[2018.11.01] Team Brian: A New Journey

[yuzurujenn]

NOTE: Chapter 1 up to Chapter 3.5 are the same from the book "Team Brian: 300-Point Legend." Please check the translation in 2017 thread.

 

 

Info: https://www.amazon.co.jp/チーム・ブライアン-新たな旅-ブライアン・オーサー/dp/4065123666/

https://ebookjapan.yahoo.co.jp/books/497167/

 

 

"I want to experience that overwhelming emotion again and again, the kind that makes my whole body tremble."

After Sochi, Brian Orser, the renowned coach, speaks about Yuzuru Hanyu’s journey up until PyeongChang, including the untold struggles and the path that led to Hanyu’s historic back-to-back victories in men’s singles at the PyeongChang Olympics. This new edition of the book, Team Brian: The 300-Point Legend, has been extensively revised to include these new developments. The author, who knows Hanyu’s journey best, delves into these moments and shares insights on how Evgenia Medvedeva and Jason Brown came to join the team, the new season for Yuzuru Hanyu and the rest of "Team Brian," and the dreams they all shared moving forward.

 

 

Table of Content:

Spoiler

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Road to PyeongChang – 2014-2015 Season

-There's plenty of time to evolve

-The free skate is Yuzuru's choice, but the short program is planned

-The value of the quadruple jump in the second half of the short program

-Yuzuru's worst night at the China Cup

-Deliberately imposing hard training after the injury

-Extreme tension in front of Spanish fans

-Yuzuru’s abdominal surgery

-Winning a world title changes Your life

-Team Brian community 

 

Chapter 2: Two Champions, Two Comrades – 2015-2016 Season

-The awareness of being a top skater

-Aggressive or calm? The quadruple Lutz

-Incorporating two quadruple jumps into the short program

-Important information that was helpful for the PyeongChang Olympics

-Drawing the moment of surpassing 300 points through one's own strength

-Yuzuru battling with himself

-The World Championships, the two skaters' plans

-Secrets to surpassing 300 points: GOE and PCS

-Towards Boston, Worsening Injury

-Yuzuru continues to face challenges
-The night in Boston illuminated by Sinatra

 

Chapter 3: Pre-Olympic Season – 2016-2017 Season

-Choosing music with the Olympics in mind
-Yuzuru's quadruple loop is firstly a form of injury rehabilitation
-A surprisingly low evaluation compared to last season
-Discussions and understanding
-Third time surpassing 300 points
-The Four Continents Championships to get a feel for the Pyeongchang Olympics venue
-Focusing on "rankings" at the World Championships

Chapter 4: PyeongChang Olympics – 2017-2018 Season

-Competing not as a challenger
-Performing the same program but with a more aggressive content
-I must not let Yuzuru’s frustration annoy me
-Bringing back more than just results from the Autumn Classic
-"Their game" and ours
-The biggest crisis between him and Javier
-Yuzuru's serious injury
-The Grand Prix Final without the two champions
-Yuzuru appearing with crutches
-Imagining jumps and spins in the head

-Return to Practice

-Still in rehabilitation on the day of Team Event competition
-The energy that only Yuzuru has
-The first step starts with compulsory figures
-The magma of the heart
-What Happened During the Official Practice the Day Before the Short Program

-It was a real miracle
-Yuzuru and Javier as I had always envisioned
-Yuzuru needed the Olympics
-The calm heart of Javier
-The two with teary eyes
-Olympic moment
-Yuzuru energetically preparing for the ice show
-Questions for Yuzuru

Chapter 5: Evgenia and Jason

-Meeting with Evgenia Medvedeva
-A period of patience for change
-Jason Brown's unexpected joining
-The significance of rule changes
-The challenges for athletes using the quadruple jump as their weapon
-The "plus 5" rule created by Yuzuru 
-Heading to Beijing, the start of a new team
-The athletes are the ones who helped me grow as a coach

 

Afterword by the Author

 

 

 

Up to Chapter 3, "Third Time Surpassing 300 Points," this book is a significantly revised and re-edited version of the book "Team Brian: The 300-point Legend" published in January 2017. Starting from the section "The Four Continents Championship to Feel the Venue of the Pyeongchang Olympics," the content is based on an interview with Coach Brian Orser conducted in July 2018 at the "Toronto Cricket, Skating & Curling Club." The interviewer was Mie Noguchi.

 

Although there were major rule changes starting in the 2018-2019 season, the rules and scores in this book are explained based on the regulations at the time.

[yuzurujenn]

*Machine translation, inaccuracies exist. Please do not reply in this thread.*

 

 

Introduction

 

Spoiler

In life, there are partings, and there are encounters. The year leading up to the PyeongChang Olympics became, for me, a time of losing the person I loved most, while at the same time reaffirming the bonds I shared with the greatest of companions.

 

Ever since Yuzuru (Yuzuru Hanyu) became the first in the world to surpass 300 points in 2015, our Team Brian had become like adventurers traveling an uncharted sea in search of a new frontier. Following Yuzuru, his teammate Javier Fernández of Spain also surpassed 300 points. At that time, only two people on Earth had reached that cloud-high realm of 300. Led by those two, I kept steering our course toward a new horizon beyond the edge of sight. It truly felt like we were living through days that would go down in legend.

 

With less than a year remaining until the PyeongChang Olympics, the calendar had turned to March. The World Championships in the pre-Olympic year serve as a key preview of the coming battle for medals. The athletes approached this competition with fierce determination, and our training base, the Toronto Cricket, Skating & Curling Club, was filled with a powerful, surging energy.

 

I, too, raised my voice to encourage them. “Come on, more speed!” “That jump had great flow!” “Count all eight rotations properly on your spin!” And yet, there was a huge, gaping hole in my heart. My beloved father had passed away.

 

My father had long suffered from Alzheimer’s, and watching over his struggle had been deeply painful. Every Saturday, I would drive to the town north of Toronto where he lived to see him. I tried to spend as much time by his side as possible, staying with him over the weekend, and then early the following week, I would return to coaching my athletes at full energy. That had been my routine.

 

On March 3, 2017, a day I believed our memory-filled days would last forever, my hero passed away. I was left with deep grief and a multitude of emotions I still couldn’t fully process. There was no longer anyone to visit on weekends. I could no longer see his smile, nor hear his jokes… Weekends without my father no longer gave me strength; instead, the time that had been freed up was spent quietly grappling with my sorrow.

 

However, the World Junior Championships were in mid-March, and the World Championships were scheduled for the end of March. I could not let my personal circumstances dampen the athletes’ motivation or cause them worry. So when the new week began, I put on a smile and stood at the rink as if nothing had happened. Of course, this is how working adults live. I had no intention of voicing my weakness to anyone. I believed I hadn’t caused anyone concern.

 

But Yuzuru seemed to notice the change in me. That in itself was rare. He is usually intensely focused on himself during practice, so absorbed in the content of his training, physical condition, and technique that he doesn’t chat with other skaters or take breaks. Yet he would watch my expressions, trying to empathize. Having experienced the Great East Japan Earthquake, perhaps he is especially sensitive to death. In any case, on days when I felt down, his mood seemed to dip with mine, and he would quietly watch me from afar as I let out a sigh. This went on for many days.

 

At first, I thought perhaps I was imagining his sensitivity. I was feeling so low myself that the world looked different than usual. Besides, with the most important World Championships of the pre-Olympic season approaching, Yuzuru and Javier were entirely focused on the competition, and our conversations revolved almost exclusively around that event.

 

For Yuzuru, winning this World Championships and claiming the title of “champion in the year before the Olympics” was crucial. And he did so brilliantly. It was truly something to be proud of. Heading into the Olympics, there could have been no better scenario. Javier finished in fourth place, which was also within our plan. He had won the World Championships in both 2015 and 2016, and a third consecutive victory would have increased the pressure heading into the Olympics. Considering Javier’s tendency to be weighed down by pressure, it was actually better that he didn’t take the title that year, and fourth place was exactly the right result.

 

Both of them were selected for the exhibition gala reserved for top finishers. Normally, I would leave early and not watch the exhibition, but this time I stayed rinkside to watch their performances.

 

Yuzuru’s exhibition number was “Notte Stellata,” a vocal piece based on Saint-Saëns’ The Swan. The program, choreographed by David Wilson of Team Brian, included only a delayed Axel and a triple Axel. It was a mesmerizing program designed to showcase Yuzuru’s beautiful skating to the fullest. The piece depicts a dying swan taking flight once more, and Yuzuru had always skated it with the image of people in disaster-stricken areas regaining their strength. On this day, he performed the swan’s dance more tenderly and beautifully than ever before.

 

Then something astonishing happened. After finishing his performance and returning rinkside, Yuzuru said to me: “I skated thinking about your father.”

 

He had dedicated that performance as a tribute to my father. I was surprised that Yuzuru, usually so reserved, spoke clearly of mourning him. Through that program, he was telling me, “Stay strong.” I, who had not yet fully come to terms with my father’s passing, felt something shift profoundly within me at that very moment.

 

It was our sixth year as coach and student. I had always believed we understood each other and formed the strongest possible partnership, but this was the first time I truly felt that Yuzuru was standing beside me, supporting me.

 

The second Olympics I would experience with Yuzuru was now just ten months away. I resolved in my heart that, no matter what challenges lay ahead, I would move forward alongside him toward the Games. Of course, I could never have imagined the truly intense Olympic season that awaited us. Still, I vowed to support Yuzuru not only as his coach, but also as a friend and as a fellow human being.

 

 

 

[yuzurujenn]

*Machine translation, inaccuracies exist. Please do not reply in this thread.*

 

 

Chapter 3: Pre-Olympic Season – 2016-2017 Season

 

 

3.6 The Four Continents Championships to get a feel for the Pyeongchang Olympics venue

 

Spoiler

For Yuzuru, there were two things he needed to accomplish in the season before the Olympics. One was to win the title at the World Championships the year before the Games. I’ll come back to why that mattered later. The other was to experience the rink at the Olympic venue during the test event held there, specifically the 2017 Four Continents Championships.

 

I myself had already visited the venue during the Korean National Championships, so I had a general sense of what it was like. For Javier, who couldn’t compete at Four Continents, the only thing I could do was pass along my advice. But as the saying goes, seeing is believing, so I wanted Yuzuru to experience the venue firsthand and use that for simulation ahead of the real event.

 

What mattered was getting a feel for the atmosphere in the stands, the sense of distance in the venue, and understanding the kind of environment Team Yuzuru would be dealing with at the PyeongChang Olympics. In Yuzuru’s case, he wouldn’t rely solely on the athletes’ village. He would also have a hotel secured, which would serve as a base for care, meals, and support from the Japanese team. That’s why it was important not just for Yuzuru, but for the whole support team as well, to see the town in advance and get a sense of things like how far the hotel was and what traffic conditions were like.

 

Yuzuru was already an Olympic champion from Sochi, and unquestionably among the very best in the world. That meant that, more than technical preparation, what mattered was mental and psychological readiness—how to deliver in the actual performance. He also does more image training than most athletes before competition. While many skaters think of “warming up” as stretching or light physical exercises, for Yuzuru, the key part of warming up is sharpening his focus and mentally rehearsing the competition. Therefore, it was necessary to check the path from the venue’s gates to the stadium, the layout of the corridors, the location of the locker rooms, which hallways led to the rink, where media interviews would take place, and also to look for suitable spots to warm up away from others.

 

In reality, the Gangneung Ice Arena venue was an excellent facility, and I personally had a very positive impression of it. I wanted Yuzuru to feel the same way: to leave thinking, “All right, I’m going to deliver a great performance here. I can almost hear the crowd already.” Bringing that feeling back with him was the main objective of this Four Continents Championships.

 

Of course, winning is always wonderful at any competition, but this was not a competition where that was necessary. And in a sense, things went according to plan: it was Nathan Chen, not Yuzuru, who won.

 

In fact, Yuzuru has never won the Four Continents Championships. It’s an interesting thing. He’s an Olympic champion, a world champion, and has broken world records multiple times, yet he hasn’t won this event. To me, this shows just how much focus Yuzuru has when it comes to delivering results at truly important competitions.

 

So the advice I gave him for this Four Continents Championships was simple: “Come away with a good impression of the Gangneung Ice Arena.” I didn’t say anything about winning or even about skating well. Yuzuru is an intelligent athlete, so he understood exactly what that meant.

 

The competition itself unfolded in a very interesting way.

 

In the short program, Nathan landed a quadruple Lutz and a quadruple flip to take first place, with Shoma in second. In the free skate, Nathan successfully executed five quadruple jumps and won the competition, scoring over 300 points for the first time in an ISU event. Until then, only Yuzuru and Javier had entered the “300-point world.” Now Nathan had arrived there too. The news that "Nathan landed five quadruple jumps in the free skate" became a new top story in the figure skating world, and the media covered it extensively.

 

But in truth, at this Four Continents Championships, it was Yuzuru’s score that spoke more clearly to "what figure skating really is." Despite a mistake in the short, he scored a solid 97.04 points. In the free skate, he successfully landed four quadruple jumps, scoring 206.67 points. His score was higher than Nathan's, who landed five quadruple jumps. Yuzuru placed third in the short and first in the free, finishing second overall. It was a result that showed how important not just the number of jumps, but their quality and the overall performance truly are.

 

The media tends to focus on the “number of quads.” True, if the outcome were decided solely by the number of quads, it would be easy to understand. As a result, Nathan became the leading favorite for Olympic gold. Javier, who only included two types of quadruple jumps, faded from the spotlight, and Yuzuru was cast as facing a formidable challenge from younger skaters.

 

For us, what mattered was sticking faithfully to the plan we had already made. The media got excited about “Nathan beating Yuzuru a year before the Olympics,” but to me, it wasn’t a concern at all. If anything, I watched calmly as attention focused on a slightly misplaced measure: the number of quadruple jumps.

 

 

3.7 Focusing on "rankings" at the World Championships

 

Spoiler

The most important competition of the 2016–2017 season was the World Championships in Helsinki. Not only was it the culmination of the season, but it was also the most important competition in the four years leading up to the Pyeongchang Olympics. This is because the results of the World Championships in the year before the Olympics have a major impact on an athlete’s mindset during the Olympic season, as well as on media perception and the judges’ impressions. For that reason, more than the performance or the score, the "ranking" was paramount.

 

Yuzuru had to win the World Championships for himself and for his pride. He had won the World Championships once in 2014, but in 2015 and 2016 he earned silver. By claiming the “world’s best” title once more before the Olympics, I wanted him to solidify the mental image that he can win the competitions that matter most.

 

I thought it would be better for Javier to aim for a bronze or something around that. Having won in both 2015 and 2016, a third consecutive victory would have made him the “undisputed three-time World Champion” heading into the Olympics. Everyone would then expect him to take gold, seeing it as a given. That kind of pressure would have been overwhelming. On top of that, as Spain’s first-ever medalist, he would also be carrying the weight of his entire country’s expectations.

 

I myself entered the Olympic season in 1987 as the reigning World Champion, the year before the Olympics. And it was the Calgary Olympics, held in my home country of Canada. For some reason, that season the Canadian team had no reigning World Champions in any other winter sport besides figure skating. There were no Canadian world champions in skiing or hockey that year. Being the only titleholder at a home Olympics, I was under intense scrutiny. Every newspaper, television program, and magazine featured my gold medal prediction as its top story, even surpassing ice hockey and skiing. The pressure was immense.

 

If a similar situation had occurred with Javier, he wouldn’t have been able to enjoy skating. That’s why I thought it would be better for him not to win gold at this World Championships.

 

The result: Yuzuru won, and Javier placed fourth. For us, it was exactly as planned, a perfect outcome.

 

This was, in a way, the “perfect storm” we could prepare for in the year before the Olympics. Let’s call it a carefully prepared chaos. It allowed us to set the perfect foreshadowing for the PyeongChang Olympics for both of them.

 

Of course, even though rankings mattered, it isn’t something we can control. Ultimately, in sports, athletes can only do their best.

 

In reality, there was nothing I needed to tell Yuzuru. He is always a young man who wants to win, and he is smart enough to understand which competitions must be won. Yuzuru wins at the competitions where victory is necessary. That is his ability, his spirit, and it's not something I taught or controlled. Winning when it matters most is his talent, his mentality, and that is what makes him special.

 

Nathan’s result at this competition reflected the current state of figure skating. In the free skate, he attempted six quadruple jumps, landing only two cleanly. Mistakes in both the short and free programs left him in sixth overall. This was a competition where young skaters fought with full courage and ambition to try various quads. It was admirable bravery. But in a major competition where rankings must be prioritized, jumps that are possible in other events suddenly become much more difficult. That pressure can only be understood by those competing under the same circumstances.

 

When I first landed a triple Axel in my career, the media and skating community talked almost exclusively about the jump. I succeeded in practice, and in smaller competitions. But at the World Championships or the Olympics, it became an entirely different jump. Today’s young skaters attempt not just one quad, but five or six. Nathan has mastered the high-level skills needed for quads, yet he could not fully demonstrate them at Worlds.

 

I could deeply empathize with Nathan’s mental state. It was something I had gone through over 30 years ago. At the same time, I had won Olympic gold alongside Yuna and Yuzuru. Over the past three decades, I’ve learned what figure skating is really all about.

 

This World Championship served as a chance to revisit the “art of competing” in figure skating. Competing with a program containing five quads at Worlds or the Olympics is incredibly demanding. The pressure is enormous. To succeed, mental preparation is even more crucial than technical skill. No matter how advanced a skater’s technique, if they don’t have the mental strength to deliver it on the day, the performance remains incomplete.

 

The fact that the focus was solely on the “number of quadruple jumps” made me, after 30 years of thinking about what figure skating truly is, honestly feel that public opinion had lost its way. Team Brian’s plan, however, remained unchanged.

 

The preparations for the PyeongChang Olympics were complete. Technique, results, media perception, rankings—everything. I felt a sense of relief, and at the same time, immense pride that my two students were on such a winning streak heading into the Olympic season. Normally, I would skip the exhibition and return home to oversee other skaters’ lessons. But at the Helsinki World Championships, I made the rare effort to watch both of their performances rinkside.

 

It was then that Yuzuru performed his "Notte Stellata" program beautifully and, after returning to the rinkside, told me, “I skated thinking about your father, Brian.” At the World Championships, everyone is completely focused on themselves. On top of that, this was an important competition for Yuzuru, one he had to win to prepare for the Olympic season. And yet, in the exhibition immediately after that intense event, he was thinking of my father, who had passed away just that March. I had tried to hide my grief in front of the skaters, but Yuzuru still noticed and cared about my feelings.

 

Yuzuru is a strong, young, and energetic athlete. But I realized he is also someone who can empathize with the delicate feelings of those who are grieving. Through his support, my impression of him changed profoundly. As a coach, I often only see his strength, but in reality, he possesses deep compassion and a sensitive nature, and that is exactly why he can perform so beautifully.

 

My father's death, the excitement of the upcoming Olympics, and Yuzuru’s affection—all these emotions mixed together, filling my heart with overwhelming feelings. Little did I know the trials that still lay ahead.

 

[yuzurujenn]

*Machine translation, inaccuracies exist. Please do not reply in this thread.*

 

 

Chapter 4: PyeongChang Olympics – 2017-2018 Season

 

 

4.1 Competing not as a challenger

 

 

Spoiler

The off-season leading up to the PyeongChang Olympics felt completely different from both the off-seasons before the Vancouver Games eight years earlier with Yuna, and before the Sochi Games four years earlier with Yuzuru and Javier. Until now, it had always been a battle as a “challenger aiming for the Olympic gold medal,” competing in the presence of rivals. But this time, none of the usual assumptions or approaches applied. For me as a coach as well, it was a new kind of challenge.

 

There was no doubt that the PyeongChang Olympics would center on Yuzuru and Javier as the central figures. Over the past four years, the World Champion title had been won twice by Yuzuru and twice by Javier. No matter how much younger skaters were rising, these two were still the ones who drew the spotlight as the main characters. The media was hyping up the rise of younger talent as news, but considering their experience and consistency, I was convinced that only Yuzuru and Javier truly had a realistic chance of winning in PyeongChang.

 

So how would these two World Champions approach the PyeongChang Olympics? The first key point was program selection. Because they are completely different in personality, the process of choosing their programs was naturally different as well.

 

First, regarding Yuzuru’s competitive music: at the end of the previous season, I had already decided that I would leave the music selection entirely up to him. This was because, at the moment we began discussing the Olympic season, Yuzuru said to me:

 

“Brian never goes against what I decide, and he always trusts me and my choices. He never doubts my decisions. That’s why I want to think for myself and decide how I’m going to compete.”

 

In fact, over the six years we worked together, Yuzuru had made most of the decisions regarding music selection, costumes, and even what kind of jumps he wanted to perform. I always accepted that, because that was simply his way of doing things. He is not the type who responds well to being told what to do. He wants to work hard on what he has chosen himself.

 

It’s like when a parent tells a child “you should study,” and it has the opposite effect. There is no need to say to Yuzuru, “use this music” or “do this jump.” What matters is quietly offering advice when his direction seems off, and helping create an environment where his efforts are properly recognized by those around him. The most important thing is to support him from the background. If I could provide the mental support for Yuzuru as he devoted himself wholeheartedly to his work, that would be enough.

 

 

4.2 Performing the same program but with a more aggressive content

 

Spoiler

First, for the short program, Yuzuru was thinking of going back to Chopin’s “Ballade No. 1,” which he had used two seasons earlier. In an Olympic season under intense pressure, it is standard practice to reuse the short program you are most confident in. Even at the Sochi Olympics four years earlier, he had performed the same short program as the previous season, “Parisienne Walkways,” and went on to break the world record. It was a program in which he could reliably deliver his best. This time as well, no one objected to using Chopin again.

 

For the free skate, Yuzuru had already made up his mind to bring back “SEIMEI,” which he had used two seasons prior. It is a program themed around Japanese aesthetics, representing Yuzuru’s unique worldview. Both Yuzuru and I had long felt that there was no better program.

 

In other words, there were no new programs. There was a possibility that this would spark mixed opinions. Some people might even criticize it, saying that the world champion was playing it safe. However, I fully trusted Yuzuru’s decision. There was no way he was choosing these music pieces with a “defensive” mindset. For Yuzuru, these two were simply the strongest weapons, programs that gave him the greatest chance of victory and the confidence to skate aggressively.

 

What mattered most was making sure the media and the fans understood that this was the correct choice. We had to clearly communicate to others outside ourselves that our decision was not wrong.

 

If this had been Javier, I would have objected. If Javier had said, “I want to use past programs for both short and free,” I would have said, “Hold on, what do you mean by that? Are you slacking off?” and we would have discussed it seriously. With Javier, we were deeply involved in selecting program music and costumes, and in shaping the overall direction. He is someone who gets bored easily, so freshness is what fuels his motivation.

 

But Yuzuru is the type who deeply studies a single thing and refines it endlessly. Even if he skates to the same music for years, he never gets bored, and he can continue evolving it. He is not someone who loses interest just because the short and free use the same music.

 

He fully understands both what he is doing and how others perceive him. When Yuzuru makes a decision, it is always carefully thought through. That’s why I thought repeating the two programs was a very smart choice.

 

Through six years of working with him, I had also learned when to speak and when to step back. What I learned most clearly was that when he makes his own decisions, he is capable of producing explosive performances.

 

For that reason, the timing of the announcements was carefully decided by Yuzuru himself. The short program was announced at the ice show in May, and the free skate was announced at the public practice session in August.

 

The important moment was the public practice in August. In reality, even though it was the same music, the content was completely different from two years earlier. Back then, he had set a world record with two types of quadruple jumps, but since then Yuzuru had added the quadruple loop and was also attempting the quadruple lutz. He was even considering increasing the total number of jumping passes beyond three.

When the types of jumps change, the entry and approach trajectories also change, which means the choreography has to change as well. Even the breathing rhythm, the skater’s mindset, and the emotional emphasis within the program all shift dramatically. So it wasn’t enough to simply announce, “we are using the same music for the Olympic season.” We had to create the impression that, “the Olympic season programs are going to be this aggressively constructed.”

 

Yuzuru trained extremely hard for that public practice. That one skate would shape how the media viewed his whole season. To give the impression that he had improved since two years earlier and was entering the season with momentum, he needed to be landing those jumps successfully already by August.

 

In the actual public practice, Yuzuru delivered an outstanding performance. The Japanese media did not criticize the decision to reuse the music at all. On the contrary, the introduction of the quadruple lutz for the Olympic season became the headline. The narrative shifted toward: “His jump content is now on par with the younger skaters. Therefore, with his superior skating and performance quality, Yuzuru has the advantage.”

 

 

4.3 I must not become frustrated by Yuzuru’s frustration

 

Spoiler

However, I had one concern. The quadruple lutz.

 

I was remembering the previous season. The days it took for Yuzuru to master and successfully land the quadruple loop were filled with difficulties that cannot be described in a single phrase. As younger skaters around the world began attempting new quadruple jumps, Yuzuru became determined to land the quad loop as well. But it was a difficult jump that no one in the world had yet successfully landed in competition. Although he eventually learned to execute the quad loop itself, it is not something as simple as successfully landing loop, salchow, and toe loop quads all within a program. Because of repeated mistakes in practice, Yuzuru was often visibly frustrated on the ice. Unable to perform as he intended, he would show a very strained expression during training, to the point where no one could even approach him. It was easy to imagine that once he began training the quadruple lutz, he would fall into exactly the same state.

 

In other words, my concern with the quadruple lutz was that Yuzuru would become consumed by anxiety and a kind of fear. Ideally, he should be balancing practice of other quadruple jumps, steps, and the program as a whole—but once he starts working on the lutz, it becomes as if nothing in the world exists except that one jump. His extreme level of concentration was my only real worry.

 

Yuzuru is extremely competitive. So when he sees Nathan or Shoma attempting quad lutzes or quad flips, he wants to try them too. That strong ambition is precisely what makes him so strong, so it is not a bad thing in itself. As an athlete, being competitive is an advantage.

 

However, from a coach’s calm perspective, if the goal is to become world champion or Olympic champion, it is actually wiser to compete with only two types of quads—the toe loop and the salchow. Considering the rules, the success rate, the quality of execution, and the overall completeness of the program, two quads is the more reliable path to victory. That is why I was quite nervous about introducing a new element like the quad lutz in an Olympic season.

 

The quad loop he worked on the previous season was relatively smooth to learn, partly because he already had a strong triple loop. But the lutz was not so easy. In fact, there were many days when he simply could not land it, and he grew increasingly frustrated. Watching him train like that even made me feel irritated myself.

 

To be honest, I did not want to see him practicing while so visibly frustrated. I wanted to ease that frustration, to solve it somehow. As a coach—and also as a friend—I wished he could enjoy skating a little more.

 

In the middle of these emotionally tense days, I realized, “I’m just repeating last year.” The fact that I disliked seeing his frustration was my own issue. For Yuzuru, even being in a state of struggle was acceptable. That is something I learned over the six years I worked with him.

 

He is the kind of athlete who can only move forward by suffering through it. He takes on difficult challenges, blames himself, becomes disappointed in himself, feels anxious thinking about his rivals, and practices with intense concentration while frustrated. Day after day, he experiences setbacks and wonders, “Why am I even doing this?” He feels frustration, yet never leaves the rink midway. He keeps working. He jumps, and jumps, and keeps jumping. The reason he has continued to grow without limits is precisely because he has always trained in this way. He did not improve by smiling and enjoying practice. So if the challenge makes him frustrated, then even those frustrated days are part of the process he accepts.

 

The quadruple lutz was the impulse he needed to move forward at that time. It drove him, almost obsessively, to practice.

 

This is a completely different approach from Javier. Javier only practices the quad loop on days when he is in very good condition. Landing it in practice makes him feel capable and confident, and it boosts his motivation. But on bad days, he does not attempt it. He does not try to place himself in the same kind of difficult emotional state as Yuzuru. He is happy with his excellent toe loop and salchow, and he becomes stronger by staying happy and enjoying his programs every day. Happiness is his source of power. So if Javier was in a slump, I would tell him, “On days like this, pushing too hard won’t help—go home early and clear your mind.” Most skaters need this kind of calm advice from a coach.

 

But Yuzuru was different from any other skater. I tried to understand him. Honestly, as a coach, it is difficult to simply “leave an athlete who is struggling alone,” but I considered this his challenge and forced myself to hold back. In the end, he had to find his own solution if he was going to reach happiness.

 

What I learned most over those six years was precisely how to deal with Yuzuru. I must not become frustrated by his frustration. I had to let him experience the process of frustration, confusion, reflection, and resolution himself. That was his way. Watching him struggle without intervening was painful as a coach, but I believed that was exactly what would make him stronger, and so I endured it.

 

In fact, I myself had been very similar during my competitive career. When I thought about the triple axel, my mind would become completely consumed by it. On bad days, I would be overwhelmed by fear and would practice it day after day. Those difficult training days later became confidence, allowing me to perform well in competition and feel a great sense of achievement when I succeeded. Of course, I also made sure to take proper breaks, go out with friends, and reset my mind. In that sense, Yuzuru is even more singularly focused on skating than I ever was. That is precisely why I felt I understood him—and at the same time, why I kept thinking he might be focusing on the lutz too much. To be honest, I was genuinely worried.