Martina

Those Olympics took place in Russia, and Russia had never won gold in the women's event. Many considered Lipnitskaya the favorite over Sotnikova, but it is always good to have multiple athletes to rely on if possible. Lipnitskaya made mistakes and took herself out of medal contention, while Sotnikova’s rapid rise provided a safety net for Russia. That is somewhat similar to what the United States did in the most recent women's competition. In the 2023–24 season, Isabeau Levito was clearly the leader of the US team and a strong medal contender for major events. While she truly deserves high PCS, her jumping technique is among the ugliest I have ever seen. Within a few months, Amber Glenn stabilized her triple Axel, and her federation threw its support behind her. In the 2024–25 season, Glenn won the Grand Prix Final with higher PCS than Chiba—something that defies logic. Glenn herself acknowledges that she does not skate as well as Chiba. She has the 3A and—barring errors—a higher Base Value (BV), but Chiba is the one who deserves higher PCS. At that Grand Prix Final, Glenn scored in PCS 1.69 points more than Chiba across the Short Program and Free Skate combined. Had their scores been swapped—which would have been far more accurate—Chiba would have won the competition. At the 2025 World Championships, in the US, with Levito and Glenn both making errors, the technical panel failed to call Liu’s under-rotations, and she emerged as the new champion. The US arrived at the Olympics with three potential title contenders. If one of them faltered, the others were there to step up. It is true that Sakamoto made a costly error—otherwise, she would have won—but when a nation has multiple medal-worthy athletes (like in Sotnikova and Lipnitskaya case), the chances of winning increase.

No, I hadn't seen them. Thanks for the links. Consider the previous seasons' medalists. The 2014–15 season saw the dominance of Elizaveta Tuktamysheva, but the following season she failed to replicate those performances, and Russia could no longer rely on her. Who came before Tuktamysheva? Russia managed to secure an Olympic gold for Adelina Sotnikova, but then she disappeared. Lipnitskaya suffered a serious injury after winning just one World silver medal. Aside from those three, medals in preceding years had gone to Asian skaters—Japan’s Mao Asada and Miki Ando, and South Korea’s Yuna Kim—as well as Italy’s Carolina Kostner. Few other skaters won anything; no one won gold, and no one claimed more than two medals across the Olympics and World Championships. On the men's side, following a period of dominance that began with Urmanov—think of the Olympic champions: Urmanov (1994), Kulik (1998), Yagudin (2002), and Plushenko (2006), with Plushenko also coming agonizingly close to gold in 2010—and a haul of countless medals, Russian skating was in a slump. Skaters like Kovtun, Kolyada, Voronov, and Gachinski—who vanished immediately after winning a World bronze—stood no real chance of winning major medals. With no contenders on the men's side, Russia needed a champion among the women, and at that moment, Medvedeva—with her ability to consistently deliver clean programs—was the perfect fit. Later, when Chen became competitive, Russia and the United States simply ceded the other nation free rein in the discipline where they themselves lacked competitiveness. They didn't get in each other's way, allowing Russia to win the women's events and the US the men's events without interference. Japan? Compared to them, it didn't matter. Korea? I believe it is the nation that treats its own athletes worse than any other. No, because each analysis takes a lot of time, and I didn't manage to look at the women as well. Real-life commitments come before any online chatter. I, too, sometimes disappear for a while because I’m too busy with other things. Just go at whatever pace works best for you. Yuzu is much happier now than he was during the last four years of his competitive career, and what he’s showing us is extraordinary. That’s why I’m glad he’s a professional now—though I will never forgive the ISU and the JSF for the suffering they caused him and all the medals they stole from him. So, if there’s a chance to talk about what happened during those years, I won’t shy away from it.

We've all been there, more or less. Whether we follow figure skating or it just happened us to see him by chance, something strikes us, we start researching, and we're hooked. You're not alone in saying you've never been a fan like this before. This is true for many of us. One of the beautiful things about this community is that we help each other find new information, share what we know, or figure out how to navigate a language we don't know and buy what we're interested in. We'll always be worried about him. He always gives his all, and the risk of injury is always present. And if it were to happen, we'd know about it afterwards, because he never spoke before, when he was still injured, when there was something he had to do and for which we had high expectations. Respect for his competitors? Yes (except when it is the rivals who forget to respect him, which has happened on a few occasions). Chen has my respect, his coach no. And a lot of judges and ISU (and JSF) officials don't have it. It takes time to learn to distinguish jumps, and you only do it if you're willing. You don't need to know the jumps to appreciate the programs and competitions. Seeing if rotations are complete is not easy, especially if the missing part is around 90°. Is it more? Is it less? Small differences in rotation can have huge effects on the score. Chen's jumps had the virtue of being stable. He almost always landed them. They weren't big, he needed a long preparation, and the exit was always a bit rushed. He put his free foot down as soon as possible because he had not a good running edge, but fundamentally his technique was correct. He simply didn't deserve high GOEs because his jumps lacked amplitude and there was a clear gap in his programs: long preparation, then jump, then immediately put the foot down to avoid losing balance, without doing anything difficult, and then another preparation for the next technical difficulty. Yuzu made more mistakes, but his programs were a continuous flow from one movement to the next, because when he didn't make mistakes, he deserved much higher marks than Chen. And the marks, if assigned correctly (even in the PCS), should have been enough to compensate for Chen doing one more quadruple. Malinin jumps like no one before him. Right now, and with these rules, he's the strongest skater. Which doesn't mean he's a complete skater, but figure skating hasn't required completeness for years. It requires quadruple, and for skaters who are more or less at the same level in quadruple, it's a good thing to have the right passport. The judging system can be improved, but there will always be problems. The one you noted is one of the most complex, but something can be done. Chopin's Ballade in 2015 received a huge number of 10.00s. The Ballade in 2020 was a better program. The judges couldn't give the Ballade a 10.50, but they could have given that program the same marks they had in 2015, and given programs skated at the same level as the 2015 Ballade a 0.25 or a 0.50 less. Instead, in 2020 they slightly lowered the marks for the Ballade and raised the marks for lower-level programs. This distorts the results. If the judges maintain the correct level difference between the programs, the judging system works. If they lower the scores of the best programs and raise the scores of mediocre programs, they make the difference in value disappear and distort the competition results. Years have passed, but I still want to say a few words to certain people. And in one case, I'm truly hoping that justice will take its course, even though it's clear that politicians are very good at evading legal trouble. I fear his perfectionism tends to affect him too much. But I also think that turning professional, distancing himself from the toxic world of competitions and meeting artists with whom he can be himself, have helped him a lot. Much of the negativity of the past has disappeared; the important thing is that he doesn't get injured again (and that the tabloids go bankrupt). - The +5/-5 system is much more easily manipulated than the +3/-3 system. - The US Federation started applying much more pressure because they needed a champion and finally had a skater who, with a little help, could win. On the other hand, the JSF, which had never liked Yuzu, found a potential medal contender in Uno. For some time after Sochi, the JSF could only count on Yuzu for the world medals, so sabotaging Yuzu meant winning nothing. Uno's arrival prompted them to think they could have a champion they liked better because he didn't think for himself as Yuzu, but did what they wanted. - The judges, even the honest ones, stopped giving Yuzu the highest score because they expected the impossible from a two-time Olympic champion. Look at the competitions. Anyone who performs a short program with 4T and 4S, one of the two in combination, and completes the program well, is praised for having performed a very difficult program. When Yuzu did it, his jumps were considered easy, everyone assumed he could do them, after all, he was a two-time Olympic champion, and since they thought his jumps were easy, they gave him marks lower than the ones he actually deserved. Yes, Beijing was important because Yuzu finally understood that for us he as a person is more important than any medal.

Over the past few years, I've read numerous books and newspaper articles, and compiled countless statistics, and what I've seen is disturbing. And the ISU does nothing, or does too little, because the people who run the federation have their own vested interests, and honest and competent judges struggle to get their work done. In 2021, as soon as I read the names of the judges who would be judging the World Championships, I complained about Salome Chigogidze's presence, stating clearly that she was one of the most biased judges around. A few months later, the ISU suspended Chigogidze for national bias, specifically for the scores awarded at that World Championships. If I knew before the competition that she was biased, how could the ISU not know? Why was she allowed to falsify that result? And why was she back judging after just a year? So when someone tells me they trust the judges' scores because they're more competent than us, I don't know whether to laugh or cry. There are many interesting statistics to be done, although unfortunately, for some time now, if you don't have a paid subscription, you can only see the top ten results. With a little imagination, however, you can get a few more answers, because the order can be by score, BV, GOE, PCS, chronological, from highest to lowest, or reversed. If you search for all skaters, you can request the result by "single skater," which will give you the best score for everyone. You can select the season, nationality, competition, short program, or freeskate... by combining the results together, you can see more than just 10 lines.

Because in 2014, the United States had no chance of reaching the podium in any of the other events, so they went all-in on ice dance. And when the United States gets involved in politics, Canada isn't strong enough to keep them at bay. This is the passage from "On Edge," a book written by American judge Jon Jackson. Note that he's talking about a novice competition, not a major competition. And note that the judge he's talking about has judged Yuzu (giving him absurdly low marks) at the 2016 GPF, 2017 4CC, and 2018 OG, among other events. I commented on this book on my blog. The comments are in Italian, the quotes from the book are in English: https://sportlandiamartina.link/2020/12/14/jon-jackson-on-edge-4/ Jenn already answered this by showing you Noriko Shirota's role. I'll just add Yutaka Higuchi's name. Higuchi was the first Japanese skater to train at the Toronot Cricket Club, in the 1970s. He met Orser when he was still very young, and they remained friends. After retiring from competition, he worked as a journalist (in this photo, you can see him on the left, interviewing Yuzu and Mao Asada at the 2012 NHK Trophy) and collaborated with the JSF, connecting Japanese skaters with foreign coaches and choreographers. Discussions took place with Shirota, but the organizational work was done by Higuchi. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Yutaka_Higuchi?uselang=it#/media/File:Hanyu_and_Asada_in_Yutaka_'_s_room_at_the_2012_NHK_Trophy.jpg Yuzu wanted to learn the 4S. I don't know when he started carefully observing other skaters, but I'm sure he had already started doing so at least in his second junior season, since he said he studied the 3A of Denis Ten and Artur Gachinski. Fernandez began training in Toronto in the 2011-12 season. That year, he competed in four competitions where Yuzu was also present: the Nebelhorn Trophy, the Rostelecom Cup, the GPF, and the WC. You can be sure he studied him carefully, because at the Rostelecom Cup, Yuzu won by just 3 hundredths, which made him realize that every extra hundredth can make a difference. If you look at the link, these are Fernandez's 4S, arranged in chronological order. Notice when he started landing the jump, and think about who his coach was. If Orser could teach Fernandez the 4S, he could teach him too. https://skatingscores.com/q/element/?show_ranks=on&underline=&season_codes=all&division_codes=sr&division_codes=jr&event_codes=intl&series_codes=all&discipline_codes=men&segment_type_codes=all&unit_country_codes=all&unit_name=javier+fernandez&element_type_codes=jump&element_code=4s%&bonus=none&sort=chron&limit=10&submit-button=Submit I think there are two reasons. Chan had not the 4S in his programs, and Yuzu wanted to watch closely a skater land the 4S. Also, probably he felt he had to maintain a certain distance, since Chan was the skater he wanted to overtake. We don't know all the details, but Nanami Abe know really well the training conditions in Sendai after the earthquake. She knew this was a huge limitation for Yuzu. And I think Yuzu is capable of showing the intensity of his feelings like no other. Abe was very important to him, but getting results was also very important. And she understood this and put Yuzu's needs first. The relationship remained excellent; Abe's husband continued to sharpen Yuzu's blades, and they later worked together on some choreography.

The +5/-5 system is much more open to manipulation than the +3/-3 system, so older results are more reliable. This doesn't mean they can't be manipulated—Sotnikova's and Davis/White's victories in Sochi are proof of that—but there's a big difference between the two systems. I'll give you an example with a 4T. From the 2010-11 to the 2014-15 season: BV 10.30, points earned with GOE +3 13.30, with GOE -3 7.30 From the 2015-16 to the 2017-18 season: BV 10.30, points earned with GOE +3 13.30, with GOE -3 6.30 (the negative GOE for quadruples was increased from -3.00 to -4.00) From the 2018-19 season: BV 9.50, points earned with GOE +5 13.75, with GOE 5 4.75 This means that the fixed part, the one the judges cannot control (unless the tachnical panel starts making rotation calls based on how much they like the skater), gives fewer points, and the part decided by the judges has grown dramatically in both positive evaluations than in the negative ones. We can make a comparison of this kind for all the jumps. The new system is more manipulable. As for the Gailhaguet episode, I've never found any newspaper articles confirming it. I believe it really happened, but we have no proof.

Generally, the most powerful federations are the Russian and the US. Another federation that's very active behind the scenes is the French one. Partly, it's a matter of political alignment: the Russian federation can count not only on the favorable votes of Russian judges, but also those of Belarusian, Georgian, and so on. And with so many judges voting a certain way, it's harder to see that the votes are odd. The US federation relies on the favorable votes of Mexican judges and, in many cases, those of Canadian and Japanese judges, depending on the skaters in question. The Italian and Israeli federations seem to operate differently depending on the competition, but they certainly seek strong allies. There may be actual agreements, but also more subtle influences. I've read judges state that when a judge is inexperienced, he tends to imitate what more experienced judges do, and from there, it's not far to being influenced. Then there's the matter of reputation. When a skater is touted as a great champion, judges tend to raise their scores. How come this didn't happen in the last part of Yuzu's career? Because the US federation, aided by the press, repeatedly emphasized that Yuzu was old, no longer in peak condition, that his routines had become repetitive... A couple of Yuzu mistakes, and the fact that he was no longer the strongest became common belief. And the Japanese federation sabotaged him in turn because its directors never liked him. After Sochi, they only had Yuzu, so they were more or less fair, but when Uno became strong, they saw an opportunity to surpass Yuzu and began sabotaging him, as we clearly saw at the National Championships. There's also another issue: if a skater has very difficult technical content, judges tend to raise his scores. Among the men, this means that those who perform 4Lz or 4F have higher GOEs and PCSs than they deserve, while the other quadruples are considered easy. Zagitova did all her jumps in the second half of her programs, Shcherbakova and Trusova had quadruples, and Kostornaya the 3A (Kihira also had 3A, but her federation never loved her, and anyway, the JSF means nothing compared to the Russian federation). Yes, we can consider ourselves lucky that Patrick wasn't Russian or American, although Yuzu might have won anyway. They hadn't yet realized Yuzu was so strong, so perhaps they wouldn't have used enough manipulation.

No, youre right. He broke the Zayak rule in that program. In the previous phrase I wrote "free skate", I forgot to repeat the detail in the other phrase. The Zayak rule works a little differently in SP and FS. It's rarer for the rule to be broken in SP, and the chances of changing a layout are lower, so at Skate Canada, Yuzu didn't realize the problem until he saw the score. With the new layout, the 4T in combination, he eliminated this risk, but I'm sure that if he hadn't changed the layout, he wouldn't have made that kind of mistake again. At Skate Canada, he should have left the 3Lz alone. He would have had a slightly negative GOE, but it would have been entered as a triple jump, and the toe loop would have been called as a 2T + COMBO. He would have gotten roughly 6 more points.

Yuzu will soon upload Prequel to YouTube and it will be available for everyone to watch for a week:

Yes, Yuzu was clear-headed; he was careful not to broke the Zayak rule. One of the many extraordinary things he did was to repeatedly modify the layout of his free programs to correct a mistake, but he only broke the Zayak rule twice: once when he was 13, in a novice competition, and once when he was 15, in his second senior competition. But both could be true. He was clear-headed in understanding how to modify the layout, but the determination to try that risky layout came from the thought, "I either do it now, or I'll give up the competition." He still didn't win because Chen's PCS were inflated (and it wouldn't have been the last time, nor the worst time), but he tried.

For some time I too struggled to understand this. YOLO = You Only Live Once. There are moments in which, if you want to achieve something, you have to take risk.

This article only scratches the surface. It's nice to see that the press was aware of the problem, but they've written far too little. Perhaps if they'd covered it more often and in more detail, we'd have more fair scores.

I'm happy that I'm not his mother, I would not have survived to some competitions. If you wants serenity, it's ok. We all have our own way of supporting him and receiving from him what we need. I prefer to know everything and be close to him in thought even in difficult times, but it's a personal choice. There's no one way better than another.

He relied on painkillers, as he did a lot of times during his competitive career. I'd prefer he didn't need them; I'm worried about the long-term effects of all these painkillers. If you're up for a long list, I can list quite a few physical issues Yuzu had to overcome over the years. Let me know if you want to read it. Painkillers aside, how could Yuzu go on like that? He is stubborn. When he wants to do something, he really does his best. Probably he has an high pain threshold, but mostly is stubbornness. No, he can't change the format of the performance. He loves to skate in an arena full of people who wants to see him. Take that away from him, and you take away what he loves most. A recorded show isn't the same. A video, as Ikue, is wonderful, but he wants to perform in front of the public. I saw him live two times. At the 2019 Grand Prix Final: short program, one official practice (the one in which he tried the 4A) and free skate, not the gala: that day I was at work. There were a lot of strong skaters in all the competitions. No one was comparable to him. He was magnetic, he was able to catch my eye even when he was at the side of the rink, drinking water, and at the same time one of the other skaters was doing a quad at the center of the rink. I learned in that competition how overwhelming his presence is. In 2022 he went pro. I saw all his solo show from my computer. Prologue only some time after the show, but for Gift, Re_Pray, Echoes of Life and Realive I bought the ticket for the livestream every time, this means 9 tickets. For the other shows, two times (Echoes day 2 and Realive day 1) I was able to watch them on Asahi in real time, I watched all the others when they were aired some times later. So I know what he did. I saw everything. I won the tickets for Echoes of Life in Chiba, both days (but I bought also my ticket for the international livestream, as a support for Yuzu). Chiba was the third city of the tour, so I already knew the story. This aided me a lot, because I was able to understand what was happening even whithout the English subtitles. And... it's totally different. From a screen, the shows are wonderful. From a cinema (two days later I went to a cinema in Kyoto and I watched the delayed viewing) they are even more beautiful, because you feel the atmosphere with the other fans. Inside the arena... it's totally different. The light are brighter. The colours more intense. The music wraps the people. There is a sensation of the space that you can't feel from a screen. You see Yuzu's speed, the beautiful transitions from one move to another that sometimes get lost when in the video there is a camera change. You feel to be part of the shows, because the lights often go over the public. You feel the emotions of the people sitting near you. It's totally different. Without the live performances, what Yuzu is doing would lose a big part of his meaning. The emotion would not be the same. Think to a detail: no one knows whether Yuzu will be able to skate a clean show or not. He too doesn't know it. And this feeling is an important part of the show. Really. When in Gift he started the six minutes of warm up, I was worried as I was worried the year before, when he was about to skate in Beijing. In a video... would he show a flawed performance, or would he skate again and again until he will do a perfect performance? There can't be the same tension in a recorded show. Another thing: he loves challenge. He could do easier shows. But he doesn't do them. He needs to be challenged, otherwise he would lose interest. At the 2017 Autumn Classic International he obtained 112.72 points in the short program. The Total Element Score, with three jump elements (one combination), three spins and one step sequence, was 64.17 points. For the free skate he decided to avoid the 4Lo and the 4Lz because he felt some pain to one knee. And he lost his concentration. He did countless mistakes. The Total Element Score for eight jump elements (three combinationa), three spins, one step sequence and one choreo sequence was 67.02 points. Less than three points more compared to the short program, but with a lot more of elements. Because on his mind he perceived the program as easy, since he had decided not to do the most difficult jumps, he was unable to concentrate and made mistakes that he normally does not make. When he doesn't feel challenged, he is not able to skate at his best. So we have to accept that sometimes he will be injured, and that, prayers aside, we can do nothing. To be his fans means, among all the beautiful things, also accepting this truth. From time to time, we will have a new trauma because we will discover something painful.

Same. We can't know when something wonderful will disappear. The only thing we can do was to wonder. Would his ankle heal? And would heal in time for the most important competitions? I'm happy that I was not a fanyu at the time of the 2014 Cup of China. The other injuries were devastating enough, that one would have been a nightmare. Anyone who doesn't follow Yuzu's career closely can't imagine how much criticism he's received, how many senseless accusations he's faced. But when we look at what not jealous people but others say, then he has received enormous praise, because everyone realizes what he does, how he does it, and who he is as a person. It was Yuzu who sprained his ankle. I don't know wether you saw the video of Yuzu walking in the backstage, at Notte stellata, with the ice on his ankle. And in Notte stellata he avoided the 3A and did only two 1A delayed, a 2T and a 3Lo. When he skated Requiem for the anniversary of the earthquake, the 3A was not so good. In Realive, for Otonal, he did only 3Lo, 3A, 3F+2T. His layout in his first senior season was more difficult, because then the combination was composed by two triple. We know that he wants to restore all his jumps, he was clear about it in Radio Members. But with his ankle is really difficult. We can only hope.

I, too, was sad to see that some people who had written so much in the past, produced analyses, videos, and texts... at a certain point stopped doing so. There could be many reasons for this, but it's still a treasure we're losing, because none of us can know everything, and by talking to each other, we learn so much. Years ago, I read some old forums, precisely to understand how people reacted in real time to episodes that, for me, were part of history. It helped me better understand the doubts and fears that so many had experienced. These doubts and fears haven't disappeared just because Yuzu is now a professional. In a recent interview, David Wilson stated that he was supposed to fly to Japan in January to choreograph Yae no sakura for Notte stellata, but that they had to abandon the project, and work with Zoom on a later date, due to yet another sprained ankle.

Chan had amazing skating skills and a wonderful 4T. His biggest flaw was the axel, he did a lot of mistakes on it. Fernandez has excellent skating skills and he was really good in connecting with the public. Uno's butt sticks a lot. And in order to raise his BV he cut transitions and skated a lot on two feet. He knew how to skate, but to be able to do more jumps, he simplified his skating. The judges should have noticed this and lowered his PCS scores, but they didn't. And his 4F was a really ugly jump. It was always cheated, but the judges gifted him huge scores. There are a lot of skaters better than Chen in spins, transitions and body movement. He learned to jump, and in his programs he did almost only jumps. But he was from US, and between the US press who praised him a lot and US federation who was able to influence the judges, the results were the ones we know.

Ci siamo ancora, ma sospetto che siamo altrove, su social media come Facebook o Twitter (mi rifiuto di chiamarlo X), o che scriviamo prevalentemente in inglese.

Me too struggle with English. I definitely make a lot of mistakes, and sometimes I worry I won't be able to get my point across or explain something properly. All we can do is do our best. Yes, I'm that Martina. I'm not special. I'm a fan as countless of other fans, so, thank you, but we are all equal. It doesn't matter what we do, or how long we've been following Yuzu. It doesn't even matter if we just follow him without doing anything in public or if we do something in a public space, visible to everyone. We're all equal. I wrote a lot of things. I hoped that the press would take an interest in the topic and would force the judges and the ISU to evaluate the competitions correctly. It didn't happen. Now I'm writing because I love to write, and I love to highlight how extraordinary is what Yuzu did in the past and how extraordinary is what he is doing now.

I'll touch on a few of the points you mentioned, but I'm not entirely exhaustive. Regarding the score, it's a long discussion. I remember the 2019 World Championships, the disappointment with the result, but also the lack of understanding. He'd missed a jump in the short program, but even so, I didn't understand how he could have lost. Then I started reading comments from people criticizing the result. Were they just disappointed fans, or was there some truth in what they were writing? I wanted to understand, so I started studying. It's true, he often made mistakes. No one denies that. But the score is made up of so many things. The base value, and Chen's was higher. The grade of execution, and the elements Yuzu performed correctly, were never comparable with Chen's. Most of Yuzu's elements, executed correctly, deserved a +5. Chen made few mistakes, but the quality wasn't great. His scores were too high. The same goes for the components. Yuzu always deserved top marks for quality and complexity. Even in his worst programs, he was still superior to the best Chen. The fact that the highest and lowest scores are excluded from the average slightly reduces the risk of a single judge manipulating the score, but even a single judge can be decisive when the gaps are small. And there are so many things that come into play and influence the judges, including the belief that Yuzu was "old" and therefore no longer in top condition. The +5/-5 system is much more manipulable than the +3/-3 system, and that played its part. As for 4A, Yuzurujenn already answered, it was a childhood dream of him, and immediately after winning in PyeongChang he said that was his goal, so the choice to focus on 4A had nothing to do with scores. He had already won everything, he just needed a new challenge, that's all. Yuzu has never been one to get discouraged by a negative result. Frustration, yes, a lot. But he always thought he could win; he just had to practice more, perfect his skating. Until he realized the scores were assigned arbitrarily, this was discouraging. The knowledge that, no matter what he did, they wouldn't allow him to win. Skating with this knowledge also increases tension, making it easier to make mistakes. There's a happy ending, if we want to see it. It's up to us. Yuzu is still the only skater to have won two Olympic gold medals in the men's event since 1952. In Beijing, he showed that we can be struck by bad luck—the hole in the ice and the sprained ankle—but we can still continue to do our best. We can still chase our dreams. And if we can't achieve what we dreamed of, we can set ourselves a new goal and work toward it, like Yuzu did when he skated a perfect Rondo during Gift.

Hi, I completely understand the difficulties of being a working mother. My daughters were born in 2006 and 2009, so I missed the first part of Yuzu's competitive career. The fandom is huge, and there are certainly people who follow him for his looks. But most of us follow him for what he can do on the ice—because we've never seen a skater like him—and for what he does off the ice. For his intelligence, his sensitivity, and the way he faces every challenge. He wrote his first biography when he was 17 because he wanted to help his rink, so much so that he always donated royalties to the rink, and this although at that time he had no sponsors, and training was very expensive, expecially when he moved to Canada. It's true, he made a lot of mistakes, but he always managed to learn from them. This is one of the characteristics that allowed him to win everything he won. He's truly grateful for everything. He certainly had an extraordinary character to begin with, and his parents certainly gave him a great upbringing, but I think the earthquake played a fundamental role. He knows he could have died at 16. He's never forgotten that. He's never forgotten the difficulties of that period, nor that, compared to many others, he was lucky because none of his loved ones died. This helps him put things in perspective: he can't take for granted that what he has now he'll still have in a few minutes, be it his house, destroyed by the earthquake, his rink, which he lost in 2004 and again in 2011, or anything else. So he's grateful for what he has. He's not just a role model for you. He is for so many other people. Age doesn't matter. I'm older than you, I've followed him for years, and I continue to be amazed and to admire him for what he does.

Hi, I bought the digital version of the book while I was in Japan. These are the photos mentioned in this passage. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1v1GUo2AwhCt8-SjkHye9Vn9zfwN7ckBa/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YYbqfpka2z9vdShg6t9F6akfBhkxUwT_/view I have no idea if there are better ways to share images on this site. I haven't read the other messages yet, so I don't know how complete your translation is, but I can always take more screenshots if needed.

Me too try to read and keep all the articles. I was hoping there was something I missed, but I think you're right, with the New Year's Eve so close almost surely there was no media. If Yuzu doesn't bother to say the number some other time, those boxes will remain empty.

I don't write this very often, but I am one of the people who updates Wikipedia. My updates are mainly in Italian, and in fact Yuzu's Italian page is among the most complete, and every now and then I make some updates to the English version. There is one detail that I would like to add but I can't. Does anyone know how many spectators were present at the Hiroshima shows? I tried to look for the information but I couldn't find anything. If anyone knows a newspaper that published the data and can give me the link, it would be a great favor.

In the book there is also the image of the pendant: