sochi, the first Japanese to win the men's singles plus (and this has been overlooked by many) also the ONLY Japanese athlete in any sport to bring home a gold medal from those games, that underlined his achievement then. I think that he was the only gold medal recipient skating in the shadow of the 2011 disaster did much to make him a true symbol of Japanese resilience and determination. In the intervening years he appears to have engaged in many efforts to help those recovering from the disaster and then add the heroic (I'm not exaggerating here) circumstances of him working back from a potential career-ending injury to win the gold at PC, this went to make his life thus far one which the Japanese authorities felt needed the recognition of what I believe is Japan's highest civilian honor (I could be wrong here so if need be correct me). We have to realize that the Yuzu receiving the award is not just the skater but the whole package. It's a recognition that Yuzu is not simply a complete skater but a complete human being.

Since many people here have opined on second and third and more languages and have discussed English as an acquired language I think a few things might be pointed out here as to where and why I think Yuzu is having trouble with his English. The first thing is that I've gathered over time from other posts that Yuzu seems to have a decent grasp (though far from 'native-speaker') of conversational English. Being surrounded by English usage while training and being fairly young when moving to Toronto he would have absorbed English osmotically. Others here have indicated that he's been taking formal English lessons though to what depth has not been indicated. I think Yuzu's real trouble with English comes when he's in a formal situation - an interview or a press conference, for instance - and where he's reluctant to speak English because he's afraid of making a mistake. One person pointed out that Yuzu's Japanese is articulate and precise and I think that because he cannot use English with such precision it makes him reluctant to use it in public-speaking situations. That's very understandable. Now, as for English as a language to learn. In comparison to the other Indo-European languages (Slavic, Latinate, Germanic, Celtic, Hellenic) English is grammatically quite simple. It has just three cases - nominative, objective and possessive. It does not have noun genders. It does have a fair share of irregular verbs and nouns that change to plural in ways other than adding an 's'. The problem is that most of the irregularities involve frequently used words, which does make it somewhat confusing, though my experiences with German and French lead me to believe English doesn't have more than usual. I would say that the major problem with English is spelling. Frankly, English spelling is a mess. This is because of the fact that there are so many words imported into the language - Germanic (the base language for English), French, Latin, Greek, Spanish plus a number of others, even from non-Indo-European languages (tsunami from the Japanese, for instance). Generally if a word has come from a language that doesn't use the Latin alphabet, it's spelling is accommadated to standard English spelling rules. But from other Indo-European languages quite often the native spelling is retained when adopted for English usage, which means one has a whole complex of competing spelling rules. Good spellers in English seem to sense which language an unfamiliar word came from and use that language's spelling rules when writing it out. They might not know the specific name of that language but they intuitively recognize when a word seems to have a Greek spelling or a German spelling, etc. As far as spelling goes, the only language I've encountered that is as bad or even worse than English is French, there because of the diacritical marks and the vast numbers of silent letters. I will admit, though, that my exposure to spelling conventions from other languages is limited. Now back to Yuzu and the English language. I think part of his difficulty is related to learning a new alphabet and new grammatical conventions. Japanese is a language that seems to exist on its own. It does not appear to be a part of any language family, although there have been several attempts to link it up to geographically proximate languages, all to no avail. It does have a large number of loan words from Chinese but that's the thing. They are loan words, not words that have been Japanese all along. I think this fact makes it difficult for many Japanese to learn ANY foreign language because the rules of any language they might learn are inevitably different from Japanese. True, there are some elements that are consistent for virtually any language spoken today. They all have verbs. They all have nouns. Beyond that, though, language structures start going off in different directions when we start thinking of major linguistic families. Japanese is basically a very lonely place. I have no doubt that Yuzu's English in informal situations is probably fairly well-developed. He's been immersed in English for over half a decade and that's been the sole language used at TCC. If you listen to him talking to Brian or Tracy in the kiss and cry he doesn't seem to be struggling for words. In short, I would have to say his English has probably reached the level of being functional. The informal situations of day to day living, plus those situations that he encounters while training, these would seem to be well within his grasp now. It is Yuzu the public speaker that has him resorting to Japanese, even when asked a question in English. Those occasions are special. They are occasions when he is addressing the world at large. He wants to make a clear, detailed response but he doesn't trust his English enough to do so. I can well understand that. My three extended trips to Germany many decades ago, where I stayed with a German friend and when my German was fairly functional, allowed me to converse lightly with German speakers. But when I needed to go into detail on some subject I reverted to English. I did so because in such conversations I was always surrounded by educated Germans who knew English. On such occasions we would switch to English since they knew their English was better than my German. Of course I was never involved in press conferences there but if I were I would have done exactly what Yuzu does ordinarily. I'd use English. He uses Japanese. Enough said.

I can't remember the names since I wasn't looking specifically to see if they were attempting Bielmanns when I was watching. I seem to remember Shoma trying it and not doing well at all on it. I do remember when I was watching them thinking they were trying to copy Yuzu but they'd have been better off not trying.

To Bielmann or not to Bielmann, that is the question. I think the Bielmann should remain in his repertoire. It's one of his signature moves, indeed the first one he adopted, going all the way back to his Novice days. I think he should keep it in because a number of other men's skaters have tried to do it, almost all of them messing it up in some way or other. I remember seeing one skater trying it and what came out was something halfway between a Bielmann and a Donut. Not the prettiest thing. His other signature moves - the Donut, the Ina Bauer, the Hydroblade - all have places in his armory. It, more than any other, showcases Yuzu's flexibility and goads other, less flexible skaters to try to show off. Their showing-off usually doesn't work and so they leave a negative impression with the judges and the audience. They might not be tempted to show off that way if Yuzu was not doing the Bielmann, so anything to weaken the opposition is my feeling (and probably Yuzu's). So I'd not be prepared to jettison history and drop the Bielmann. Use it where it can do the most good for Yuzu and the least good for his opponents.

Even if he has it I don't think he's going to let on, at least not definitively. TCC is growing increasingly adept at disinformation and dissimulation, the art of misleading without actually lying. Despite the loss of his official number one ranking no sane person in the figure-skating world is going along with that notion. Yuzu is number one and the fact that the skating world is hanging on every announcement from TCC and parsing every word with the care that diplomats parse the language of a treaty, is evidence of that and all this is playing directly into TCC's hands. They'll keep the opposition guessing all the way up to the first competition and even then Yuzu might not go out with all guns blazing, figuring ACI (if that is indeed where he competes first) is not a stage large enough to let the world see the new and improved Yuzuru Hanyu. I think just how much he reveals in each competition will depend on who amongst the elite he's meeting there. The one thing I feel confident about is that his programs, as he has stated, will be composed of what he wants to skate and not necessarily what the judges want. On the other hand I have a feeling that he is planning to awe the judges with a display of artistry that is going to milk them for every last PCS 10 he can get and additionally throw in some better-than-perfectly-executed jumps to get as many GOES as possible. Yuzu is the better-than-complete skater and that is the advantage he should exploit at every opportunity. Nathan can jump to his heart's content but until he starts taking the need for basic skating skills seriously he's going to lag behind Yuzu. I'm sure Nathan realizes that if Yuzu had actually been fully healthy at PC Nathan's FS score would have been dwarfed. As Johnny Weir said some years ago and I feel he would repeat it today, 'Nobody can beat a perfect Yuzuru Hanyu. True then, true today, true tomorrow.

Being very new to the whole figure-skating scene I still was able to glean something from the several pages back from this point I picked up working my way forward to here. Now, if I understand things right, there are now restrictions on how many jump passes can be made for extra points after the halfway mark. If it means there won't be so much rear stacking I'm for it. It should result in better-balanced programs. Limits on the number and type of repeat jumps left me quite confused though I did sense that the 3A might be resurrected as a truly major component of a skating program. Knowing Yuzu's command of that jump I think I would welcome it. I've known for some time about the shortening of the FS duration. I don't know if any others have picked up on it but even though Brian and company have adopted strategies in training Yuzu and structuring his programs to ameliorate negative effects from his asthma, the shortening of the programs should work for Yuzu, allowing his to do things now that they might have contemplated in the past. Just some thoughts there. I was struck by one item of discussion, though, and I didn't know whether people were serious or not, regarding the wearing of tights by the men. It seemed a number here didn't like the idea but as somebody who's been a strong fan of ballet for over half a century I can say I would have no objections. Actually some of Yuzu's costumes (in ice shows mainly) were tights in all but name, being loose only below the knees but I really don't have any personal objections. The thing is that one of the advantages tights have over looser trousers is that they allow one to more clearly see the attitude of the feet during a performance and also get a clear sense of the lines of the legs. Now I know I'm talking here as a ballet fan but wearing tights allows the legs to be seen as a seamless whole as they are manipulated. I do admit, however, that skating boots aesthetically do not go as well with tights as ballet slippers do, so there is that element to remember. All in all, I have to say, the changes I've been seeing discussed here do not strike me as working against Yuzu's approach to skating. He is, after all, a complete skater and one who is able to adapt any number of strategies when planning his routines. I think he'll adapt much more readily than many of the other men. Nathan Chen strikes me as the one who's going to lose out from this unless he learns how to put more substance into his programs and not rely almost entirely on his jumps. The other major jumper, Boyang Jin, has been working on his skating skills the last couple season and the results are starting to show. His move to train under Brian I think also will help him. Back to Yuzu, though. He, like every other men's skater and coach, is watching the proceedings this week with fierce attention. A lot is on the line but since it has become apparent that much of the planning of Yuzu's programs is actually his own doing, with his awareness of his strengths and weakness, he'll adjust. Remember, Yuzu is one of skating's supreme strategists. He's playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers.

What I've been able to gather about the award is that it's not an annual prize but is only given out when someone is deemed to deserve it. First awarded in 1977 it's only been given out 26 times (25 to individuals, one time to a group). Basically it's an award given out for excellence in sports, the arts and similar areas. It is not an award given for political or financial success. I don't know who else has received it so I really can't say how much younger Yuzu is from other recipients but I have a feeling, like we see in the Nobel Prize for Literature, that it's given out for lifetime achievement rather than for any specific accomplishment, which means that Yuzu is already recognized as having a career worth celebrating. Another factor that might have been involved, though, is his public identification with recovery after the earthquake. I don't know Japanese culture to any great depth but I do sense from multiple sources that the fact he was actually skating on the ice when the earthquake occurred has become symbolic of how the earthquake interrupted a normal afternoon for the Japanese nation and how all routine stopped when the shaking finally finished.

I've watched this video any number of times and I've failed to find any videos of him in earlier competition. The camera work is obviously of an amateur and the quality is rather grainy. One really feels one is in a time warp as the scores are announced. This is the only video I've seen where Yuzu is skating to the old six-points system. What I find most fascinating here, though, is Yuzu's complete earnestness. He doesn't have the superior grace which later would become a hallmark of his skating personality, but he has that dead seriousness that we've all come to know and love. One of the great moves he makes in this skate is a Bielmann towards the end and it's almost as perfect as the ones he routinely tosses off today. The Bielmann is the first of his trademark moves and it's easy to see that superior flexibility that allows him to routinely do stuff other male skaters can only attempt to do or not even bother to try and which I'm sure have garnered Yuzu many points on both the TES and PCS sides of the board.