[2025.05.22] Documentary Program by Sports Graphic Number x Lemino

[Wintek]

NumberTV: The point of failure - The reason I looked forward at that time
Episode #21 Yuzuru Hanyu "I want to burn that scene into my mind."

Streaming available from May 22nd to June 18th, 2025
 

Two consecutive Olympic gold medals, four consecutive Grand Prix Final gold medals, two World Championships, and recipient of the People's Honor Award. Yuzuru Hanyu is the greatest figure skater of all time, who has captivated the world with the overwhelming beauty and strength he displays on the ice. Behind this glittering career lies unimaginable suffering and conflict. The closure of his home rink, which he was powerless to prevent, and life in an evacuation shelter after the Great East Japan Earthquake. And the greatest tragedy of his skating career, brought about by a single jump just before the Pyeongchang Olympics, where he was aiming for his second consecutive gold medal. The many struggles and "points of failure" he has faced since childhood, which he has rarely spoken about until now, are revealed in this film. (From Lemino)

 

38-min Interview available on the streaming platform LEMINO.

7-min video showing the beginning of the interview available on Sports Graphic Number official YouTube Channel

[Wintek]

*Machine translation, inaccuracies exist*

2025.05.22

Source: https://number.bunshun.jp/articles/-/865808?page=1

Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250522192623/https://number.bunshun.jp/articles/-/865808?page=1 

PART 1 - "I felt fear, or more precisely, despair," Yuzuru Hanyu opens up about the many times he’s hit rock bottom in his skating life: “I wondered if I had no room left to grow…”

NumberTV, May 22, 2025, 11:07

Text by Takaomi Matsubara; Photos by Kiichi Matsumoto

A childhood without a training environment. And a struggle with injuries. Whatever trials he faced, he continued to overcome them. A special article from the documentary program NumberTV produced by "Sports Graphic Number x Lemino". [First published in Number issue 1120 , now on sale [Talking about his failure point] Yuzuru Hanyu "Even when he was attacked by fear and despair"]

 

Spoiler

“I’ve hit rock bottom more times than I can count.”

With achievements that include back-to-back Olympic gold medals, Yuzuru Hanyu built a dazzling legacy during his competitive years. Now, as a professional figure skater, he continues to shine brighter than ever. His skating life may appear brilliant and graceful from the outside, but Hanyu himself says, “I’ve hit rock bottom again and again and again.”

“There were so many times when I faced situations where I didn’t know if I’d be able to keep skating or not.”

He says the hardest time of all was when he was in elementary school.

“I wasn’t someone who won from the very beginning. As far back as I can remember, I couldn’t win for quite a while after I started skating. The first time I ever won a competition that had ‘All-Japan’ in the name was when I was 9 years old, in fourth grade.”

That competition was the 2004 All-Japan Novice Championships in October. He gave a flawless performance and won the title. Just two months later, he competed in his first international event in Finland—and won again. Looking back, he says, “I was full of confidence.”

“I felt fear, or more precisely, despair.”

That season, he spent every day with complete faith in the bright future ahead. But his path took a sudden, unexpected turn. Right after the Finland competition, the rink in his hometown of Sendai—where he had trained—was forced to close due to financial difficulties. He moved to another club in order to continue skating, but the change in coaches and the much longer commute drastically reduced both his practice time and intensity.

“I was barely managing double Axels and just scraping by with triple jumps, while the other kids around me were suddenly landing triples left and right. I felt myself being left behind. No matter how hard I tried in that limited environment, I just kept slipping backwards. It was frustrating—and it was scary. I started to feel like maybe I had no potential left. Like there was no more room for me to grow. That’s when it turned into despair.”

This darkness, where he couldn’t see a way forward, lasted until October of sixth grade. What helped him bounce back was, once again, his environment. The rink that had closed eventually reopened, allowing him to dedicate himself to training again. Around the same time, he began working with a new coach who was a student of the instructor who had taught him the fundamentals as a child. And suddenly, he began landing triple jumps consistently.

“I realized how important it is to take a step forward and not settle for the status quo. What I’d been taught as a kid—the fundamentals I practiced so thoroughly—connected with who I was at that moment. It also taught me that hard work alone doesn’t always pay off. You need a method that suits you.”

Fighting Injuries

Another experience Hanyu describes as rock bottom was his long battle with injury.

“When you get injured and can’t train, you lose muscle strength. The injured part starts to hurt even more… I never said anything about it, but I’ve had the kind of injuries where you don’t just go back to square one—you fall into the negatives.”

He gives one example: the injury he sustained during official practice at the NHK Trophy in November 2017. It was later announced as a right lateral ankle ligament injury—a serious one.

 

 

*Machine translation, inaccuracies exist*

2025.05.22

Source: https://number.bunshun.jp/articles/-/865809 

Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250522042047/https://number.bunshun.jp/articles/-/865809 

 

PART 2 -Yuzuru Hanyu reflects on a skating life full of rock bottoms—why he never used the word “setback”: “I’m the type of person who can’t live unless I overcome things.”

NumberTV, May 22, 2025, 11:08

Text by Takaomi Matsubara; Photos by Kiichi Matsumoto

The Moment When All Your Hard Work Crumbles

The example he gave was an injury he sustained during an official practice session at the NHK Trophy in November 2017. It was later announced that he had "damaged the lateral ligament of his right ankle." It was a serious injury.

“How should I put it… it felt like everything I’d worked so hard for was collapsing.”

Spoiler

It’s no surprise. Just three months later, the Pyeongchang Olympics were set to take place.

“To be honest, all I could do after that was take each day one step at a time. I couldn’t step on the ice for such a long period, so I had to focus entirely on how I cared for my body—treatment, rehab, recovery methods. I kept trying different things and just concentrated on those. It was tough, feeling my sense of the ice gradually fade away, my strength draining, my body growing weaker. During that time, it was just terrifying to see the results of what jumps the other skaters were doing and what scores they were getting.”

The Word He Never Said: “Setback”

He didn’t resume training on the ice until the new year. The gap was long, and he couldn’t even compete in any lead-up events before the Olympics. But he never gave in to despair. He never gave up.

“Even when I wasn’t sure I’d make the Olympic team, not doing everything I could wasn’t even an option. Maybe the Great East Japan Earthquake had exposed me to sadness and suffering, and so my tolerance threshold, so to speak, was higher than most people's. Or perhaps the struggles I faced in elementary school gave me a kind of immunity to tough situations—like I’d already been trained, mentally, from a young age.”

This led to his second consecutive Olympic victory in Pyeongchang (TN: the original article says Sochi Olympics, a mistake?). And this brings up a striking fact: in interviews, press conferences, and post-competition comments, Hanyu has never once used the word “setback” (挫折, zasetsu)—at least not as far as we know.

“That’s true,” he nods, without hesitation.

And then he continues:

“To me, the word ‘setback’ means that you stop and then it is over. But in my case, I'm the type of person who can't live without overcoming something that I've come up against. So before I even think about calling it a failure, I start thinking about how to overcome it, that’s my opinion.”

He saw rock bottom many times, and each time he was struck with fear and felt as if he was being knocked down. But he never stopped moving forward. Losing his training environment as a child, suffering serious injuries multiple times—he overcame all of it, precisely because he refused to label those moments as setbacks. Yuzuru Hanyu's true worth lies in his strong mental strength, which made him feel that seeing rock bottom was an opportunity to climb back up and grow even further.

 

[Wintek]

*Machine translation, inaccuracies exist*

 

2025.05.22

 

Source: https://lemino.docomo.ne.jp/contents/Y3JpZDovL3BsYWxhLmlwdHZmLmpwL3ZvZC8wMDAwMDAwMDAwXzAwbHhiajZ6Znc=?pit_git_type=PIT

Available for free (using VPN) until June 18, 2025.
 

Machine Translation of NumberTV #21 Yuzuru Hanyu

 

Before you read!!! 

• Machine translation based on very imperfect machine transcription using MS Word dictation. Inaccuracies exist! Use this as a very general reference!

Spoiler

• If possible, watch the video source to consider Yuzu’s body language and intonation. He kept a very serious demeanor when talking about competitions but was light (yet pensive) when talking about some heavy topics.

Translation available on this link:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vSx8skbRmZ5Z4-T58VdFPb36y2W12-O16q0A00U0QdRuMCBlenomEsKpXQ2xhocbn5qOVcH0Yu6d-Lb/pub

 

[yuzurujenn]

*machine translation, inaccuracies exist*

 

2025.05.22

 

Source: Sports Graphic Number 1120: June 2025 issue, pg 68-69

 

Yuzuru Hanyu: "Speaking About the Moments I Hit Rock Bottom"
"Even When Faced With Fear and Despair"

 

As a young boy, he lost access to a training environment. As an athlete, he faced relentless battles with injury. No matter the trials he encountered, Yuzuru Hanyu continued to break through walls. This special feature presents an excerpt from a documentary program produced by our magazine.

 

Text by: Takaomi Matsubara
Photography by: Kiichi Matsumoto
Sports Graphic Number TV | Episode 21

 

Spoiler

With back-to-back Olympic gold medals and a shining competitive career behind him, Yuzuru Hanyu now shines even more brightly as a professional figure skater. While his skating career may appear dazzling on the surface, he himself says, "I've seen rock bottom over and over again."

 

"There were many times when I faced situations where I didn’t know if I’d be able to continue skating."

 

Among those, he says the hardest time was "when I was in elementary school."

 

"To begin with, I wasn’t someone who won from the start. From what I remember, I couldn't win for quite a while after I started skating. But when I was nine, in fourth grade, I entered my first national-level competition and won."

 

That was at the All-Japan Novice Championship in October 2004. After delivering a flawless performance and claiming the title, he went on to win his first international competition in Finland two months later. Reflecting on that time, he says, "I was filled with confidence."

 

It was a season where he believed 100% in the future ahead of him. But unexpectedly, that path took a dark turn. Shortly after the Finland competition, the local rink in his hometown of Sendai, his main training base, was closed due to financial difficulties. Searching for a place where he could continue skating, he joined another club. But with a new coach and a much longer commute, both the quantity and quality of his practice time dropped drastically.

 

"I was barely able to land a double axel or a triple jump, while the other kids around me were nailing triple jumps with ease. I felt like I was being left behind. No matter how hard I worked in those limited conditions, I kept slipping further behind. It was frustrating, and I was scared. I felt a kind of despair, like I had no potential left to grow."

 

This hopeless period lasted until October of his sixth-grade year. What helped him recover was, again, a change in environment. The rink reopened, and he was able to focus more on training. Around the same time, he started working with a coach who had studied under the very teacher who had taught him the basics of skating. From that point, he quickly gained consistency in his triple jumps.

 

"I realized how important it is to take that extra step instead of settling for the current situation. I also felt that the foundational skills I had worked on as a child were finally connecting with who I was then. It’s not just about working hard, it’s about finding the method that suits you."

 

Another major low point he talks about is his battle with injury.

 

"When I got injured and couldn’t train, I lost muscle strength, and the injured area would hurt even more… It wasn’t just starting from zero, it felt like going into the negatives. That’s something I’ve experienced."

 

One example was his injury during official practice at the 2017 NHK Trophy. It was later diagnosed as a lateral ligament injury in his right ankle. It was serious.

 

"I don’t know how to explain it… It was like all the work I’d done just crumbled away in an instant."

 

And no wonder, he was just three months away from the PyeongChang Olympics.

 

"After that, the only thing I could do was keep doing what I could each day. I couldn’t skate for such a long time. So I focused entirely on things like physical therapy, treatment, and rehab. I kept experimenting and finding ways to stay engaged. But losing the feel for the ice and watching my strength fade was hard. Seeing other skaters land jumps and post scores while I was out was nothing but terrifying."

 

“The Word ‘Setback’—A Term He Had Never Used”

 

He only returned to the ice after the new year. The gap in training was long, and he had no opportunity to compete before the Olympics. Still, he didn’t lose hope. He didn’t give up.

 

"Even when I wasn’t sure if I’d be selected for the Olympic team, the idea of not doing what I could wasn’t even on the table. Maybe it was the experience of living through the Great East Japan Earthquake that gave me a higher threshold for pain and sadness. Or maybe the tough experiences I had in elementary school had already trained me mentally. I don’t know, but that’s possible."

 

That resolve led to his second straight Olympic gold. But the story also highlights something striking: as far as can be recalled from his interviews, press conferences, and post-competition comments, Hanyu had never used the word “setback.”

 

"That’s right," he nodded without hesitation, and continued:

 

"In my mind, a setback is when you stop and give up. But in my case, when I hit a wall, I have to get through it. It’s just who I am. Instead of saying I’ve hit a setback, I immediately start thinking about how to overcome it. That’s my approach."

 

He’s seen rock bottom many times. Each time, he’s felt the terror and despair of being crushed. But he’s never stopped. Even when he lost his training base as a boy, even after multiple serious injuries, he kept going. His refusal to label those moments as setbacks is what allowed him to overcome them. His powerful mental strength to turn hitting bottom into an opportunity for further growth is the true essence of Yuzuru Hanyu.

 

To see the full story, including the emotions that surged through him at the PyeongChang rink and his unwavering pursuit of excellence, watch the full episode of “Setback Stories.”