General Yuzuru Chat

[Yuzu_GOAT]

What I love about seeing so many people rallying around Yuzu is it really cements him as the GOAT. In 5 years, it's not going to be Nathan or Shoma or Yuma that people remember, it'll be Yuzu, regardless of what results he gets in this Olympics

[micaelis]

I know everybody is upset, almost everybody is more upset than Yuzu.  You have to remember that 11 years ago next month Yuzu experienced something that radically altered his perspectives, namely the earthquake.  He survived and thousands others perished.  He felt guilty about continuing skating, feeling he should be more directly involved in the recovery efforts but a series of experiences later made him realize that his skating was sufficient to cheer up many of those who were so frustrated with their situations following the quake.  On 3/11 Yuzu learned what it takes to be a survivor and he's carried that knowledge within himself ever since.  I doubt that there are any other skaters out there who literally have stared death in the face as Yuzu did that afternoon scrambling from the ice wondering whether he'd make it outside before the building came down.  He did and the building didn't collapse (though it was heavily damaged and Yuzu's still contributing funds to IceRink Sendai to help it pay off the loans it needed for its repairs).  If anything, though, this accident has given him the ability to keep in focus his real reason for being in Beijing - bringing Nessie out in all her 4 1/2 spins glory.  No longer considering himself in contention for the gold he can now relax and do the 4A like he has in the past (I'm privately convinced that those failed attempts everyone saw the other day were fakes, meant to keep his opposition asking - Can he? Will he?).  I think we will see a Yuzu beginning his free skate with a zen-like calmness tomorrow, with all his focus on solving that figure-skating koan, the 4A (4A is analogous to the Zen koan, being in its way like the riddle of explaining the sound of one hand clapping, the answer being that you can only explain it by doing it).

 

PS - I'm thinking (maybe even hoping,  though Yuzu would thoroughly disapprove of me doing so) that having sailed through the SP with a trumped up world record score Nathan might lose his focus because of overconfidence and thoroughly screw up his free skate, delivering the gold not necessarily to Yuzu but at least to someone not named Nathan Chen.

[hamaguri]

Haa... Now is at night in Europe... What a day, starting from that incident...

I am drinking camomile tea with milk and honey. It is really good for deep sleep.

I am trying to see that he was saved from an injury. The hole was very big.

No one can decide which is lucky, which is unlucky. That's life.

 

Whole day, I was reading comments, blogs...

[LaCarmi]

Hi Everyone.

 

I'm not actually new here, but this is my first post. I've started reading this forum before JNats 2020 but decided to join in March 2021. But since I'm too shy I didn't have the courage to write (and well I think I choose the wrong username, not that I don't believe in it, but now I think it's cheesy, is there a way to change it? I know, I digress...). I'm sorry that it took this event to give me courage to write and come out of lurker status but I should learn from Yuzuru and go for it, right?

 

I'm here and I'm crying (and feeling stupid about that but I am an empathic person and a lot of things make me cry). KendallKlaire's words made me cry, because they made me remember when I found Yuzuru. KendallKlaire said:

 

Quote

Yuzu has provided a light for me since I saw his 2017 Worlds free skate.

 

And that's what happened to me. Unfortunately I need to thank the ISU  for making me a fanyu (can you believe that?). I've never watched figure skating, I was never interested in jumps and that's what I thought FS was all about, at most I preferred ice dance because people don't fall (in theory) and the performance is all smooth (always, in theory). I was a fan of Virtue and Moir just because they were the Olympic champions in 2018 not because I knew of them (this just to tell you that I really didn't follow figure skating that much, I didn't even know that an Italian couple was world champion in 2014! I only knew of Carolina Kostner as a skater and nobody else, and the "like" of VM and ice dance didn't last much since I didn't follow anything after a few months of the Olymics), so when ISU posted all world 2017 championships I said why not? I mean it was march or april 2020 and we were in lockdown, I didn't have anything better to do than watch videos on youtube, or read books, or clean the house or cook, right? We all went through that fase. So I watched all the videos, all the performances and the gala. And that's when Yuzuru saved my sanity.

 

I wasn't in a good place back then even if I didn't want to admit it. Covid was and is still hard on anyone right? But watching Yuzu's H&L in that video made me curious about this man, who in the video before was dressed in purple pants and rocking Prince (and boy did I enjoyed that performance even if it wasn't his best) and the next day skated that masterpiece so different from the SP. So day after day I watched every competition and every show and knew about him more and my mental state got better. First I was moved by his skating, then I was moved by his life story. How can a person be this good? So humble? I was touched by him. And it's true that his skating touches people like no other.

 

After that I learnt everything about FS, I can recognise jumps even better than the judges, I learnt that FS is not all about jumps as I previously thought but I even learned about the sad part of FS. But I'm not here for that. 

 

By the way, I'm Laura, sorry for the lengthy post. Yuzuru may have saved my sanity during 2020, but I need to say a big thank you to all of you for saving my sanity during Yuzu's competitions. I didn't know it was so hard, since I wasn't here for all his competitions! Today I was really down, I didn't eat a lot, I didn't read, I didn't want to study Japanese (another thing I did again because of him after trying a few years ago and giving up) because I was too sad and couldn't concentrate. I know it may be stupid but that's what an emphatic person does. Coming here and reading all your support made me feel better. My greatest fear was about the backlash of journalists (I do think it was a smart move to address the hole soon) but at the end of the day, who cares? It's okay to not wanting them to slaughter him, we love him right? But real fans don't care. Common people will read the articles and move on and won't remember what was said. And seeing the love from people and other skaters made me realise that words are just words, they may hurt but the actions of other people matter the most.

 

So sorry for the long read, I just really wanted to share my story of how I found Yuzu and thank you all for keeping me sane during his competitions. I may not post a lot, it did take me a lot to come out of the shadow but I will support him in whatever he decide to do. As for now, Yuzu, go for the quad axel! You don't need a third gold olypmic medal to show us your value. You already did your part, now follow your heart. (I don't know why I'm saying this to Yuzu since he's not here - and if you are, what are you doing! go back to sleep and rest! - but I'm sending positive thoughts to him...)

 

By the way, I found consolation in the fact that he wasn't at the press conference so no stupid question for him.

[Ulrinis]

13 hours ago, Suzu said:

I am so proud of him too He popped first jump but the way he collected  himself and skated the rest of the program, that was amazing,  WELL DONE YUZU

Exactly. His program was so beautiful to watch - apart from how his every move perfectly went with the music, I liked those soft landings. Just pure magic.

[Yuzu_GOAT]

@Omoshiroi_Zuzuabsolutely agree about the press conference part, goodness knows he would've had to deal with media attempting to tear him apart

1 minute ago, Ulrinis said:

Exactly. His program was so beautiful to watch - apart from how his every move perfectly went with the music, I liked those soft landings. Just pure magic.

His jumps are smooth as butter. No one else jumps the way he does

[Yuzu_GOAT]

Also, anyone know if we'll get Yuzu practice content today?

[Yuzurella]

1 hour ago, Anni said:

 

 

 

 

Here his post about this (translation) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So many people support Yuzu

 

[NEWS]

 

7 hours ago, hamaguri said:

Guys, right now, Shinya Kiyozuka has uploaded the video, 'praying' for yuzu.

 

 

 

This is so beautiful! I cried when I listened to the music.

I'm so glad that Yuzu has this immense love and support from so many people. I hope he knows about it and can use this as his power.

[Ulrinis]

11 hours ago, Mary_kyo said:

Now that I'm calmer, I'm relieved that he isn't injured. That hole on the ice looked so dangerous. It could have easily caused a very nasty ankle sprain. I'm happy that he can still do the free skate in good health.

Yes, after the first shock and sadness I've come to this conclusion, too: Bad luck regarding the element but no fall, no injury, so he was lucky and we should be relieved and looking forward to Thursday. 

[Lynn487]

I want to send my best wishes to Yuzu for both his practices and for his free skate. I'm glad that he seems to be okay and doesn't blame himself for something beyond his control. I only wish for him to enjoy skating to his free skate and to be proud of what he's done. It took all night and honestly all morning for me to calm down, but reading yuzu's words after the sp and seeing the amount of support he's getting has helped me out a lot.

 

I will always support him and he will always be the GOAT of figure skating no matter who tries to undermine his achievements (looking at you ISU & NBC).

 

In other news, I am excited to see his 3a3lo in the free! Ever since JNats, I have fallen in love with that combo. I'm wishing yuzu the very best and hoping for him to be happy, healthy, safe, and successful (on his own terms)! I saw a tweet yesterday that sums up my feelings at the moment, and it's that I will always bet on yuzu and his skating- no matter the circumstance :-)

 

 

[Yuzurella]

 

Yuzu has the support of so many Poohs and people from all over the world.

[swan_queen]

I haven't been keeping up with this thread today so I don't know what's already been said or discussed. But I came to a realization earlier and wrote it down this morning--just wanted to share.

 

For the past few months, I often wondered what it would be like in the brief time period we are in now between the short and free. At first I predicted I would not be able to endure this period of waiting between the two skates. But now that it's here, I realize that it's a beautiful time in its own way: we don't yet know what will happen, which means anything could happen; whether it be the worst, in which case we are currently living in blissful oblivion--or the best, in which case there is endless, unimaginable happiness in store. 

[Yuzu_GOAT]

1 minute ago, swan_queen said:

I haven't been keeping up with this thread today so I don't know what's already been said or discussed. But I came to a realization earlier and wrote it down this morning--just wanted to share.

 

For the past few months, I often wondered what it would be like in the brief time period we are in now between the short and free. At first I predicted I would not be able to endure this period of waiting between the two skates. But now that it's here, I realize that it's a beautiful time in its own way: we don't yet know what will happen, which means anything could happen; whether it be the worst, in which case we are currently living in blissful oblivion--or the best, in which case there is endless, unimaginable happiness in store. 

In some ways, not going into the FS as a gold contender or defending top SP is great for us because it can't possibly get worse than it is now so either he'll stay off podium or he'll do amazingly and podium. No stress for us having to worry about him defending from the top of the leaderboard, just anticipation for 4A and tenchi

[desteva]

Hey everyone! New member here: I've mostly been lurking around but I'm confused on something- if anyone could help me understand that would be great!

 

I think it's pretty common knowledge here that both the ISU and JSF dislike yuzu and have constantly underscored him in the past few years, but I've always struggled to understand why they dislike him so much to this extent.

 

I really don't understand why the JSF hates yuzu so much. Like, he's their most respected, highest achieving, and popular skater over all of these years. So why are they so cold to him and prefer/push Shoma and Yuma over him? Is it since they want to move on from Yuzu and promote a new generation of Japanese skaters, AKA Yuma? I can't really put my head around this one.

 

And also for the ISU, I guess this directly correlates to the JSF not liking Yuzu. Since the JSF has substaintial power as a federation similar to the Russians and the Americans -- so you would expect that to work to Yuzu's favor, but it really doesn't because his own federation doesn't like him

 

This is just me being really frustrated with all the federations, scoring, etc. At this point it really seems like Yuzu (and Fanyus) vs. the world, and it really makes me sad that it's not going to change. But it really shows how committed Yuzu is to this sport and how much he loves it. He doesn't care so much for the scores but I'm glad he continues to enjoy the sport and push himself further. 

[Yuzu_GOAT]

9 minutes ago, desteva said:

Hey everyone! New member here: I've mostly been lurking around but I'm confused on something- if anyone could help me understand that would be great!

 

I think it's pretty common knowledge here that both the ISU and JSF dislike yuzu and have constantly underscored him in the past few years, but I've always struggled to understand why they dislike him so much to this extent.

 

I really don't understand why the JSF hates yuzu so much. Like, he's their most respected, highest achieving, and popular skater over all of these years. So why are they so cold to him and prefer/push Shoma and Yuma over him? Is it since they want to move on from Yuzu and promote a new generation of Japanese skaters, AKA Yuma? I can't really put my head around this one.

 

And also for the ISU, I guess this directly correlates to the JSF not liking Yuzu. Since the JSF has substaintial power as a federation similar to the Russians and the Americans -- so you would expect that to work to Yuzu's favor, but it really doesn't because his own federation doesn't like him

 

This is just me being really frustrated with all the federations, scoring, etc. At this point it really seems like Yuzu (and Fanyus) vs. the world, and it really makes me sad that it's not going to change. But it really shows how committed Yuzu is to this sport and how much he loves it. He doesn't care so much for the scores but I'm glad he continues to enjoy the sport and push himself further. 

Yeah re: JSF I have zero clue why they're like this, especially because it isn't representative of the overall attitude of Japan as a country towards Yuzu - they love him. You'd think that JSF would see Yuzu's success both with the public in Japan and internationally and boost him up but they just... don't. Like, ISU I'd expect that attitude cause they always try push RusFed or US federation, but JSF genuinely boggles my mind.