kiches

It’s just gum, (chiclet style gum) although mine came with some small post-it’s as well. I asked my cousin to try and look for the clear files files when she goes to Japan in a week. Hope she finds some. I’m tempted to ask her to snap photos of these train station ads too if she sees them n

I sort of assumed he loved eggs because he loves tamago kake gohan. Although maybe this refers to cooked eggs.

If I were to think of a unique move that would get named after Yuzu it’d be: - The spin position with the foot over his head (anyone else doing this?). - One of his signature entries/exits for his jumps, of which there are many but they sort of already have their own names. I feel like the triple axel of his flavor should get dubbed a “Hanyu axel” but he has so many stunning variations on the entry and exit.

From my angle I totally thought he was doing a heart shape with his arms instead of bear ears, will have to rewatch your video .

I meant to blog about it but haven’t gotten to it yet! Basically he was acting all kinds of cute, I think he was doing it as fan service because he felt bad that he didn’t win and so many came to see him. A couple of things: - Crouching down by the boards and peaking out with just his eyes. - He apologized (he had nothing to apologize for!). - He went around and basically acknowledged each of the banners. - He was gesturing really cutely with Shirota about the gloves. - There was more but honestly I can’t remember, normally I would record the medal ceremony and but since I was facing the judges and Yuzu didn’t win this time I wasn’t up for it.

Is it weird that I'm not a fan of the term "fanyu"? It's always had a derogatory connotation for me (that and I'm not huge on things that are nicknames, only allowable exception is if it's a shortening of a person's name). I do enjoy the gigantic rank list though!

I vaguely remember a tweet where Stephane Lambiel said he'd want to invite Yuzu to his ice shows, so I'm sure he'd accept that invitation. In fact, if any retired skaters who have ever worked or helped him in some way asked him to be in their shows I'm sure he'd accept since he wants to repay their kindness.

Lol. On a side note, Tracy was squishing Pooh in such a weird way in the Kiss and Cry during the WTT SP. Must've hurt.

I think he was mainly joking with Patrick there due to the high level of skating they were seeing at Worlds. He may not have felt like going to one more competition of the season after worlds (I'm sure most skaters felt this way), but as WTT is a Japanese created competition held in Japan he would never skip it unless he physically couldn't go.

Japan Open is by invitation, I think it's put together by the JSF but it's invitational. It's not an ISU competition so you don't really gain anything from it competitively other than experience and probably a nice check. I think Japan Open is also linked with IMG, so a lot of skaters who are represented by IMG tend to get invited.

He basically fudged it in EVERY exhibition the last season. NHK was the closest but I don’t think he really did the twizzle into the axel there. It’s such a shame, it’s so gorgeous. As for post-Olympic programs, I am betting on a jazz SP. Yuzu has been saying he wants to try skating to jazz, and I think Jeff could create something really interesting for him.

Listing my fancam videos from Autumn Classic here. Feel free to share the links, but do not re-upload elsewhere. Autumn Classic September 21, 2017 Autumn Classic September 22, 2017 Autumn Classic September 23, 2017 Ladies 20170921 ACI Elizabet Tursynbaeva SP Run-Through 20170921 ACI Mai Mihara Warm-Up 20170921 ACI Mai Mihara SP Run-Through 20170921 ACI Kaetlyn Osmond SP Run-Through 20170922 ACI Mai Mihara FS Run-Through 20170922 ACI Kaetlyn Osmond FS Run-Through 20170923 ACI Mai Mihara FS Run-Through 20170923 ACI Kaetlyn Osmond FS Run-Through Dance 20170920 ACI Gilles & Poirier FD Run-Through 20170921 ACI Virtue & Moir FD Run-Through 20170921 ACI Weaver & Poje SD Run-Through 20170922 ACI Virtue & Moir SD Run-Through Yuzuru Hanyu 20170921 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Image Training 20170921 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 1 of 3 20170921 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 2 of 3 20170921 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 3 of 3 20170921 ACI - Yuzuru Hanyu FS Run-Through 20170922 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Image Training 20170922 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 1 of 2 20170922 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 2 of 2 20170923 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Image Training 20170923 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 1 of 3 20170923 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 2 of 3 20170923 ACI Yuzuru Hanyu Practice 3 of 3

Yes it was the first time we saw Notte Stellata since he didn't do any shows that summer, and ACI doesn't have a gala. When he unzipped his jacket and revealed the costume I think everyone went "wahhhh". You can see him fiddling with the the loops for his fingers, I think people were saying it wasn't quite long enough and it wasn't 100% comfortable for him, maybe he had the costume adjusted later.

This is actually my favorite performance of Notte Stellata since I was there watching live and it was the first unveil. Maybe if I had seen NHK Trophy version live it would be my favorite instead as it was the cleanest, but during this practice session with fewer people and a quieter atmosphere it really felt like a private show and a peak into Yuzu's own little world. I loved the program the moment I saw it, and felt it really captured his feelings on the journey from injury back to the ice.

They started skating around the ice again after he was done. Patrick and Virtue a Moir I think we’re still up to do run-through, probably the other first place winners as well. Yuzu and Medvedeva were doing jump off during Patrick’s run-through .

You know, I thought I spotted Kevin Reynolds in the rink from across the way, but I couldn't tell if it was really him (something about the hair and the red jacket of the person I saw from across the rink reminded me of him). During the Skate Canada Gala practice last year all the skaters on the ice stopped practicing and moved to the sides or sat and watched him do a run-through of Notte Stellata. That didn't happen for anyone else during that practice. In fact, you can see Kevin in my fancam deliberately stopping and moving to the side.

Yes, that’s a group of us outside the rink after the SP!

It only took a few minutes. Some ladies were hustling and rushed past us once we got in.

That ~300 count was from me, I went and counted that line. We were numbers 284 when we got there around 7:30 AM.

Actually I think it was the other way around where people thought it was Gabby and Kaetlyn she was pointing to but it was really his mom. I can almost make out what Tracy says in the Japanese broadcast. I do know that during practice his mom was sitting near that general area at least on day 1. (saw her sitting there with someone) She was probably seated somewhere behind Gabby and Kaetlyn but all the photos I've seen cut off too much of the audience to tell.

I don't think he was pissed about the incident and care provided at CoC, he was more shaken up than anything and trying to be willful to continue, but you could see him getting emotional right before the second 6 min warm up where Brian tells him to breath. My overall take on CoC was that Brian didn't want Yuzu to go out there and skate after the collision, but since Yuzu was determined to do it any way and was cleared to do it by the medical staff that attended to him (which he has thanked before, I believe it may have been Team USA's medical staff while the Chinese staff at the rink tended to Han Yan), he was resigned to it. You can hear Brian say "You don't have to do this. You don't have to be a hero", this was his way of letting Yuzu know it was okay for him to not skate and withdraw, but Yuzu wasn't going to do that. I do feel for his poor mother during CoC, it must've been so frightening watching that unfold. If I was his mom I'd probably be crying through his entire skate.

actually I'm guessing that is a washer/dryer combo so it wouldn't be surprising if it came out dry.

I think you're misunderstanding my point a bit. I'm not saying ladies aren't what the US audience is most interested in, that is true at the moment and has been in the past, and NBC influenced the schedule at the Olympics hoping to draw more viewers. My point is, if they devoted that type of resources or energy and were smarter and more efficient at promoting the other disciplines as well that they wouldn't have to rely solely on the success of the American female skaters to generate interest in the sport within the US. Besides Michelle Kwan who else does the general US audience know from the figure skating world? At the moment my guess would be Meryl Davis as she's had the most exposure after Sochi with being on Dancing with the Stars even though she's not a singles skater. You can only generate so much interest without putting in effort, money, and some PR to get people take notice of the sport, and clearly the USFS has failed to do this properly in ladies, AND in the other disciplines.

I like what they're doing with the junior grand prix, I like how it's accessible to watch for nearly anyone with internet connection. It's true in the US, figure skating doesn't get a ton of coverage compared to the past. When I started becoming a more serious fan after Sochi I struggled to find where I could watch competitions regularly, particularly because I don't have cable TV or any other tv programming outside what is available over the air for free. Eventually I figured it out of course. I think the USFS is stuck on the idea that to have a star in skating they need to have a female champion. They've had champions in ice dance with Davis and White, and Nathan has garnered a lot of attention as well and now they have a junior world champion in Vincent. They need to promote the sport better as a whole and not focus on just the ladies because that is clearly not where their strongest competitors are. The fact that the men's discipline is now arguably the most popular globally out of all four disciplines says it's possible and that fans, even casual fans, can enjoy and become hooked on the sport through something other than ladies skating. USFS just seems incredibly outdated (much like the comments from Bianchetti in the article, which goes to show that those in the ISU are also outdated in their thinking), even their website looks like it'd something out of the 90s and Ice Network isn't much better. They need to get with the times and make the sport easier to watch and information more readily available, but they try to make it more entertaining by hiring Tara and Johnny to do color commentary rather than people that know how to educate and explain what is happening in the performance. It's just incredibly misguided, they're not making it easier for Americans to get into this sport as a fan.

I read both her pieces on Worlds and the GPF from both years. I think it's the unevenness of her comments that show her bias. Javi basically had a worst performance than what Yuzu showed at Boston in 2016, but I didnt see her comment that he should've potentially been scored lower on his PCS. I'm not sure if she's still with the ISU (I don't think she is a a I thought she retired) so she is entitled to her opinion and to publish it how she sees fit. However, I think in her writing you probably see a lot of the same opinions that her son, Fabio, who is featured in the article on the upcoming changes and is spearheading them, has. It's likely they share similar tastes and I think Sonia at least prefers that overt style of expression that a skater like Javi or Ashley Wagner displays. Personally, this is not the type of expression I respond to, but there's room in the sport for variety and that diversity should be encouraged, celebrated, and rewarded. As for the popularity of the sport, it's clearly doing very well in certain countries and less so in others. Perhaps the ISU needs to study the success of the sport in these areas to see how they can apply it in countries where it's not thriving. If tickets for events like NHK Trophy and GPF are selling within minutes then clearly there is a demand and money to be made in that market. Also, if you read enough of her writing you will notice she recycles her compliments from event to event verbatim.