Yuzuru Hanyu awakened his ability for the Sochi Olympic. "With all my best always" (3ページ目)

  • text by Toshimi Oriyama
  • photo by Sunao Noto(a presto)

"I've tended to spend two whole seasons in order to complete my jumps," Hanyu analyzed calmly. However, the challenge of completing two kinds of quadruples seemed to suggest that he was willing to improve faster for his ultimate goal of including three quadruples in a composition.

In August 2013, Hanyu opened his training up to media in Sendai. Almost a hundred journalists gathered, and although Hanyu was "surprised at the number of people", and "I couldn't focus at the beginning of the training", he went on to perform "Romeo and Juliet" from his free skate, and "Parisienne Walkways" from his short program. During the training, he tried to jump a quadruple toe loop and Salchow. Though he was tired due to his intense training in Canada beforehand, he managed to execute the toe loop finely.

"The success ratio of the toe loop has improved and I can now jump it without warming up," Hanyu said. "But the Salchow is totally different and it was very hard (on the day). It reminded me that I worked so hard to complete the toe loop a few years ago."

Hanyu said of his first Olympics in Sochi that "my dream will come true and I want to make it the highest point of my career". As a result, he decided to use "Romeo and Juliet" in this crucial season as he had done two seasons previously in the year of the Great East Japan Earthquake. He switched his jumps from the previous season, moving the Salchow first and the toe loop second, into what he called his "easiest order".

"I am now settled with the toe loop so I can focus on the Salchow as well," Hanyu said. "That's why I didn't think about omitting the Salchow. If I jump a quadruple Salchow, I can try three consecutive jumps with a triple toe loop as well as a triple Salchow - that should be good for the score. There are several skaters who try multiple quadruple but there are only a few skaters who are capable of jumping the Salchow. So I decided to try that.

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