[2026.08.08] Sportiva: Journey of Japanese Figure Skaters - Yuzuru Hanyu

[yuzurujenn]

*machine translation, inaccuracies exist*

 

 

2026.08.08

 

Source: https://sportiva.shueisha.co.jp/clm/othersports/figure/2026/08/08/post_49/

Archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20260808131322/https://sportiva.shueisha.co.jp/clm/othersports/figure/2026/08/08/post_49/

 

 

The desire to "do something for someone else" that awakened Yuzuru Hanyu: The path to the remarkable achievement of winning two consecutive Olympic gold medals.

 

[Series: The Journey of Japanese Figure Skaters]
Final Installment: Yuzuru Hanyu

 

Part 1:

 

Spoiler

At the Milano-Cortina Olympics held this February, Japan’s figure skaters won a record six medals, including the team event. This remarkable achievement was undoubtedly made possible by the accomplishments and struggles of the Japanese figure skaters who came before them.

 

This final installment (the 14th in the series) of our look back at Japanese figure skaters who have competed from the 2002 Salt Lake City Games to the 2022 Beijing Games, focuses on the career of Yuzuru Hanyu, who has achieved numerous milestones, including winning consecutive gold medals at the 2014 Sochi Olympics and the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics. The first part tells the story of how he rose from his junior days to the pinnacle of the sport.

 

The Undefeated Boy Was Different in His ‘Movement’

 

The 2009–10 season was Yuzuru Hanyu’s second season in the junior category. He won consecutive victories at the Junior Grand Prix events in Poland and Croatia, and at his first-ever Junior Grand Prix Final, he became the youngest-ever winner at the age of 14. Then, at the World Junior Championships in March 2010, he became the first Japanese male skater to win the title while still in junior high school. This undefeated boy, Yuzuru Hanyu, made his senior debut in the 2010–11 season, when he entered high school.

 

At the time, Japan’s men’s figure skating scene was exceptionally strong, with skaters such as Daisuke Takahashi, Nobunari Oda, and Takahiko Kozuka competing at the highest level in the world, all of whom had competed at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. Against this backdrop, Hanyu finished fourth at his first senior Grand Prix event, the NHK Trophy, making a very promising start. Hanyu himself felt encouraged by his performance, saying, “Even under intense pressure, I was able to land better jumps than I expected. I realized that I still lack stamina, so I want to build up my stamina and aim for the podium.”

 

However, the December 2010 Japanese Championships ended with a result that fell short of his expectations. Although he started in second place after the short program (SP), mistakes on his jumps in the free skate left him fourth overall. “Compared with the beginning of the Grand Prix series, I’ve gotten much better at my skating and spins. That’s precisely why I'm so frustrated about the jump mistakes. I think I was too tense,” he said, openly expressing his disappointment.

 

Nevertheless, to me as I watched him skate, what stood out were his movements, which used his entire body with a fluidity that set him apart from other skaters, and the way his performance seemed to firmly contain the emotions welling up inside him.

 

As the new year began, Hanyu demonstrated his ability to perform under pressure at his first Four Continents Championships. Competing alongside Vancouver Olympic skaters such as Takahashi, Kozuka, and Jeremy Abbott (USA), he started in third place in the short program with a personal best under the official scoring system. Although he made some mistakes on his jumps in the free skate, he still earned the third-highest score behind Takahashi and Kozuka, bringing his total to 228.01 points, well above his personal best at the time. He finished second overall behind Takahashi, securing his first senior podium finish.

 

After the competition, Hanyu's eyes lit up as he said, "I'm just surprised by the result. More than the placement, being able to land the quadruple jump and the triple Axel in the second half cleanly will give me confidence going into next season.”

 

The Struggles and Resolve Following the Great East Japan Earthquake

 

On March 11, 2011, the Great East Japan Earthquake struck. Hanyu, who was practicing at his home rink in Sendai, experienced the terror firsthand. Moreover, the earthquake rendered the rink unusable, so during the off-season he practiced at rinks in the Kanto region and gained experience by performing in ice shows. At the time, Hanyu spoke about his feelings during that period as follows:

 

“There were so many people close to me who had been affected by the disaster and were going through such a difficult time that I wondered if it was okay for me to be doing what I loved. But when I went to school or walked around town, there were people who would call out to me and say, ‘Watching your performance cheered me up.’ If I could be of even a little help to those people, I thought maybe it was okay for me to continue skating, and I decided to work even harder so that I could cheer them up even more.”

 

The desire to “do something for someone else” may have been what awakened Hanyu. He steadily progressed throughout the 2011–12 season.

 

He challenged himself by incorporating a quadruple toe loop into his short program (SP), and at the Grand Prix event in China, he scored in the 80-point range for the first time in an SP. At the following event in Russia, he set new personal bests in both the SP and free skate. Hanyu narrowly held off Javier Fernández (Spain), who mounted a comeback with his quadruple jumps, to claim his first Grand Prix victory.

 

At his first Grand Prix Final, he raised his personal-best score yet again, but finished fourth behind world champion Patrick Chan (Canada), Takahashi, and Fernández. He experienced the difficulty of competing at the top level, but immediately afterward, he delivered another strong performance at the All Japan Championships despite the demanding schedule, with only one week between events. He started fourth in the SP, but won the free skate after landing a quadruple toe loop. He finished third overall behind Takahashi and Kozuka, earning his first-ever spot on the World Championships team.

 

Looking ahead to his first major international competition, Hanyu expressed his determination, saying, “I’ve experienced a lot, including the earthquake, so I want to make use of those experiences. At the ice shows, I think I had more opportunities than ever before to land a quadruple in a competition-like setting. I also gained confidence from landing quadruples even under dim lighting, and I think I’ve built up my stamina within the program as well.”

 

However, at the World Championships, Hanyu sprained his right ankle during the official practice the day before the SP. He was pushed to the point of considering withdrawing from the competition. Nevertheless, he decided to compete, and in the SP he successfully landed a combination consisting of a quadruple toe loop followed by a double toe loop. Although a mistake on his final Lutz left him in seventh place, he put together a solid free skate without any major errors and achieved a new personal-best score. He raised his total to 251.06 points, finishing third overall behind Chan and Takahashi and once again demonstrating his ability to perform under pressure in the face of adversity.

 

Growing Through Competition with His Rivals

 

Heading into the 2012–13 season, Hanyu made a new decision. He chose to leave coach Nanami Abe, whom he had trained under until then, and take on the challenge of moving his training base to Canada to work under Brian Orser.

 

Behind this decision was his expectation of Orser, who had coached many top skaters, including Kim Yuna of South Korea, as well as his desire to train and learn alongside Fernandez, who was able to land the difficult quadruple Salchow cleanly. Until then, Hanyu had been able to land the quadruple Salchow in practice, but had not been able to incorporate it into his competition programs.

 

“The first thing I did in Canada was basic training, such as learning how to use my edges properly. I need to be able to do the jumps if I want to compete at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, so I want to raise that level as well. Now that I also understand my muscle structure, I’ve started getting into stretching to improve my flexibility.”

 

Hanyu spoke these words at his new training base. In this challenging season, in which he incorporated the quadruple Salchow into his free skate, he was about to make another major leap forward.

 

First, at the Grand Prix event in the United States, he faltered in the free skate and finished second, but he set a new world-record score in the short program.

 

At the following NHK Trophy, he broke the previous world-record score in the short program once again. In the free skate, although he fell on the triple Lutz and combination spin in the second half after saying, “I got tired toward the end,” he still recorded a personal-best total of 261.03 points to win the competition. At his second Grand Prix Final, he started third in the short program. Despite making a few minor mistakes in the free skate, he finished second overall behind Takahashi with a high total of 264.29 points, achieving the goals he had set before the season: “First place in the Grand Prix series and a podium finish at the Grand Prix Final.”

 

However, Hanyu was not satisfied with that result, saying, “If my goal for the 2014 Sochi Olympics were simply to qualify, then third place at the Grand Prix Final would be fine. But I really want to win (at the Olympics), so I think I have to surpass the skaters ahead of me soon. Dai-chan (Takahashi) is still very strong, but I have to surpass him by Sochi.”

 

Then, in December 2012, he achieved his first “surpassing Takahashi” at the All-Japan Championships. He started in first place with a flawless short program. In the free skate, he had to fight for the landings on his opening quadruple toe loop and quadruple Salchow, and his skating lacked momentum toward the end, resulting in the second-highest score. However, he held off Takahashi’s comeback and won his first national title with a total score of 285.23 points.

 

Of course, Hanyu did not become complacent despite the result. Reflecting on the All-Japan Championships, he said, “I still felt that I didn’t have enough stamina. It was a big thing that I was able to give a good performance in the short program, but I’m frustrated that I was second in the free skate. The point difference came about because Takahashi made a mistake in the short program, but I still don’t have the confidence that I surpassed Takahashi through my own ability. I think there are still things I need to work on while continuing to make an effort every day,” he said, once again steeling his resolve.

 

Subsequently, at the Four Continents Championships in February 2013, Hanyu finished second while the other Japanese representatives struggled with poor physical condition. However, his second appearance at the World Championships proved difficult. The competition was crucial because Japan needed to secure three spots for the following year’s Sochi Olympics, but Hanyu made a major mistake in the short program, falling on a jump and putting both hands on the ice, leaving him in ninth place. Takahashi also got off to a slow start in fourth place in the SP, putting Japan’s hopes of securing three Olympic spots in jeopardy.

 

The reason for Hanyu’s poor performance was his physical condition. After the Four Continents Championships, he contracted influenza and was bedridden for about 10 days. On top of that, shortly after resuming practice, he injured his left knee and was unable to skate for about a week. By the time he competed at the World Championships, he was still skating while taking painkillers.

 

To make matters worse, he injured his ankle during official practice on the morning of the free skate. He was truly battered by injuries, but Hanyu said, “Now that I’ve come this far, I wanted to compete without regrets as a representative of Japan, and I wanted to channel the frustration and sense of guilt I felt after the short program into my performance. I chose to reduce the amount of painkillers a little and prioritize how I felt.”

 

In the free skate that followed, he made errors on his second quadruple Salchow and triple Flip, but limited his mistakes to those alone and delivered a determined performance. He scored 244.99 points in total to finish fourth overall. As a result, Japan secured three Olympic spots based on the combined results of Hanyu and Takahashi, who finished sixth. Hanyu showed a look of relief.

 

 

[yuzurujenn]

*machine translation, inaccuracies exist*

 

 

2026.08.08

 

Source: https://sportiva.shueisha.co.jp/clm/othersports/figure/2026/08/08/post_50/

Archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20260808132150/https://sportiva.shueisha.co.jp/clm/othersports/figure/2026/08/08/post_50/

 

 

Yuzuru Hanyu, who at one point gave up on winning a gold medal at the Sochi Olympics, said, "I learned the true fear of the Olympics..."

 

Part 2:

 

Spoiler

This final installment (the 14th in the series) of our look back at Japanese figure skaters who have competed from the 2002 Salt Lake City Games to the 2022 Beijing Games, focuses on the career of Yuzuru Hanyu, who has achieved numerous milestones, including winning consecutive gold medals at the 2014 Sochi Olympics and the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics. Part two covers his journey to the Sochi Games, his first Olympic appearance.

 

What he learned from losing to Patrick Chan

 

With the 2014 Sochi Olympics, which he had long been aiming for, in sight, Yuzuru Hanyu said, “I want to put all my feelings into it as the culmination of four years of hard work,” and decided to continue with his 2013–14 short program (SP), “Parisienne Walkways,” from the previous season. He also decided to place greater emphasis on the free program. For the free program, although the music itself was different, he chose “Romeo and Juliet,” the same music he had used during the 2011–12 season, which had been a turning point in his career.

 

“The music is different, so I think I’ll be able to skate it with a different atmosphere. And now that I’m a university student, I’ve gained more stamina, so I have a different kind of energy than I did back then. Being able to skate during the season of the Great East Japan Earthquake was incredibly important to me, and although I don’t think I can perform that program the same way again, I want to create the best "Romeo and Juliet" I can now.”

 

Having expressed his determination, Hanyu also decided to challenge a new program layout, placing a quadruple toe loop after the quadruple Salchow. However, he struggled to improve the consistency of the jumps, and the Sochi Olympic season got off to a somewhat unsettled start.

 

At the Grand Prix event in Canada, mistakes in the SP left him in third place, putting him on the back foot from the start. He also made several jumping mistakes in the free skate and could only manage to move up to second overall. Then, at the French event, he set a personal-best score in the short program to sit in second place, but in the free skate, his opening quadruple Salchow went awry after his blade caught a groove in the ice, and he also fell on the quadruple toe loop. He finished second, more than 30 points behind Patrick Chan (Canada), who had set the highest score in history at the time. It was Hanyu’s second consecutive loss to Chan, following the Canadian event.

 

However, Hanyu was pleased to have had the opportunity to compete directly against Chan in two consecutive competitions. He said he learned from Chan during the competitions, including his detailed use of his body and his attention to expression. In addition, by comparing himself with Chan, who had recorded the highest scores in history at the time in both the short program and free skate, he was able to consider which aspects of his own skating he needed to strengthen in order to catch up with and surpass him.

 

In fact, Hanyu quickly put what he had learned into practice. Three weeks after the French competition, at the Grand Prix Final, he improved his program component scores, which had been identified as an area for improvement, and broke the previous world-record score in the SP, taking the lead by more than 10 points over Chan. In the free skate, although he fell on his opening quadruple Salchow, he executed everything perfectly afterward, recording a total of 293.25 points, the second-highest score in history at the time, and winning the competition. There, he gained a firm sense that he could compete with Chan on equal terms at the Sochi Olympics.

 

At the All-Japan Championships in December, Hanyu scored over 100 points in the SP for the first time in his career. In the free skate, he fell on his opening quadruple Salchow, which he had said he “still lacked experience” with, but he put everything else together cleanly, scoring a total of 297.80 points (unofficial record) and winning decisively to secure his first Olympic berth.

 

“Even though everyone around me was tense and on edge, I was able to maintain my own rhythm. I think that’s because I had the valuable experience of competing against Patrick in every single Grand Prix event.”

 

Winning His First Gold Medal, but Learning the True Fear of the Olympics

 

In February 2014, at his first Olympics, Hanyu competed in the figure skating team event, which was being held at the Olympics for the first time and began the day before the opening ceremony. Under the pressure of being the final skater, he delivered a flawless performance. He showed his excellent form by finishing first, far ahead of Evgeni Plushenko (Russia), an idol whom Hanyu said made his “legs tremble,” and Chan, who was in the midst of winning three consecutive World Championship titles.

 

That momentum carried over into the individual short program a week later. Despite the unexpected withdrawal of Plushenko due to a back injury, Hanyu said he was “far more nervous than in the team event,” but after landing his opening quadruple toe loop, he delivered another flawless performance that exuded confidence. He scored 101.45 points, a new highest score in history at the time, surpassing his score from the team event.

 

“I had a dip in my condition and there were some things that made me anxious, but I was very conscious of trying to maintain a positive mindset. It was better than the performances I had given before, but I myself never really thought I would be able to score over 100 points. I’m really happy that I was able to do it on the Olympic stage.”

 

Chan, who skated after Hanyu, had a slightly shaky landing on his triple Axel and scored in the 97-point range, leaving Hanyu in the lead. The competition for third place and below was extremely close, with nine skaters packed within 3.5 points of one another. However, the highest score among them was in the 86-point range, making the battle for the gold medal essentially a two-man contest between Hanyu and Chan.

 

Hanyu was the third skater in the final group for the free skate the following day, but he said, “My body just wouldn’t move, and I was really anxious from the six-minute warm-up.” Nevertheless, he said, “I tried my best to give everything I had, whatever condition I was in,” but he fell on his opening quadruple Salchow. He landed his next quadruple toe loop cleanly, but then fell again on his triple Flip, getting off to a rough start.

 

Even in the second half of his performance, Hanyu said, “I ran out of stamina, my legs stopped moving, and negative feelings started to creep in.” He made a mistake in his planned three-jump combination, failing to land the final triple Salchow, and his free-skate score of 178.64 points was nearly 25 points below his personal best. Although his total score of 280.09 points put him provisionally in first place, Hanyu admitted that at that point he “thought the gold medal was out of reach” and had given up on reaching the top.

 

However, Chan, who skated next, landed his opening quadruple toe loop–triple toe loop combination perfectly, but then put his hand down on the landing of his next quadruple toe loop. He also had a major wobble on his triple Axel. His skating became unstable in the second half of the program, and his total score was 275.62 points. Even for the world champion, the pressure of having an Olympic gold medal within reach had been immense.

 

Thus, Hanyu won Japan’s first Olympic gold medal in men’s singles figure skating. “I can honestly say that I’m truly surprised,” he said. Regarding his performance, in which he made a mistake on the triple Flip, a jump he considered one of his most reliable, he said, “To put it plainly, I’m not satisfied.” At the press conference the following day, he said:

 

“Last night’s free skate made me realize the true fear of the Olympics, and I feel that I came to understand the weight of the Olympics. But this isn’t the end. I still want to continue competing, so I want to keep working hard alongside the skating that I love so much.”

 

Major titles won, his winning streak continues

 

One month later, at the World Championships held in Saitama City, Hanyu started third after the short program but came from behind in the free skate to win his first world title by a margin of just 0.33 points over runner-up Tatsuki Machida

 

“My body was at its limit, and I was also very nervous because I felt that I had to win. But the feeling of ‘I’m absolutely going to win this’ was stronger,” Hanyu said. Regarding that victory, he reflected, “I think I am where I am today because that gold medal came with the lingering frustration of not having been able to give everything I had in Sochi.”

 

That season, Hanyu won three major international competitions: the Grand Prix Final, the Olympics, and the World Championships. He became only the second skater to accomplish this feat, following Alexei Yagudin (Russia) in the 2001–02 season.