[20241207] Nikkan Sports - Celebrating his 30th birthday. Yuzuru Hanyu Interview

[yuzurujenn]

*Machine translation. Inaccuracies exist*

 

 

 2024.12.07

 

Source: (paid article, only partially translated)

P1 https://www.nikkansports.com/premium/sports/figure/news/202412030000592.html
P2 https://www.nikkansports.com/premium/sports/figure/news/202412050000738.html

CN translation: https://weibo.com/3406979710/P4JkznZdR

 

 

Part 1: [Celebrating 30 years old] Yuzuru Hanyu interview: "You can definitely get better in your 30s" Birthday

 

Figure skater Yuzuru Hanyu, who achieved back-to-back gold medals in the Winter Olympics, celebrates his 30th birthday today, the 7th, and is kicking off his nationwide ice show tour "Echoes of Life."

 

This is the third installment of the "Yuzuru Hanyu ICE STORY" series, where he performs solo and serves as the creative director. The tour begins at Saitama Super Arena and will continue through seven performances in three cities until February next year, weaving a unique story. In a recent exclusive interview, he discussed the progress and changes he has experienced as an athlete in his third year as a professional. (Honorifics omitted hereafter.)

 

Spoiler

At age 19, he won an Olympic gold medal in figure skating. At age 23, he became the first Asian to win two consecutive titles. At age 27, he turned professional. Hanyu, the rare skater who became the youngest individual recipient of the People's Honor Award, has just celebrated his 30th birthday.

 

"It hasn't changed. Human DNA inevitably gets damaged with age, but I believe the body can change in both positive and negative directions. I want to find the positive direction. There are definitely things now that I can feel, which I couldn't feel when I was in my teens. I’m certain I can get better in my 30s. Of course, compared to my teens, the recovery cycle, the way I handle tension and pressure, the development of my muscles, all those things have changed. But by thinking about how to care for myself and listening to my body, I want to live every day with the belief that I’ve definitely gotten better than I was before, and that I can improve compared to yesterday."

 

He has proven progress through his own actions. During his competitive days, in extreme terms, the short program (SP) was 2 minutes and 40 seconds, and the free program was 4 minutes, with only one performance per day. Now, he performs shows on his own that last anywhere from 90 to 150 minutes.

 

"For example, in the 'RE_PRAY TOUR' (the second tour from a year ago), after about 40 minutes into the first half of the 50-minute section, I perform a quadruple jump. By then, I’m already exhausted... but practicing to be able to perform under those conditions is essential."

 

 

Part 2: [Celebrating his 30th birthday] Yuzuru Hanyu interview: "Studying with my own body" - The evolution of his athletic side

 

In the second part of the solo interview, he looks back on his progress in his third year as a professional and shares his impressions of watching the Paris Olympics this summer.

 

Spoiler

--Two years have passed since your declaration of intent on July 19, 2022, and you’ve entered your third year as a professional. Looking back, from an athlete’s perspective, are there any areas where you feel you've grown or improved, in terms of measurable progress?

"I’ve definitely built a lot of physical strength. Plus, I’ve been able to think through everything. Whether it’s jumping or expression, I constantly think about how I need to move while continuing the performance. But as you think more, you inevitably lose oxygen. Thinking is an exhausting task, right? So, I’ve been practicing to the point where I can reduce that mental load. As a result, I feel like the quality of my performance has improved as well."

 

--Over the past two years, you’ve essentially been doing all the thinking for yourself.

"Yes, that's right. I've really been thinking things through on my own. It’s tough, but because I’m thinking, I feel a sense of conviction when it comes to my body. For example, if I were just given everything—like the practice methods, for instance—without having the time to really think, I’d end up doing it every day without questioning whether it’s the right thing for me. In that case, it feels like the only thing I can remember is what I'm taught."

 

 

(CN partial translation)

Spoiler

Although human DNA inevitably experiences damage as we age, I believe the body can change in both positive and negative directions. I hope to find the path toward the positive. There were things I couldn’t feel in my teens that I hope to experience now, and in my 30s, I definitely want to become stronger. Compared to when I was a teenager, my recovery time, my way of handling tension and stress, and my muscle mass have all changed. While thinking about how to take care of myself, I also want to listen to my body’s feedback and make sure I perform better than before and improve compared to yesterday. I want to live each day with that mindset.

 

(Leading up to the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics, where I achieved back-to-back golds, I focused on enhancing oxidative energy metabolism. After exhausting myself with high-difficulty jumps and various exercises like combining music with skating, I would spend another 30 minutes skating about 80 laps of the rink, which is roughly 11 kilometers.)

At that time, I was doing this 30-minute session of continuous skating to improve my fitness and metabolism. Nowadays, it takes about an hour and a half just to perform the entire program for the ice shows (laughs). I really value comprehensive practice, and just from that, I can feel that my physical condition has improved and evolved.

 

(Practice)

I absolutely have to spend more than three hours. On days when I can only spare three hours, I’m not even sure if I can manage to complete all of my training in that limited time. Besides that, I also need to allocate time for exercises to build a strong foundation, and for strength and explosiveness necessary for long skating sessions. Therefore, my time for off-ice and on-ice practice has also increased. I’m also responsible for designing the structure of my performances, and to ensure the quality of the show, I need to make sure I also have enough rest time… It’s really not easy (laughs).

 

I’ve been taught by my coaches in the past, but gradually I’ve moved away from them. Since the pandemic (when I moved my training base from Canada back to Japan), I’ve been practicing on my own. If I don’t acquire knowledge, I can’t win or I’ll get weaker, so I’ve done a lot of research myself, including about myself. When I was younger, I only learned about figure skating, but now, through self-study, I’ve been looking into the training methods of top athletes in other sports, keeping an eye on developments in sports science, and so on. Recently, I’ve been referencing sports like basketball while thinking about acceleration, stopping, and jumping, and repeating these ideas.

 

The scientific knowledge in figure skating is inherently lacking, and since it’s a niche sport (in terms of competitive numbers, etc.), measuring a sport performed on an ice rink that is 60 meters long and 30 meters wide is also difficult. So I try to use my (Olympic back-to-back victory) experience as a reference, practicing and seeing if I can find causal relationships through repeated trials. At the same time, I remind myself that if I set the right goals from the start, created a plan, and followed the steps in order, I would definitely reach my desired outcome.