General Yuzuru Chat

[Nutmeg]

4 hours ago, MrPudding said:

 

This is great, thanks!! (and a million thanks to the translator, too!)

This conversation between two consummate performers about what makes a great interpretation, like showing weakness in order to then show strength to greater effect, or how to incorporate silence into the performance, and not being entirely enslaved to the rhythm, and how to capture the audience attention, was fascinating to me.

Yuzuru actually does all that in his programs.

[micaelis]

Since many people here have opined on second and third and more languages and have discussed English as an acquired language I think a few things might be pointed out here as to where and why I think Yuzu is having trouble with his English.  The first thing is that I've gathered over time from other posts that Yuzu seems to have a decent grasp (though far from 'native-speaker') of conversational English.  Being surrounded by English usage while training and being fairly young when moving to Toronto he would have absorbed English osmotically.  Others here have indicated that he's been taking formal English lessons though to what depth has not been indicated.  I think Yuzu's real trouble with English comes when he's in a formal situation - an interview or a press conference, for instance - and where he's reluctant to speak English because he's afraid of making a mistake.  One person pointed out that Yuzu's Japanese is articulate and precise and I think that because he cannot use English with such precision it makes him reluctant to use it in public-speaking situations.  That's very understandable.

 

Now, as for English as a language to learn.  In comparison to the other Indo-European languages (Slavic, Latinate, Germanic, Celtic, Hellenic) English is grammatically quite simple.  It has just three cases - nominative, objective and possessive.  It does not have noun genders.  It does have a fair share of irregular verbs and nouns that change to plural in ways other than adding an 's'.  The problem is that most of the irregularities involve frequently used words, which does make it somewhat confusing, though my experiences with German and French lead me to believe English doesn't have more than usual.  I would say that the major problem with English is spelling.  Frankly, English spelling is a mess.  This is because of the fact that there are so many words imported into the language - Germanic (the base language for English), French, Latin, Greek, Spanish plus a number of others, even from non-Indo-European languages (tsunami from the Japanese, for instance).  Generally if a word has come from a language that doesn't use the Latin alphabet, it's spelling is accommadated to standard English spelling rules.  But from other Indo-European languages quite often the native spelling is retained when adopted for English usage, which means one has a whole complex of competing spelling rules.  Good spellers in English seem to sense which language an unfamiliar word came from and use that language's spelling rules when writing it out.  They might not know the specific name of that language but they intuitively recognize when a word seems to have a Greek spelling or a German spelling, etc.  As far as spelling goes, the only language I've encountered that is as bad or even worse than English is French, there because of the diacritical marks and the vast numbers of silent letters.  I will admit, though, that my exposure to spelling conventions from other languages is limited.

 

Now back to Yuzu and the English language.  I think part of his difficulty is related to learning a new alphabet and new grammatical conventions.  Japanese is a language that seems to exist on its own.  It does not appear to be a part of any language family, although there have been several attempts to link it up to geographically proximate languages, all to no avail.  It does have a large number of loan words from Chinese but that's the thing.  They are loan words, not words that have been Japanese all along.  I think this fact makes it difficult for many Japanese to learn ANY foreign language because the rules of any language they might learn are inevitably different from Japanese.  True, there are some elements that are consistent for virtually any language spoken today.  They all have verbs.  They all have nouns.  Beyond that, though, language structures start going off in different directions when we start thinking of major linguistic families.  Japanese is basically a very lonely place. 

 

I have no doubt that Yuzu's English in informal situations is probably fairly well-developed.  He's been immersed in English for over half a decade and that's been the sole language used at TCC.  If you listen to him talking to Brian or Tracy in the kiss and cry he doesn't seem to be struggling for words.  In short, I would have to say his English has probably reached the level of being functional.  The informal situations of day to day living, plus those situations that he encounters while training, these would seem to be well within his grasp now.  It is Yuzu the public speaker that has him resorting to Japanese, even when asked a question in English.  Those occasions are special.  They are occasions when he is addressing the world at large.  He wants to make a clear, detailed response but he doesn't trust his English enough to do so.  I can well understand that.  My three extended trips to Germany many decades ago, where I stayed with a German friend and when my German was fairly functional, allowed me to converse lightly with German speakers.  But when I needed to go into detail on some subject I reverted to English.  I did so because in such conversations I was always surrounded by educated Germans who knew English.  On such occasions we would switch to English since they knew their English was better than my German.  Of course I was never involved in press conferences there but if I were I would have done exactly what Yuzu does ordinarily.  I'd use English.  He uses Japanese.  Enough said.

[VyVy99]

1 hour ago, skateIT said:

On the contrary, they seem to be friends now so maybe he’s saying that because he has more personal insight on what yuzu’s plans are? I mean, I doubt he’s drawing his conclusion/prediction from the same information and interviews that we all see, he knows him and probably has more info. Idk, just a thought that came to me this morning.

 

I don't have that feeling. They're not really "friends" per say, they're just two great skaters from different genarations who admire and respect each other a lot. Other than that, they're pretty distant and are different in character, too. 2022 will be something Yuzu want to think over himself. He may ask Plushenko for his opinion when they meet in person, but I don't see how they communicate often enough to share those personal stuff.

[Deliverpooh]

Yuzu is in Aljona Savchenko's Instagram My Story today

[VyVy99]

 

God bless my soul.

[Moria Polonius]

 

Quote

ETA:  No Plushenko wasn't the only one doing quads in Vancouver.  Evan was just able to win despite not having one:  http://www.isuresults.com/results/owg2010/owg10_Men_FS_Scores.pdf  - and looking at this, Lambiel tried for more quads. Plushy should have done a second toe instead of a 2A like he was able to do in the prior Olys. 

 

Holy scores inflation! Was it really only 8 years ago that the top skaters got 83-84 PCS, they had PCS in low 7s, GOE's almost never reached 3 and very rarely got a 2, and the only +3 element across the board was Lambiel's spin?

 

Is this how stingy judges are going yo be with the new system of GOE?

[sallycinnamon]

5 hours ago, Coquelicot said:

 

Nooo I missed it!  What else did Plushenko say?

 

5 hours ago, Yoa said:

I think he also mentioned that he saw Yuzuru doing jumps with 4.5 rotations...

 

Basically what @Danibellerika said, plus Plush mentioned that they met when Yuzu was eight years old (I think he said it was at a show) and Yuzu showed him how he jumped. Plush said that Yuzu could rotate his jumps very fast even then.

I wrote down to a friend one mine what Plush said about the 4A, his words were this:

"4.5 rotation. Quad and a half jump. It'll be very soon.

I saw very good jumps from Yuzuru Hanyu. 4.5 rotation. Axel. Very close. I know he worked before...the Olympic Games and I think he'd like to make history".

 

Plushenko talked about the 4A as it was something which could happen soon, it was interesting to hear from him. If he says something about Yuzu it's usually true...

 

He also talked about others, I put this in spoiler because it's OT:

Spoiler

- about Alina and Zhenya: Plush said that he predicted that one of them would leave Eteri, because two top athletes like them need to be separated; he also trained with Yagudin back then but after a time Yagudin left Mishin

- Plush thought Alina could win OGM, while his wife predicted Medvedeva for the gold

- about Zhenya: he said Orser is a good coach, and Zhenya can go to him to train with him, why not, it's her life/decision (Plush was supportive about Zhenya's decision)

- about Sasha: he reminds Plush of himself when he was a kid. He was competitive. Sasha trains 2-3 times/day, Plush said he doesn't know what would happen, maybe one day Sasha would win Olympics/Worlds too

 

[Sombreuil]

I think Pluschenko sees Yuzuru as a kindred spirit, with the same drive and love of competition - which is fine as long as Yuzuru’s health holds out.  Iirc he doesn’t react well to the various disinfectants and drugs that go with the sorts of surgeries that Pluschenko has had to endure so on the whole I’d like him to rein in his competitive streak if he starts to approach that point.  If his health holds and he wants it - that’s his choice.  Sort of wish people could let the news season start before banging on about Beijing but if even the PM is at it .....🤷🏼‍♀️

[yuzuangel]

2 minutes ago, Sombreuil said:

Sort of wish people could let the news season start before banging on about Beijing but if even the PM is at it .....🤷🏼‍♀️

I think after every Olympics, retirements come and the end always feels more imminent, which scares and upsets people. I know I get upset thinking about it. So it's mostly wishful thinking on most of our parts, I guess 

[Sombreuil]

..

[EisElle]

3 hours ago, Moria Polonius said:

Holy scores inflation! Was it really only 8 years ago that the top skaters got 83-84 PCS, they had PCS in low 7s, GOE's almost never reached 3 and very rarely got a 2, and the only +3 element across the board was Lambiel's spin?

 

Is this how stingy judges are going yo be with the new system of GOE?

well to be fair some of those top skaters didn't had many TR, or outstanding SS, or based their interpretation on pointless arm movements... tho some probably got less than they deserved, compared with what we see today...

you don't even have to go that far, tbh, if you think Yuzuru's counter 3A still got 2.14 in Sochi (and iirc even the following season)

As for PCS, up to Sochi I think Patrick was the only one who was consistently scored in 9s (maybe that's why Yuzu's GPF score was a shock for many), even Daisuke T. usually was more in the range mid to high 8 and I'm not even sure he's ever got 90 outside Japan (he got 85 in Nice FS, I haven't checked the GP results) and the other top skaters were stuck at 8 (many PCS around 40 in SP and 80 in FS).

Spoiler

WC2014 everyone minus top 3 were <42 in SP, in FS top 3 got 90-91, then one 86 (Abbott), one 84 (Kozuka), the others all lower.

 

In WC2015 SP one 45, one 44 and one 42, Jason 40. FS top 3 were all <90, Jason 84 and the others lower.

Then from WC2016 you start seeing crazy scores (well, there was Yuzu's 49 in SP that really stood out). I think top scores started getting higher (for some more deservedly than for others) and they kinda lifted the average. There is still a gap between top skaters and the rest but now imo it's easier to see scores ranging from low to high 8 for a larger number of skaters, while before mid to high 8 was quite empty. Tho it's also true some skaters with very good SS, strong PE etc debuted starting 2015-2016...

(side note: LOL Patrick's SS scores in his 2011 WC SP range from 7.75 to 10 which makes me think judges have never been able to judge PCS  )

I expect judges won't be that stingy on +2, +3 next season, but will be super super stingy with +5, despite what GOE bullets say.

And it theory there is no reason to change how PCS are currently scored, but with the new recommendations to avoid mid to high 9 for programs with mistakes, probably scores above 94 will get fewer, so if Yuzuru or Javier (if he competes at Euros) make mistake they're probably going to lose any significant PCS cushion (tho there will still be some cushion between all top skaters and the others)

 

 

RE: Plushy's predictions

Can't he wait a couple seasons before saying Yuzu will go to PC?

Tho I might forgive him if it means Yuzuru will be healthy the whole quad and he'll still be enjoying competitions (meaning: slaying all the quad children with his beautiful jumps and complete package)

(I'm still half-pleased and half-bitter for Plushy's PC prediction, pleased that it came true, bitter that he said Yuzu only needed 4T and 4S and apparently skating gods decided to accept the challenge)

 

Now off to bed, I don't want to miss the twitter storm for Chopin 4.0   new costume   unexpected bis of Dory  new program reaveal

 

[OonsieHui]

I've currently lost track of Yuzu's ice show schedules in the midst of real life (I'm graduating medical school! And my family is here!! And we're travelling around!!!) so I'm sorry if this is all actually already shared in some other thread 

 

But SO MUCH YUZU ON ALJONAS INSTA! 

 

borser interaction! 

https://referencesandrandomness.tumblr.com/post/174883618614/yuzuru-and-brian-at-aljonas-savchenko-instagram

 

What are they doing?? XD

https://myjunkisyuzuruhanyu.tumblr.com/post/174895589113/aliona-and-yuzu-from-alionas-instagram

 

Who is Yuzu skating with??

https://referencesandrandomness.tumblr.com/post/174883681381/from-aljonas-savchenko-instagram-story

 

 

[MrPudding]

 

[skateIT]

New Yuzu pics thanks the the Faoi twitter!

[ruruzest]

Wow ! Congratulation at your great achievement @OonsieHui!