Yuzuru Hanyu talks about the difference between two Olympics he won the gold.

  • text by Toshimi Oriyama
  • photo by JMPA/Sunao Noto

"I thought I had won when the performance was over. At the Sochi Olympics, I was worried about whether I could win or not right after the free skate, but this time I thought I had won."

Hanyu's score for the free skate was 206.17 points, following Nathan Chen who attempted four types of six quads and earned 215.08 points to relieve the regret of his short program. Hanyu increased his overall score to 317.85 points, more than 10 points ahead of Javier Fernandez (Spain) and Shoma Uno, who performed after Hanyu, to achieve consecutive Olympic golds in figure skating for the first time in 66 years.

In the free skate, he jumped two quadruple Salchows and two quadruple toe loops. In the latter half, he combined a triple Axel and two types of quadruples in order to gain high basic points. He decided on the composition on the morning of the performance.

"It wasn't whether I wanted to jump a quadruple loop or not. The matter was that I wanted to win this, and I thought it would be meaningless if I didn't win. As I thought about the fact that the result of this competition will become a part of my life, I took care to achieve a good result."

Taking the lead in the short program, he was mentally stable before the free skate. By performing the best possible composition in his current state and receiving a great score just below the highest in the history of the short program, he gained confidence in his skating, and this led to his decision to jump composition of the free skate.

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