Some Random Thoughts After Studying Yuzuru for 3 Months

[databeej2w]

So, I’ve only known Yuzuru Hanyu for three months. Honestly, I missed his entire competitive career because I was a working mom with two kids (born in 2015 and 2018), and life was just crazy busy. My days were all about work and babysitting, and I barely had any time for myself until my kids started school. 

 

I’d heard his name before, but I just thought, “Oh, must be another good-looking skater who has a ton of fangirls.” I never bothered to check him out until one day I watched a few intro videos about him on YouTube after the 2026 Olympics. And wow, I was completely shook by how much he’s accomplished and just how young he was when he did it! I felt kinda embarrassed for myself, comparing what I’ve done in the last 16 years to his record. Sure, fan videos might hype him up, but what really blew my mind was the wisdom he showed in interviews—especially the “Olympics is Never Fun to Me” one (link).

 

Anyway, I ended up buying all 4 volumes of his biography (in Traditional Chinese), hoping to figure out how he's so successful, how he stays motivated after reaching the top, how he handles challenges—basically, I wanted to see what makes him tick. At that point, I was way more interested in his life story than his skating, tbh.

 

Here are just some random things that stood out after a month of “studying” him:

1. Most celebs write their biographies after they’ve lived a lifetime, but Yuzuru published his first one when he was just 17 and a half. Which is kind of insane.
2. He is human most of the time, (though occasionally he is not)
3. He has made tons of mistakes, had setbacks and failures. When I mess up, I hide. When things go wrong, I bail out. I don’t have the guts to keep trying. But he actually uses mistakes and regrets as fuel to push himself further.
4. I can’t believe how many interviews he does—even about his mistakes. He could have chosen privacy and avoided scrutiny, but he spoke openly even about his regrets. In his biography, he’s frustrated with his mistakes, but never dismisses the entire experience. After listing his errors, he also outlines the parts he handled well and the lessons learned.
5. He’s so grateful for everything, big or small—his skates, the ice, his coaches, teammates, just everything. Not just out of politeness, but wholeheartedly. It’s almost unbelievable that someone with such a pure, noble soul exists. Honestly, his sheer existence makes the world better.
6. He does what he says, says what he means. No pretending, no drama. Just authenticity and determination. Almost unreal!
7. There was this interview where he was asked how his parents raised him (because Japanese moms are obsessed with figuring out how to raise their kids like Yuzu). Honestly, it felt like a trick question—he was only 19 or 20! But he just said, “Everyone is unique, has their strengths and weaknesses. I have weaknesses, too. Look at the strengths, not the weaknesses in your kids.” That’s the perfect answer. And it’s not just talk; he REALLY lives by that. I am sure people around him are not all pleasant. He recognizes and appreciates their merits, so he gets along well with everyone. 
    

Those were my thoughts after month one. I was maybe naive, but his story made me feel like I could step up too if I learned from him. He was my role model, though he is 14 years younger.

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Then things kind of changed.

The more I learned, the sadder I got instead of feeling inspired.
I try not to get into those “underscoring” debates—honestly, it’s pretty discouraging if it’s true.
I don’t want to believe someone pushed him away from the sport he literally poured his life into.

It just rocked my belief that working hard and being nice means the world will treat you kindly in return… I wish it were true, but it’s clearly not.

I watched most of his competitions and started to understand figure skating a bit more.
He only skated clean maybe less than 20% of the time.
That’s because he kept raising the difficulty level, always pushing himself. Making two mistakes would cost 20-30 points easily.

But still, whenever he actually nailed a clean performance, he basically broke the world record.
From 2013 to 2018, he always managed to make a comeback with a big win after setbacks.
But between 2019 and 2022, that didn’t happen.
I kept telling myself, “No one’s actually against him—the real enemies are age and injury.”
He can’t push his limits forever; that’s just how it is for athletes. Sooner or later, he has to retire from competition. When he reaches 40 or 50, he as to retire from performance as well, just like Brian Orser, Plushenko, Kurt Browning, and Johnny Weir. It’s sad, but I gotta accept it.

I also told myself, the change of scoring in 2018 is not against him, since IJS 1.0 also heavily rewards quads over spins or choreography.
Nathan could do two more quads than Yuzu, which gave him a 10–20 point lead.
Yuzuru had to be perfect elsewhere to even catch up, which is really tough.
He never landed two clean programs head-to-head against Nathan after 2018.

The scoring system isn’t perfect, but I get why they use it—it’s more objective to tally up jumps than argue about choreography.
And even if judges gave him weirdly low GOEs, the system tosses out the highest and lowest to reduce bias.

When he skated clean, he still got high scores. I didn't see evidence of huge underscoring, at least not big enough to change the results. 

 

What I overlooked at first is that he was actually shocked by his results at GPF and JNats 2019, lost his confidence, and switched back to old programs (Chopin and Seimei).
He said in his biography by 2020 that he realized he couldn't get higher PCS, no matter how much he improved.
Honestly, I don’t get why he seemed so discouraged, since a 0.74 points difference in PCS (48.40 in 4CC 2020 vs. 49.14 in GPF 2015) wasn’t enough to beat Nathan’s technical scores anyway.

But then, I finally got it — Nathan’s PCS was insanely high, even greater than Yuzu (e.g., 95.78 for Nathan and 93.64 for Yuzu in GPF19).  It was like he couldn’t beat Nathan on PCS or GOE. The only way left was to raise the base value. So he changed his goal; he tried to redeem himself by challenging 4A. OMG. 

 

Nathan's PCS really puzzled me. For example, Nathan had a PCS of 97.22 at the 2022 Olympics, higher than Yuzu’s 97.08 at Worlds 2017. His FS in the 2022 Olympics is definitely not comparable to H&L in Worlds 2017. What's wrong?

I’m definitely not a skating expert, but a program with PCS of 97.22 should be so mind-blowing even casual fans should go “wow, that’s perfect.” But I can see many places to improve, so why do judges think it’s flawless? Are there “Picasso on Ice” that only judges can see and general people are too dumb to appreciate?
At that point, I am convinced the scoring was problematic. 

 

Nonetheless, though problematic, none of the over/underscoring was big enough to change the results of the competition.
Why risk the sport’s credibility by favoring anyone? Is Nathan really so much better in both technical and artistic aspects? I’m confused. Even with fair judging, Nathan would still be hard to beat, but not totally impossible. Maybe he wouldn’t have felt so desperate, risking his health to challenge 4A? At least, he would feel that his improvement in skating skills got recognized?

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Despite all that, Yuzu didn't become cynical but remained kind to the world and cordial to everyone. He congratulated Shoma genuinely, not just for show; he was truly happy for him, knowing Shoma had gone through a tough year. He didn't collapse and moved on to complete the Gala and the MOI as planned. One could barely notice his frustration and desperation.

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I honestly have no idea how to wrap this up. There’s no happy ending, and I can’t find any meaning in it. I don't know how he felt about the 4 years now. Losing the gold in 1988 haunted Brian Orser for decades. For over 10 years, Brian couldn't watch his own FS in the 1988 Olympics. I don't know if the same feeling haunted him, but I was haunted by many **What if** thoughts in the past few weeks. I really need to get them off my chest by posting them here.

Many fans must have gone through a similar process 4 years ago, and hence, my post probably adds no new value to the world
Thanks for reading and letting me vent.

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BTW, Yuzu is so productive. Look at how many shows he created in the past 4 years. He is still unbelievable. 

[yuzurujenn]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. Like you, I also came to know and admire Yuzu more for his wisdom first than skating (which is also great obviously!).

 

I started following in 2022, and with what happened at Beijing Olympics, I was quickly fed with lots of information about scoring and judging bias. What I learned that year was that you can’t really base your views solely on “clean” skates. Judging involves multiple criteria, and every small detail adds up. Yuzu understood he was being unfairly scored in his last quad (post-2018). Of course he didn't mention it outright in public and always gave politically correct responses, but there were hints that he was unhappy.

1. He did his graduation thesis around "solving" judging problems ("A Feasibility Study on Utilization in Figure Skating by A Wireless Inertia Sensor Motion Capture System" - Yuzuru Hanyu – 20210318).

2. In a 2020 interview, he said the sport felt different now and wasn’t the kind of sport he used to fall in love with when he was young and had pursued for years.

3. He didn’t switch back to Chopin/Seimei in 2020 because he lost confidence. In fact, he did it to prove a point. He delivered arguably the best Chopin of his competitive career, yet the scores still didn’t reflect his skills (yes it was WR but it still should have been higher). He didn’t even look happy in the K&C because at that moment he realized that all his efforts were ultimately futile.

4. In an interview after his retirement presscon, he said he constantly felt like he had been placed on a train with a predetermined destination, almost like a puppet (i.e. being told he's not needed anymore)

5. In some of the recent radio talk on his Youtube membership, he also brought up scoring frustrations from his competitive days and the extra long wait for his scores to show up compared to others (as if the panel was trying to nitpick every detail of his performance)

 

By the way, I have to make this clear. Yuzu did not train the 4A to redeem himself. The 4A had always been a childhood dream of his (there was footage of him mentioning it when he was 9 or 12). After winning in Pyeongchang, he immediately said his next challenge was the 4A.

 

 

 

A lot of Western narratives tried to paint fanyus as obsessive or delusional because they were very vocal about these issues. They didn’t like being proven wrong or having it pointed out that their American favorite was relatively average outside of jump content. Landing jumps is one thing, but there are six bullet points that determine GOE and judges are often not fully objective and also influenced by bias. Score manipulation has existed in this sport for years. There were judges who actually got penalized, skating officials who dared to speak up before, and even the legendary Dick Button had talked about the corruption.

 

Did you know the scoring rule changed in 2018 because then ISU VP Lakernik didn't like that Yuzu kept dominating the sport? It was in the news, what he said. Also, the BV difference between Yuzu and Nathan was never actually that huge. If PCS had been scored more fairly and consistently, the gap between them would have been pretty close given that Yuzu was clearly superior in skating skills, interpretation, transitions, and overall performance quality.

 

If you're interested, you need to read up on Martina's posts about these scoring issues. She has published detailed analyses of those judging biases on her website over the years. Some examples:

https://sportlandiamartina.link/2022/02/27/from-3-3-to-5-5/

https://sportlandiamartina.link/national-bias/

https://sportlandiamartina.link/2021/04/11/yuzuru-hanyus-world-records-bv-goe-and-pcs/

 

 

And try to go through these threads to understand why there shouldn't be such a gap between Yuzu and Nathan's scores:

 

 

 

 

 

To quote a friend on the mental effect:

Quote

 When you're regularly overscored, you grow more and more confident making you likelier to skate clean. When you're regularly underscored, you grow more and more stressed and desperate and likelier to make mistakes. After all how would you feel taking your starting position knowing you have to be foot perfect to get 90% of what you deserve? And your rival will be cushioned and rewarded 120% of what they deserve as long as they stay on their feet? It's as if 1 runner was allowed to start the race 5m ahead of you. And you can't simplify your programs' non-jump content like them because you'll lose PCS for that, they don't. For them it's "they're still young, they can improve SS later." Would you enjoy knowing you had to work hard and improve first to get the great component scores, while watching someone else get to enjoy the great scores first and optionally but not necessarily improve later?

 

 

 

Well, in the end, Yuzu is happier now than ever in his professional career. He has found the best team with the right mindset, and together they continue to expand his creative vision while giving us top-quality skating performances and entertainment.  

[Martina]

Hi,
I completely understand the difficulties of being a working mother. My daughters were born in 2006 and 2009, so I missed the first part of Yuzu's competitive career.
The fandom is huge, and there are certainly people who follow him for his looks. But most of us follow him for what he can do on the ice—because we've never seen a skater like him—and for what he does off the ice. For his intelligence, his sensitivity, and the way he faces every challenge.
He wrote his first biography when he was 17 because he wanted to help his rink, so much so that he always donated royalties to the rink, and this although at that time he had no sponsors, and training was very expensive, expecially when he moved to Canada.
It's true, he made a lot of mistakes, but he always managed to learn from them. This is one of the characteristics that allowed him to win everything he won.
He's truly grateful for everything. He certainly had an extraordinary character to begin with, and his parents certainly gave him a great upbringing, but I think the earthquake played a fundamental role. He knows he could have died at 16. He's never forgotten that. He's never forgotten the difficulties of that period, nor that, compared to many others, he was lucky because none of his loved ones died. This helps him put things in perspective: he can't take for granted that what he has now he'll still have in a few minutes, be it his house, destroyed by the earthquake, his rink, which he lost in 2004 and again in 2011, or anything else. So he's grateful for what he has.
He's not just a role model for you. He is for so many other people. Age doesn't matter. I'm older than you, I've followed him for years, and I continue to be amazed and to admire him for what he does.

[Martina]

I'll touch on a few of the points you mentioned, but I'm not entirely exhaustive.
Regarding the score, it's a long discussion. I remember the 2019 World Championships, the disappointment with the result, but also the lack of understanding. He'd missed a jump in the short program, but even so, I didn't understand how he could have lost. Then I started reading comments from people criticizing the result.
Were they just disappointed fans, or was there some truth in what they were writing? I wanted to understand, so I started studying.
It's true, he often made mistakes. No one denies that. But the score is made up of so many things. The base value, and Chen's was higher. The grade of execution, and the elements Yuzu performed correctly, were never comparable with Chen's. Most of Yuzu's elements, executed correctly, deserved a +5. Chen made few mistakes, but the quality wasn't great. His scores were too high. The same goes for the components. Yuzu always deserved top marks for quality and complexity. Even in his worst programs, he was still superior to the best Chen.
The fact that the highest and lowest scores are excluded from the average slightly reduces the risk of a single judge manipulating the score, but even a single judge can be decisive when the gaps are small. And there are so many things that come into play and influence the judges, including the belief that Yuzu was "old" and therefore no longer in top condition.
The +5/-5 system is much more manipulable than the +3/-3 system, and that played its part.
As for 4A, Yuzurujenn already answered, it was a childhood dream of him, and immediately after winning in PyeongChang he said that was his goal, so the choice to focus on 4A had nothing to do with scores. He had already won everything, he just needed a new challenge, that's all.
Yuzu has never been one to get discouraged by a negative result. Frustration, yes, a lot. But he always thought he could win; he just had to practice more, perfect his skating. Until he realized the scores were assigned arbitrarily, this was discouraging. The knowledge that, no matter what he did, they wouldn't allow him to win. Skating with this knowledge also increases tension, making it easier to make mistakes.
There's a happy ending, if we want to see it. It's up to us. Yuzu is still the only skater to have won two Olympic gold medals in the men's event since 1952. In Beijing, he showed that we can be struck by bad luck—the hole in the ice and the sprained ankle—but we can still continue to do our best. We can still chase our dreams. And if we can't achieve what we dreamed of, we can set ourselves a new goal and work toward it, like Yuzu did when he skated a perfect Rondo during Gift.