memae

I say this a lot about Yuzuru and how his titles have never been a given, even when he was the favourite. He has had numerous rivals throughout his career, some of whom he had to rise to overcome and others who were there chasing him. Daisuke, Patrick Chan, Denis Ten, Javi, Boyang, Nathan. His achievements are beyond comparison.

The RJ fall from worlds still gets me every time lol. My poor heart seeing him fall like that </3

Rewatching Sochi FS while I wait for my hair to dry and had to pause after the 4S fall because apparently I still get worked up and nervous for Yuzu even though I know every step (figuratively speaking and puns all round) in this skate of this program like the back of my hand.

Seeing this makes me livid all over again about missing the warm up and all the goodies in it because of the terrible organisation at GPF. Stood in that line for close to an hour and made it inside just in time to see them clear the ice for Boyang.

Not just before the start of class but right into the middle of the first one at the (private) school I taught at in Menteng. Drove me crazy because I'd never be able to catch up the class time. It never occurred to me that the similarities to classroom routines in Indonesia and Japan might be because of the occupation. It was very nice entering a classroom and having all the kids stand up to say good morning. Now imagining how cute baby Yuzu must have been as a school kid I bet he was the teacher's favourite. He's so charismatic.

To be fair, those pants must be awful to skate in

I think that a lot of people across the world are looking back at history more openly and finding they have some level of unease for their country's flag. I feel that way about the Australian flag and about Australia. In a way, I'm patriotic - not in that I think we're the greatest and that my love for my country is perfect and unconditional, but I want us to be better and better and better. I do love my country - so when our government does terrible things (our whole refugee travesty for one) I get furious because I expect better from and for my country. I don't like our flag because it represents ideas of Australia as a new country on 'discovered' land when we know that our first nations had tens of thousands of years of history before Australia even existed. But I don't hate our athletes for being proud to have our flag flown when they do well. They're representing our country and that's the flag they're doing it under - there's absolutely an appropriate context for it or for Yuzu skating around with the Japanese flag while the other medalists skate around with theirs. There isn't really much they can do in those moments without being disrespectful to their country, supporters, sport, etc. There was huge uproar 20 years ago when Cathy Freeman did her victory lap at the Olympics with the Aboriginal flag and the Australian flag. She had BOTH of them. It's not like she chose the Aboriginal flag over the Australian flag. Imagine if Yuzuru wasn't so respectful with the flag. I bet people would have more to say about that than the way he treats it so carefully. And I guarantee that if he had another country's flag in his hands for whatever reason, he'd treat it respectfully too. I feel uneasy when I see Australian flags flying in people's yards any old day of the year. That screams to me of a sense of nationalism that is likely to be problematic. Those ultra-nationalists would probably be super careful to fold flags and not let them touch the ground etc if they knew other people were watching, just to make a display of how patriotic they think they are. I'm pretty sure, judging by Yuzuru's character, he acts the same way whether there's people and cameras around or not simply because he's a good egg. It's so insulting that people read into his actions being ultra-nationalist when he's just doing his job as a representative of his country and being thoughtful in how he does it.

I had some small groups in my last school's reading program for a few months and we read a couple of articles about Yuzu and the Poohs so I could justify watching some of his programs in class time. You know, for building understanding of context and all Kids love him without knowing anything about skating. They were so impressed by Origin at WC 19 and so outraged Nathan Chen won (just 'because' in kid terms - like they literally have no understanding of scoring or the elements or anything or the impact from 4S snaking in the short). Thank you Yuzu for making even boring reading programs enjoyable

NO! No no no no I wonder why though, since China has two places but is only using one. Perhaps this was more his call than China's?

Oh my goodness! What a pair of sweetpeas

Not sure where to put this or if it's been mentioned yet but Satomi Ito has a figure skating costume book coming out at the end of March. I don't remember the last time I wanted a book before its release so badly. Maybe HP7. Apparently it's available for pre-order on Amazon Japan but I can't find it because English

Even TSL had things to say about the judging of Yuzu's elements at SC. They even called out the specific judges who didn't give +5 for his SP 4S. Someone on here had the idea of separating the judges for the separate scores of TES and PCS and ever since I've thought it the most simple, brilliant possible solution. I wish ISU would at least consider trialing it

Exactly. Off days are expected in sport at any level. They feel terrible at the time but usually you can look back on them and see the bigger picture of what was going on at that time. A lot of the time an off day or week or whatever at the right moment sets a build towards success in motion.

When is it March already? Hmph

I shall also add my personal fave of "bamYuzulled", the dazed state of mind his chaos puts us in.

Just imagine what he could do with Holst's Mars (as in Bringer of War) in a fierce red costume.

Plus the interest Yuzuru has brought to figure skating has brought lots of money in too - access to prime facilities and resources are hugely beneficial for producing athletes.

The 'karate, nascar, whatever' reminds me of a skit by SNL or collegehumour or something of the like back in the lead up to Sochi of the USA's 'Heterosexual Men's Figure Skaters' which was a tongue-in-cheek stab at Russia's deplorable anti-LGBTQ stance.

And he does spend time getting choreo done with Marie-France, which I think is a good move for him to develop artistry in a style that appeals to him and that he could potentially do very well. I always think he needs to hold moves (other than spread eagles - his are nice and all but I'm so bored of them being the staple of men's mitf) for a whole lot longer if he's going for this minimalist, contemporary kind of style. Like, to bring that less-is-more elegance to it, he needs to really emphasize some crazy edges and he needs to hold them for longer than Yuzuru if he's not doing all the rest of the footwork and transitions that Yuzu is doing. Of course, he's getting scored for what could be rather than what we're actually seeing from him, so I don't know what the motivation could be do improve. Even if he does want to, actually putting in the work to do so is a whole other thing, especially when at this stage it really doesn't look like he needs to in order to get the scores he's getting and he has school to worry about as well. Why waste time working on skating skills the judges don't think he needs when he could work on his grades or social life, etc instead? (I'm not saying Nathan needs to get a life or anything snarky - just that he's a busy guy under lots of pressure and friends and fun are important for keeping healthy and it's hard to maintain all the different parts of our lives successfully).

There's a refreshing confidence about guys who are okay with being cute or wearing sparkles or whatever. It seems so much more natural than the aggressive/assertive macho kind of confidence of guys who have to remind everyone how masculine they are every twenty minutes and rag on guys who aren't 'real men' like they are. They're especially nasty or try-hard in figure skating, I think because they want so desperately to distinguish themselves from the skaters they see as 'feminine'. The thing is, the guys who don't care will end up showing more variety across their careers (and perhaps then also more skill) because they don't shy away from anything. We've seen Yuzu from all sides. He's got some very masculine programs - the air he takes on for Seimei and Origin is macho AF. We've seen him switch to something absolutely delicate at the same events for his Gala ex - Haru yo Koi and Notte Stellata particularly. We've even seen him change faces like that from one minute to the next during practices when he runs through different step sequences. He seems very comfortable in who he is and what he likes. That's the true confidence the world should want to see in men. The idea that 'macho' is the only acceptable version of masculinity is so ridiculous. Let the poor guys have some sparkles and flounces without questioning their membership to the tree house.

I love listening to Tracy's commentary of his programs from before he went to Toronto. There's a couple out there and honestly, if you didn't know and she didn't mention anything about his coaching, there's no way to tell from her commentary that he wasn't already one of her own. She's such a mom to all skaters, regardless of who they skate for or are coached by. My favourite is his 4CC debut and Tracy mentioning his skating skills not being up to scratch with the top of the field yet because he's so young (she says it so that you know she had no doubts he was going to catch up with them). The best thing about that comment though is it in comparison with her commentary from his SC 2019 SP about the steps ("He's laughing but we'll have words after the competition"). She saw what he could be when he was young and he has gone on to fulfill (if not entirely surpass) that potential - and, even better, she got to be part of that journey as one of his coaches.

Got new skates and took them for a spin (plz laugh at my pun) yesterday. Man my feet are tired but happy.

Lol the look on his face! It's the same one I give my students when they try to distract me from the lesson at hand by asking personal questions.

Pity. Just recently I've been appreciating how the Brians like each other's posts on Instagram, as though with time, reflection, and wisdom they've come to look back at their rivalry as something positive rather than bitter. Try imagining that with Yags and Plush in a couple of decades - you can't, can you? I sure can't. Such a shame Brian B has to run his mouth before switching his brain on. His opinion and perspective isn't that of an expert if he's not keeping up to date with the field (and that's true of any field in which one can be an expert). His comments about Yuzuru just make him seem like he's deliberately trying to be too cool for the sport as it is now. Also, tangent about Instagram and Cricket Club: Tracy liked one of my comments on something she posted about 4CC Pretty sure she went through and liked everyone's comments but I still took a screenshot of that notification like it was the best thing to ever happen to me.

Don't forget some scathing or gushing (there's never a middle ground) remarks about free legs in layback spins. For true Dick Button style.