Yuzuru Hanyu: GPF: Three-Peat!

To borrow the tag line from Bret “the Hitmen” Hart of the WWE (a personal friend of mine),  Yuzu is “The best there is, the best there was, the best there ever will be!!”  

Good things come in sets of 3’s.  The number 3 is quickly becoming a special number for Yuzu!

• 3 new world records set at NHK
• 3 new world records set at GPF
• Currently, the 3 time Japan National Champion
• Yuzu has just 3-PEAT’d at GPF – first time anyone has ever won 3 GPF titles in a row
• 33 is the magical number for Yuzu’s birthday when added up.    (1+9+9+4+1+2+0+7=33)

 

Usually when World Records are set, they last a bit longer than 2 weeks.  Even Brian Orser thought the records made at NHK would stand up for awhile.  I guess no one told Yuzu.   I’m also thinking that Yuzu doesn’t know that it’s not necessary to break all 3 records each competition!  Even just one new world record per competition would be enough for the world to rejoice!

Incredibly, the final point spread between Yuzu and Daisuke is 94.94 points.  That is higher than the next highest score after Yuzu at the GPF for an entire short program!

Here’s the amazing protocol sheet!!

Since Saturday night, the world has been abuzz with the news that Yuzu has smashed his own world records and re-written history once again.  Keeping up with the flood of information that comes out on social media, and the news is a full time job for Hanyu fans!

To quickly summarize my thoughts on the long program:
Patrick:  The long program was a redemption skate for him.  He said that he almost withdrew after the short program.  We will see how he does against Nam at Nationals.

Daisuke: This was not his day.  Better luck at Japan Nationals.

Shoma: Yay, he fixed his landing free leg!!   I think the crazy swinging of the landing free leg only happens when he is struggling to save the jump.  I finally saw the Daisuke Takahashi in him!!  I love the nickname Kurt Browning gave him, “pocket-rocket”.

Boyang: Kudos for attempting this technically difficult program, he just needs to figure out how to add some choreography in between the massive jumps.  See you at Worlds!

Javier: This program channeled an inner Kurt Browning.  The style of it looked so familiar to me!  I think Yuzu has been such a positive influence on Javi because Javi was never this consistent before Yuzu arrived at the Cricket Club to train.

Yuzu:  What do you say about perfection, AGAIN?  It was another stunning performance!  I’ve run out of words for Yuzu, so I’m simply going to call him GORGEOUS!!  I’ve watched the program multiple times now, and even Kurt Browning decided not to commentate a single word throughout the program on CBC.   During the replays, Kurt said that Yuzu “has to compete against his own ghost”.   Yuzu doesn’t have a skater to aspire to (as he has surpassed everyone), Yuzu has to “look to the gods on Mount Olympus” for inspiration. (Kurt Browning).

 

My favorite GPF moments:

I love Plushys tweet about the quads because I totally agreed with him when he made his comments about quads at the Vancouver Olympics.

 

 

Yuzu doing a fist pump with his mom (around 18:53 mark of video) and the one bodyguard looking unsure of who Yuzu’s mom was.  Thank you to yuzupinoko for uploading this video!

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3hyycy_20151213-y-hスペシャル_sport

 

 

“Why am I crying?”   Yuzu is too ADORABLE!  Combination picture from my instagram account @won0066

 

Yuzu did not disappoint with the victory ceremony jump. Aside from the joke with Shoma about Shoma doing an arm lock instead of putting his arm around Yuzu’s waist, I thought for a moment that with the large rug in front of the podium, that we would not get to see the Yuzu podium jump.  But, as usual, Yuzu did not disappoint us!

 

 

And to leave all his fans with ever lasting cuteness, here is Yuzu imitating Machida at the Gala.

https://www.instagram.com/p/_PYuy6BJUl/?taken-by=milly_laym

 

When people talk about sporting “legends” or sporting “greats”, I think we can safely add Yuzu to the list.  He will be forever etched in history no matter what else he adds to his legend in the future, but I suspect more records will be written.

• Figure Skating – Yuzuru Hanyu
• Hockey – Wayne Gretzky
• Soccer – Cristiano Ronaldo
• Tennis – Roger Federer
• Track and Field – Usain Bolt
• Basketball – Michael Jordan
• Golf – Tiger Woods

 

My only disappointment was that the GPF event was over too fast.  With only 6 skaters in each event, it simply went by too quickly!

Next up – Japan Nationals.  I cross my fingers that some fabulous fan will upload the videos as soon as they are available since I don’t think anyone outside of Japan can watch it live.

 

 

Go Yuzu Go!!  Doki Doki!!