kiches

Oh you all missed the WR . Now that I think of it, I think Friday may be the day they invite school kids to watch and that’s why there were fewer tickets available/higher demand.

Actually I think the all-event tickets sold out in about 30 min and all single tickets sold out by the end of the day, with Saturday being the most popular date sold out.

Got my tickets for ACI too (for those who are missing a day, be sure to check back, they seem to be restocking randomly). Men are likely going to be Friday and Saturday again, but they'll likely have a practice session Thursday too.

As a first-hand witness in Boston (it was my first live comp), it was awful in a lot of ways and it still makes me depressed thinking about it. Others have summed things up well, but the major thing was Yuzu was on a hot streak of breaking records earlier in the season. In the SP he had a 12 pt lead above Javi and back then, a 12 point lead was something you no one usually overcame (it's a lot different now with all the quads). Javi had started the season with a 1 quad SP, and 3 quad + 1 3A FS and upgraded to a 2 quad SP and 3 quad + 2 x 3A FS layout after GPF due to how Yuzu was blowing through records. The worst thing about Boston for me was two things: - Yuzu's FS felt like it was coming all apart, people were calling it a meltdown and saying he couldn't handle the nerves. The tone was set the moment he messed up the first jump. - Javi won by skating cleanly in his FS getting a score similar to what Yuzu set at NHK, allowing him to overcome that 12 pt lead and win with a large margin that wasn't broken until Worlds in 2019 I believe. It was really the long awaited moment where Yuzu, and fans, expected him to take back the World title after 2015 Shanghai which was his season from hell after the Olympics. All signs pointed to it as he was breaking records left and right and had skated a clean SP nearly breaking his own WR, to watch it all sort of fall apart was heartbreaking. I'll never forget what his faced looked like during the medal ceremony, I just wanted it to hurry up and finish so he could leave the ice. It was quite emotional for me watching him receive his medal in Helsinki, this memory came up again as the Japanese anthem played and made me crying mess.

I think this was a photoshopped image from Worlds in Shanghai 2015. The blue flowered top is for Final Time Traveler.

Saw this on their FAQ now that I'm on my computer and not mobile: They also mention that for Chinese athletes, because Google and other Western SNS platforms aren't available in China that they referenced Weibo and Baidu. My guess is they likely took a mix google search (as mentioned in their FAQ) and the fact that he was basically the top 1-3 tweeted topics during the Olympics that pushed him over. I believe the tweet stats may have included Japanese tweets as well, but I'm not 100% sure.

The ESPN feature was pretty much what I expected, and not too bad as I didn't expect it to go very deep unless he somehow cracked top 10. It's a list of top 100 famous athletes so the focus was on their fame more than anything else. The Pooh thing is just going to be attached to his name no matter who is reporting (even Japanese media talk about it). The fact that they mentioned his donations and support for Ice Rink Sendai, and the dichotomy in his personality is more than we usually get from English articles about Yuzu so I'll consider it minute progress. Of course I still want a print copy of this.

http://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/23519390/espn-world-fame-100-2018# This briefly explains their criteria and what search score means.

Yes, I believe POTO is really popular in Japan. In Aoi Hono 2, Yuzu mentions he saw the movie when he was in middle school and had wanted to skate to it ever since. The first time I saw Phantom was the 2004 movie as well, and I loved it immediately. Clearly he wasn't the only skater who thought this way because both Kanako and Takahito both chose to do Phantom as well (with Kanako using it for both programs in the same season and Mura redoing the program this past season). Since this topic came up I ended up looking up a Japanese version of the songs, and it's a little different but feels so familiar!

I think when he initially skated to Notte Stellata that there was something wrong with the sleeves. During the exhibition practice at skate Canada he kept tugging at the sleeves, I think it may have been a tad too short.

I remember seeing this pic on my phone but I didn't think to zoom in . Really though, that's amazing.

Can anyone make out what’s in her hand? Looks like potentially a tourism booklet! And yes to more vids like that. Yuzu eating zunda mochi used to be my avatar.

Happy birthday to the Planet! Here’s a gratuitous Yuzu high five with a baby to celebrate

I think Yuzu does tend to have a tilt on the axis of his lutz, but I’ve often wondered if this was due to the placement of the lutz toward the end of his programs and fatigue (not sure about his junior programs as I can’t remember those layouts). Besides their placement in the second half of his programs the other times he’s had difficulty with it was when he was doing difficult transitions into it (original Ballade layout comes to mind, and in the second half). Maybe if he places his lutzes at the start of his programs it’ll allow him to minimize those errors, right now the sample size is too small to tell as we only have Rostelecom to go off of. I’m probably one of those that also believes his injury at NHK could’ve happened on any jump due to the fever he had, from some reports of that practice his other jumps weren’t going that well either that day.

Thank you for sharing your experience! I’m going to take a guess and say the fabric you saw may be chiffon. As for how thin Yuzu is, he probably really IS THAT THIN. In fact all the skaters I've seen up close are even more thin than on TV or live on ice. I remember seeing Kaetlyn and Gabby in a hotel lobby after Worlds in Helsinki and both were evening skinnier up close.

I believe that HMV does a points reward system, I noticed that 2 pts = 200 yen so I think by buying a shirt you get 2 pts and it automatically applied to our orders if we signed up for an account and made each shirt 2300 yen out of pocket plus shipping.

Yes, good seats went fast, although center/front rows are very hard to get in any competition (plus the judges get the best seats!) - but watching Yuzu live is something else, especially if you get to watch him in practice sessions. I'd say practices are my favorite part of going to live competition. I won't hold my breath on 2022, but I'd say chances are high he'll be at Worlds in Japan next year.

FYI, presale for all-event tickets to the GPF in Vancouver sold really well. I recommend getting your ticket soon if you're serious about this, I'm not sure when single session tickets will be available and what will be left.

I just looked up the FastPass system at Tokyo Disneyland and Pooh’s Honey Hunt is one of the most popular rides and I am shocked. I guess Pooh is really much more popular in Japan. At the Disneyland in Anaheim this is one of the rides that usually little to no line (wait time even during a busy season was maybe 20 min the last I went) to the point that it’s not even a Fast Pass ride. I attribute it to the fact that it’s one of the storybook rides that actually isn’t IN the Fantasyland area of the park which is where most kids and families congregate.

Is this what Brian meant when he said it’s a good feeling when other coaches watch his skaters instead of their own? They are quite literally watching Yuzu out of the corner of their eye.

I think I’ve seen this as well. I believe this was a post 2012 Worlds interview with all of Japan’s medalists. Daisuke was next to Yuzu (I think Akiko was also next to them) while Narumi and Mervin sat behind them. Daisuke was the one that said he was the most masculine.

Thanks for sharing your take on Yuzu, I found it very interesting to read! What you said about Asura and demon reminds me a bit of a conversation some friends and I were having about Yuzu and how some skating fans (maybe they are Western, maybe not) see him as feminine. We all find Yuzu to be masculine on ice. I also said if were to characterize him I’d say he’s a competitive athlete first, and Japanese second. What I mean is that Yuzu is of course, very polite and pays a lot of attention to detail in terms of his surroundings. Yet he’s extremely competitive, and that is something typically associated with traditional views of masculinity. At times I think his competitiveness leaks through when he’s not on ice and he says something that shows clearly that he believes he’s the best with a comment that would probably not be taken as humble. Back to someone else who posted about Yuzu coming off as shy in Western media, I think this is mainly attributed to the language barrier and his general politeness. He probably seems quiet to those journalists because he can’t speak as freely in English as he can in Japanese. I think Robin Cousins actually describes Yuzu very well in his Olympic interviews, which I’m quoting here. From Japan Times: “Javi was like me. I wanted to skate for the crowd,” Cousins stated. “I wanted to know exactly how many people were watching me. “There are other skaters, and I don’t know him that well, but I would say that Hanyu is that person who doesn’t need to know who’s in the audience,” Cousins continued. “He needs to know what he wants and he makes them come to him. It’s a different dynamic, but it absolutely is mesmerizing.” From Olympic Channel: ”It’s a calm, I’m going to say. Because some people, they have this exuberance and they have this wonderful performance, and you want... There’s nothing extrovert. It’s actually quite introverted, and it’s very - It’s quite soft and languid. He’s almost ethereal. He does have that aloof... I wouldn’t say tranquil, because you can see it in his eyes. And I think this is what makes him unique. You don’t see the effort. That’s a really good thing. You never see the effort with Hanyu that you see with the other boys.”

Yes, it was me who was wondering about Shae’s interview about H&L. I think I have a copy of the CBC interview with her after Worlds which you mentioned earlier. I’ll have to dig it up and check it out again when I have the time.

@KatjaThera and @eagle I’m not that familiar with Prince but I thought the program suited Yuzu just fine and I think others would agree, and I think the judges appreciated it too. It’s just that he never skated it squeaky clean so he didn’t get to score too high with it. If he had I expected it would’ve easily been a new WR at the time. Now Hope and Legacy is an entirely different story. It’s without a doubt Yuzu’s most experimental program to date, one with a somewhat vague theme that you wouldn’t guess just by knowing the music. @eagle where did Shae Lynn mention it was about rising up from the tsunami? From what I read it Shae Lynn said it was about Yuzuru’s skating life and Yuzu has said it was about nature, but I hadn’t heard the tsunami expressly mentioned before.

I was able to place an order with a foreign credit card. Maybe double check the information you entered, I used a Visa but I know not all cards are accepted. I also couldn't get the site to change the payment method from credit card to Paypal or anything else.