sportlandia

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Next month, Yuzuru Hanyu will return to the ice to perform Realive, his fifth solo show. We’ve become accustomed to saying it: Hanyu will perform in a solo show. But how revolutionary was this concept in 2022? If a free program—four and a half minutes until the PyeongChang season, four minutes in subsequent competitive seasons—was already draining him of energy, how would Hanyu skate an entire show? Would he change costumes? How would he connect the programs? Would he be able to hold the spectators’ attention for such a long time? There were many doubts, but then we saw the show, and all doubts melted away.

Let’s see what Hanyu’s journey has been in solo shows.

Il prossimo mese Yuzuru Hanyu tornerà sul ghiaccio per interpretare Realive, il suo quinto solo show. Ormai ci siamo abituati a dirlo, Hanyu farà un solo show. Ma quanto era rivoluzionario questo concetto nel 2022? Se già un programma libero – quattro minuti e mezzo fino alla stagione di PyeongChang, quattro minuti nelle successive stagioni agonistiche – prosciugava tutte le sue energie, come avrebbe fatto Hanyu a pattinare per un intero show? Si sarebbe cambiato? Come avrebbe collegato fra loro i programmi? Sarebbe riuscito a catturare l’attenzione degli spettatori per un tempo così lungo? I dubbi erano tanti, poi abbiamo visto lo show e tutti i dubbi si sono sciolti come neve al sole.

Vediamo qual è stato il percorso di Hanyu nei solo show.

Prologue

Two cities, five shows in total: Pia Arena in Yokohama, November 4 and 5, 2022, and Flat Hachinohe, December 2, 3, and 5, 2022. Tickets were sold via lottery, with the second Yokohama show and the third Hachinohe show broadcast live in Japan on CS Asahi 2; the others were broadcast on a delayed basis. All shows were sold out, with 7,900 spectators per day in Yokohama and 3,000 per day in Hachinohe. A livestream was also organized for these two dates in Japanese movie theaters. There were 81 theaters in November and 77 in December, but during the last Hachinohe show, Hanyu provided two specific numbers: 77 theaters, but a total of 100 screens. The lineup was more or less fixed, meaning that most of the programs were the same across all shows, but the third and fourth programs changed from one show to the next. The third program was chosen by the spectators in the arena from a list of five programs, while the fourth was chosen by Hanyu based on fan comments on his YouTube channel. And, at the final Hachinohe show, Hanyu performed not just one encore, but two, adding From Russia With Love to the set list.

Here are the technical data of the latest Hachinohe show:

Due città, cinque spettacoli in tutto: Pia Arena a Yokohama, 4 e 5 novembre 2022, Flat Hachinohe, 2, 3 e 5 dicembre 2022. Biglietti venduti tramite lotteria, diretta in Giappone su CS Asahi 2 del secondo show di Yokohama e del terzo di Hachinohe, gli altri sono comunque stati trasmessi in differita. Tutti gli show hanno fatto registrare il tutto esaurito, 7.900 spettatori al giorno a Yokohama, 3.000 al giorno a Hachinohe. Per queste due date è stato organizzato anche un livestream nelle sale cinematografiche giapponesi. I cinema sono stati 81 in novembre, 77 in dicembre, ma durante l’ultimo spettacolo di Hachinohe Hanyu ha fornito due numeri precisi: 77 cinema, ma un totale di 100 sale, perché evidentemente alcuni cinema hanno trasmesso lo show in più di una sala. La scaletta era più o meno fissa, nel senso che la maggior parte dei programmi sono stati gli stessi in tutti gli show, ma il terzo e il quarto programma cambiavano da uno spettacolo all’altro. Il terzo programma veniva scelto dagli spettatori presenti nell’arena da una lista di cinque programmi, il quarto veniva deciso da Hanyu sulla base dei commenti che avevano scritto i fan sul suo canale YouTube. E, nell’ultimo show di Hachinohe, Hanyu non ha fatto un solo bis ma due, aggiungendo alla scaletta From Russia With Love.

Questi sono i dati tecnici dell’ultimo show di Hachinohe:

The show features a new program, Itsuka owaru yume (officially translated as A Fleeting Dream, although the correct translation is A Dream That Will End Someday), choreographed by Hanyu. For this program, and for Haru yo, koi, Hanyu collaborated with Mikiko and the Rizomatiks.

Hanyu posted two videos related to the show on his channel. The first one, uploaded before Prologue, contains Change, a gala program of his junior years that he skated again in Prologue, and Dreamy Aspiration, a new program choreographed by Hanyu, aired on the giant screen during Prologue.

Lo show contiene un programma nuovo, Itsuka owaru yume (ufficialmente tradotto come A Fleeting Dream, anche se la traduzione corretta sarebbe A Dream That Will End Someday), coreografato da Hanyu. Per questo programma, e per Haru yo, koi, Hanyu si è avvalso della collaborazione di Mikiko e dei Rizomatiks.

Hanyu ha pubblicato sul suo canale due video legati allo show. Il primo, caricato prima di Prologue, contiene Change, un programma di esibizione che ha iniziato a interpretare quando gareggiava nella categoria juniores, e Dreamy Aspiration, un programma nuovo coreografato dallo stesso Hanyu e trasmesso sul megaschermo durante Prologue.

The second, Sasanqua, is a new program Hanyu uploaded to his channel on Christmas Eve. The music, and some of the images accompanying the program in the video montage, had already been used by Hanyu in Prologue.

Il secondo, Sasanqua, è un programma nuovo caricato da Hanyu sul suo canale la vigilia di Natale. La musica, e alcune delle immagini che nel montaggio del video accompagnano il programma, erano già stati usati da Hanyu in Prologue.

Gift

With Gift, Hanyu created the Ice Story genre. In Prologue, there was a narrative, but it was tied to Hanyu’s competitive career. Something that made sense at the time, that was wonderful, but that couldn’t be retold in that way without becoming repetitive. Gift still follows Hanyu’s career but does so differently, addressing the dreams and aspirations of one person, of all people, and how there are difficult moments, setbacks, but also how it’s possible to move forward. Hanyu’s story is universalized; it’s the story of all of us. The narrative level grows, and so does the way the show is constructed. Directed by Mikiko, with live musicians—the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra and a modern band led by Satoshi Takebe—a dance troupe, and a host of special effects. At the Tokyo Dome on February 26, 2023, in front of 35,000 spectators, obviously sold out, with live viewing in 84 theaters in Japan and 12 in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea, and a delayed broadcast the following day in 78 theaters in Japan. The show was broadcast live in Japan on Disney+ and worldwide on Globe Coding with subtitles in several languages. After, Gift would have been added to the Disney+ catalog, and is still available outside of Europe. And with the arena and everything related to the show being larger than Prologue, the set list has also become more demanding, in a show that is composed of two parts and encores.

Con Gift Hanyu ha creato il genere dell’Ice Story. In Prologue c’era una narrazione, ma era una narrazione legata alla carriera agonistica di Hanyu. Qualcosa che aveva senso in quel momento, che era meravigliosa, ma che non poteva essere riproposta a quel modo senza diventare ripetitiva. Gift segue ancora la carriera di Hanyu ma la fa in modo diverso, parlando dei sogni e delle aspirazioni di una persona, di tutte le persone, e di come ci siano momenti difficili, battute d’arresto, ma anche di come sia possibile andare avanti. La storia di Hanyu viene universalizzata, è la storia di tutti noi. Il livello narrativo cresce, e cresce anche il modo in cui è costruito lo spettacolo. La regia di Mikiko, musicisti che suonano dal vivo – la Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra e una band moderna guidata da Satoshi Takebe – un corpo di ballo e una serie di effetti speciali. Al Tokyo Dome, il 26 febbraio 2023, davanti a 35.000 spettatori che assistono dal vivo, ovviamente un altro tutto esaurito, con il liveviewing in diretta in 84 sale in Giappone e 12 fra Hong Kong, Taiwan e Corea del Sud e in differita il giorno dopo in 78 sale in Giappone, la diretta televisiva in Giappone su Disney+ e nel resto del mondo su Globe Coding con sottotitoli in diverse lingue. In seguito Gift sarebbe entrato nel catalogo di Disney+, e al di fuori dell’Europa è ancora disponibile. E con un’arena e tutto ciò che riguarda lo show realizzato più in grande rispetto a Prologue, anche la scaletta è diventata più impegnativa, in uno spettacolo che è composto da due tempi e dai bis.

There are two new programs: One Summer’s Day, choreographed by David Wilson, and Ashura-chan, choreographed by Hanyu. Hanyu also uploaded two videos to his channel for Gift. The first, The Final Time Traveler, is a performance program Hanyu began performing in 2014, which he skated at Ice Rink Sendai for this occasion.

I programmi nuovi sono due: One Summer’s Day, coreografato da David Wilson, e Ashura-chan, coreografato da Hanyu. Anche per Gift Hanyu ha caricato sul suo canale due video. Il primo, The Final Time Traveler, è un programma di esibizione che Hanyu ha iniziato a interpretare nel 2014, e che per l’occasione ha reinterpetato all’Ice Rink di Sendai.

The second, Boku no Koto (About Me), is a new program created by Hanyu and used as the closing credits for Gift, before the encores that begin with Haru yo, koi. The membership section of Hanyu’s channel also features an unedited version of the program, which shows Hanyu having completed the layout, which includes five quads, two triple axels, and three more triples performing continuously, without any interruptions.

Il secondo, Boku no koto (About Me), è un programma nuovo ideato da Hanyu e usato come titoli di coda di Gift, prima di quei bis che iniziano con Haru yo, koi. Nella sezione per abbonati del canale di Hanyu esiste anche una versione non editata del programma, in cui si vede che Hanyu ha completato il layout, che comprende cinque quadrupli, due tripli axel e altri tre tripli eseguendolo in modo continuativo, senza nessuna interruzione.

Re_Pray

With Gift, Hanyu created the Ice Story. He demonstrated all the grandeur a solo show can have. But the story was still tied to his personal experience. With Re_Pray, Hanyu demonstrated storytelling skills that were completely unexpected for someone who became famous as an athlete. We knew his intelligence, his ability to analyze things; we’d seen it in countless interviews, or in his thesis. But creating a story from scratch is a whole different story. Of course, Mikiko is still at his side, with a team of creatives who helped him develop his idea to the fullest. But the idea is his, as is the performance on the ice.

This time it’s a tour; it was supposed to be three cities, two shows per city, but it has become four cities, eight shows in total. Saitama on November 4th and 5th, 2023, with 14,00 viewers per day. Saga on January 12 and 14, 2024, with 5,500 viewers per day. Yokohama on February 17 and 19, 2024, with 7,000 viewers per day. Miyagi on April 7 and 9, 2024, with 5,800 viewers per day. Each show was sold out by lottery, with live broadcasts on CS Asahi 2 on the first day in Saitama and on the second day in the other cities, and international live broadcasts on Beyond Live on the same days, with subtitles in several languages. Asahi subsequently broadcast the other shows on a delayed basis. On the days of the live broadcasts, live viewing in theaters was also organized: 113 theaters in Japan for the Saitama show (plus 12 in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea), 64 for Saga (plus 8 in Hong Kong and Taiwan), 75 for Yokohama, and 71 for Miyagi. The set list is almost identical. The only difference is related to the third program, Hope and Legacy on the first day of each city, Ashura-chan on the second, for reasons related to the show’s plot. These are the data from Miyagi’s first day (remember that Ashura-chan, while difficult, does not contain any jumps or spins).

Con Gift Hanyu ha creato l’Ice Story. Ha mostrato tutta la grandiosità che può avere un solo show. La storia però era ancora legata alla sua vicenda personale. Con Re_Pray Hanyu ha mostrato doti di narratore assolutamente insospettabili per una persona diventata famosa come atleta. Conoscevamo la sua intelligenza, la sua capacità di analizzare le cose, l’avevamo vista nelle numerosissime interviste, o nella tesi di laurea. Ma ideare dal nulla una storia è tutta un’altra cosa. Certo, al suo fianco c’è ancora Mikiko, con un team di creativi che lo ha aiutato a sviluppare al meglio la sua idea. Ma l’idea è sua, così come lo è la prestazione sul ghiaccio.

Stavolta si tratta di un tour, sarebbero dovute essere tre città, due show per ogni città, sono diventate quattro città, otto show in tutto. Saitama il 4 e il 5 novembre 2023, 14.00 spettatori al giorno. Saga il 12 e il 14 gennaio 2024, 5.500 spettatori al giorno. Yokohama il 17 e il 19 febbraio 2024, 7.000 spettatori al giorno. Miyagi il 7 e il 9 aprile 2024, 5.800 spettatori al giorno. Ogni volta biglietti venduti tramite lotteria e tutto esaurito, dirette su CS Asahi 2 il primo giorno a Saitama, il secondo giorno nelle altre città, e diretta internazionale gli stessi giorni su Beyond Live, con sottotitoli in diverse lingue. In seguito Asahi ha trasmesso gli altri spettacoli in differita. Nei giorni delle dirette è stato organizzato anche il live viewing cinematografico, 113 sale in Giappone per lo show di Saitama (più 12 fra Hong Kong Taiwan e Corea del Sud), 64 per Saga (più 8 fra Hong Kong e Taiwan), 75 per Yokohama e 71 per Miyagi. La scaletta è quasi identica. L’unica differenza è legata al terzo programma, Hope and Legacy nel primo giorno di ogni città, Ashura-chan nel secondo, per motivi legati alla trama dello spettacolo. Questi sono i dati del primo giorno di Miyagi (ricordo che Ashura-chan, per quanto difficile, non contiene salti né trottole).

There are three new programs this time: Gate of Living, choreographed by Mikiko, and Megalovania and The Darkness of Eternity, choreographed by Hanyu, and the warm-up is also partially choreographed. Hanyu has posted four videos related to the show on his channel. The first, Goliath, expresses the spirit that permeates the first half, that of the player fighting with all their might to win the game.

I programmi nuovi stavolta sono tre: Gate of Living, coreografato da Mikiko, e Megalovania e The Darkness of Eternity, coreografati da Hanyu, e anche il warm up è in parte coreografato. Hanyu ha pubblicato sul suo canale quattro video legati allo show. Il primo, Goliath, esprime lo spirito che permea la prima metà, quella del giocatore che combatte con tutte le sue forze per vincere la partita.

The second, Aqua’s Journey, is tied to the atmosphere of the second half of the show.

Il secondo, Aqua’s Journey, è legato alle atmosfere della seconda metà dello show.

The third, Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals (in Japan, the name of the game whose music Hanyu used is Estpolis Denki II), was created as the tour’s closing credits and edited by Geekpictures. After the tour, Hanyu uploaded a slightly different video to his channel, which included some clips from videos shot during the tour.

Il terzo, Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals (in Giappone il nome del gioco di cui Hanyu ha usato la musica è Estpolis Denki II), è stato realizzato come titoli di coda del tour ed è stato montato da Geekpictures. Finito il tour Hanyu ha caricato sul suo canale un video lievemente diverso, nel quale sono stati aggiunti alcuni spezzoni di video realizzati durante il tour.

The fourth, Gate of Living, features the first of Hanyu’s new programs on tour, and was uploaded to Hanyu’s channel to coincide with the release of the DVD and Blu-ray of the show (Prologue and Gift are also available for purchase on DVD and Blu-ray).

Il quarto, Gate of Living, ripropone il primo dei nuovi programmi interpretati da Hanyu nel tour, ed è stato caricato sul canale di Hanyu in corrispondenza con la pubblicazione del DVD e del Blu ray dello spettacolo (anche nel caso di Prologue e Gift è possibile acquistare DVD e Blu ray degli spettacoli).

Echoes of Life

With Re_Pray, it became clear that, as long as he could come up with a new story and had the desire to skate, Hanyu could continue with solo shows. The next event was Echoes of Life, a tour consisting of seven dates in three different cities: Saitama on December 7, 9, and 11, 2024; Hiroshima on January 3 and 5, 2025; and Chiba on February 7 and 9, 2025. Tickets were still sold by lottery, still sold out, 14,000 spectators per day in Saitama, 8,300 per day in Chiba; I’ve never found official data for Hiroshima. I’m afraid that if I summarized the liveviewing data in a text, it would become unclear. It’s better to use a table, dedicated to all the data from all the solo shows.

Con Re_Pray è diventato evidente che, fino a quando fosse riuscito a ideare un storia nuova e avesse avuto voglia di pattinare, Hanyu poteva andare avanti con i solo show. Il nuovo appuntamento è stato Echoes of Life, tour composto da sette date in tre città diverse: Saitama il 7, 9 e 11 dicembre 2024, Hiroshima il 3 e in 5 gennaio 2025, Chiba il 7 e il 9 febbraio 2025. Ancora biglietti venduti tramite lotteria, ancora tutto esaurito, 14.000 spettatori al giorno a Saitama, 8.300 al giorno a Chiba, non ho mai trovato dati ufficiali per Hiroshima. Temo che se riassumessi i dati del liveviewing in un testo, diventerebbe poco chiaro. Meglio usare una tabella, dedicata a tutti i dati di tutti i solo show.

The first two Saitama shows, and the second Hiroshima and Chiba show, were broadcast live in Japan on CS Asahi 2; the others were broadcast on a delayed basis. The first Saitama show and the second Hiroshima and Chiba show were broadcast live worldwide on Beyond Live. The number of quads decreased, but the skating time increased as Hanyu increasingly focused on skating, interpretation, and the demands of the story. In my tables, I only list the step sequences and choreographic sequences present in the programs Hanyu performed in competition, because they are elements constructed following the requirements of the rules. However, all his programs are a continuous succession of turns, steps, moves in the field, and choreographic jumps, even if Hanyu doesn’t bother to count how many difficult turns he takes on each foot and how he combines them. And obviously, he doesn’t forget the athletic aspect, as the penultimate program of the first half was the short program with which Hanyu won his second Olympic gold medal in 2018. It followed a 10-minute program consisting of a succession of five different pieces of music, each with its own distinct interpretation. There are seven new programs: First Pulse, First Echo and Circulation, Utai IV: Reawakening (choreographed by Mikiko), Mass Destruction: Reload, Piano Collection (a sequence of five classical pieces choreographed by Jeffery Buttle), Eclipse/Blue, Gate of Steiner – Aestethics on Ice, and Hymn of the Soul. The technical elements are as follows:

I primi due show di Saitama, e il secondo di Hiroshima e Chiba, sono stati trasmessi in diretta in Giappone su CS Asahi 2, gli altri sono stati trasmessi in differita. Il primo show di Saitama e il secondo di Hiroshima e Chiba sono stati trasmessi in diretta mondiale su Beyond Live. I quadrupli diminuiscono, ma il tempo di pattinata diventa più lungo perché Hanyu dona sempre più spazio al pattinaggio, all’interpretazione, alle necessità della storia. Nelle mie tabelle indico solo le sequenze di passi e le sequenze coreografiche presenti nei programmi che Hanyu ha eseguito in gara, perché sono elementi costruiti seguendo le richieste del regolamento, ma tutti i suoi programmi sono una successione continua di passi, moves in the field e salti coreografici, anche se Hanyu non si preoccupa di contare quanti passi difficili fa su ciascun piede e come li combina insieme. E ovviamente non dimentica l’aspetto atletico, visto che il penultimo programma del primo tempo è il programma corto con cui nel 2018 Hanyu ha vinto il secondo oro olimpico. Eseguito dopo un programma di 10 minuti composto dalla successione di cinque brani musicali diversi, ciascuno con la propria diversa interpretazione. I programmi nuovi sono sette: First Pulse, First Echo and Circulation, Utai IV: Reawakening (coreografato da Mikiko), Mass Destruction: Reload, Piano Collection (successione di cinque brani di musica classica coreografato da Jeffery Buttle), Eclipse/Blue, Gate of Steiner – Aestethics on Ice e Hymn of the Soul. Questi gli elementi tecnici:

The second encore is different: on the first day in each city (and on the third in Saitama), Hanyu skates Ashura-chan, while on the second day in each city he skates Megalovania, excluding the initial part, where in Re_Pray he skated without any musical accompaniment. Hanyu posted a video dedicated to Echoes of Life on his official X account, with the music of First Pulse and excerpts from all the programs:

Il secondo bis cambia: nella prima giornata in ogni città (e nella terza a Saitama) Hanyu pattina Ashura-chan, nella seconda in ogni città pattina Megalovania, esclusa la parte iniziale, quella in cui in Re_Pray pattinava senza alcun accompagnamento musicale. Hanyu ha pubblicato sul suo account ufficiale su X un video dedicato a Echoes of Life, con la musica di First Pulse e frammenti di tutti i programmi:

プロ転向から3年を迎えました！
たくさんの応援が心強く背中を押してくださっています。
いつも、今までも、ありがとうございます！
これからも進み続けます🪽⛸️🧊 pic.twitter.com/WtMZTbn3hg

— 羽生結弦official_Staff 公式 (@YUZURUofficial_) July 18, 2025

Hanyu uploaded Danny Boy to his official YouTube channel, both in its original version and a shortened version. Danny Boy was choreographed by David Wilson for the 2024 edition of Notte stellata, after Gen Hoshino told Hanyu he’d love to see him skate to this music. The videos he uploaded to his channel have nothing to do with Echoes of Life, even though Hanyu skated Danny Boy in Echoes of Life. Instead, they were made as a tribute to Gen Hoshino. The full version of the program is here:

Sul canale YouTube ufficiale Hanyu ha caricato anche Danny Boy, nella sua versione originale e in una versione ridotta. Danny Boy è stato coreografato da David Wilson per l’edizione 2024 di Notte stellata, dopo che Gen Hoshino aveva detto a Hanyu che gli sarebbe piaciuto vederlo pattinare su questa musica. I video da lui caricati sul suo canale non hanno nulla a che vedere con Echoes of Life, anche se Hanyu ha pattinato Danny Boy in Echoes of Life. Sono invece stati realizzati in omaggio a Gen Hoshino. La versione completa del programma è questa:

Realive

This is Hanyu’s fifth solo show. We have no idea what Hanyu will do. On his official website, Hanyu explained that he wants to breathe new life into the programs he’s created so far. We’ll find out exactly what Hanyu will do on April 11 and 12, 2026, during the only two dates of a show that will take place in Rifu, Miyagi. The first show will be broadcast live in Japan by CS Asahi, the second live in Japan by Telasa and internationally by Beyond Live, with subtitles in various languages. There will also be a liveviewing, organized for the second date. It will be shown in 78 theaters in Japan, another 9 in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore, and a delayed viewing in 63 theaters in Japan.

After a period away from the arenas, Hanyu returned to perform in March at Notte stellata, offering an intense performance. Soon we will be able to witness Realive, a show whose official title does not include the words Ice Story, with an ordinal number, but An Ice Story Project. It is something different from the past, and a bridge to the future.

È il quinto solo show di Hanyu. Non abbiamo idea di ciò che Hanyu farà. Nel sito ufficiale Hanyu ha spiegato di voler donare nuova vita ai programmi che ha creato fino a questo momento. Cosa esattamente farà Hanyu lo scopriremo l’11 e il 12 aprile 2026, nelle uniche due date di uno spettacolo che si svolgerà a Rifu, Miyagi. Il primo show sarà trasmesso in diretta in Giappone da CS Asahi, il secondo in diretta in Giappone da Telasa e nel resto del mondo da Beyond Live, con sottotitoli in varie lingue. Anche in questo caso ci sarà un liveviweing, organizzato per la seconda data. 78 cinema in Giappone, altri 9 fra Taiwan, Hong Kong e Singapore, e un delayed viewing in 63 sale in Giappone.

Dopo un periodo lontano dalle arene, Hanyu è tornato a esibirsi in marzo in Notte stellata, proponendo prestazioni intensissime. A breve potremo assistere a Realive, uno show il cui titolo ufficiale non comprende la dicitura Ice Story, con un numero ordinale, ma la dicitura An Ice Story Project. È qualcosa di diverso dal passato, e un ponte verso il futuro.

Over the past few days, I’ve seen the news that Ilia Malinin won Skate Canada with a record 76.60 points over second-place finisher Alexander Selevko. Malinin deserves credit for his ability to land his quads, performing a remarkable number of them, of all types (he’s currently the only skater to have landed six different quads in competition), and almost always managing to land on one foot.

That said, how significant is his accomplishment?

The numbers alone say a lot, but they only show a partial picture. To get a clearer picture, we need to broaden our perspective a bit. To do so, I used https://skatingscores.com/, starting with a table published by SkatingScores on his profile X, but then verifying a series of details. Any comments on possible overscoring—and there have been some, but this isn’t the place to discuss them, otherwise it would lead to a lengthy discussion—remain outside of this post. The post is long, but most of it consists of tables that anyone can easily ignore.

The SkatingScores table includes 25 competitions. I focused on the 19 men’s events. I’ll return to Skate Canada 2025, and another competition, later. I ran the same type of check on all the events, so if you’re not interested in looking at all the numbers, you can read what type of check I ran on the first event, and then scroll down until you find the “Skate Canada 2025” heading.

The first event on the list, aside from Skate Canada 2025, is the 2016 European Championships. Javier Fernandez had just won his second consecutive silver medal at the Grand Prix Final. Since that event, Fernandez had modified both layouts: he added a second quad in the short program, and replaced a triple toe loop with a triple axel in the free skate, raising both his base scores and improving his overall score by 9.82 points. At that European Championship Fernandez wasn’t perfect; he fell once in the free skate and made a few other mistakes. Despite this, he dominated. Why? Because at that moment, his strongest rivals weren’t European, but Asian and North American skaters, and all the Europeans present made mistakes.

The silver medalist, Alexei Bychenko, performed the fourth short program and the fourth free skate. He failed to win a small medal for either program, yet he still won the silver medal overall because the others failed in at least one of the two programs.

In fact, Fernandez did set what for many years was the largest lead over the runner-up in a major competition. He did so by improving his personal best by 9.82 points, but without achieving the highest score in history, given that the world record set by Yuzuru Hanyu the month before is higher than Fernandez’s score of 27.66 points. This means that his score had little impact on the figure skating world because, despite its high level, it didn’t show anything new.

Not only that. At the time of that European Championships, aside from Hanyu, 31 other skaters had personal bests higher than Bychenko’s score on that occasion. The advantage of the then-best Fernandez over the best skater (excluding Hanyu) was 7.50 points, not a small difference, but not a huge one either. Fernandez was good, but the huge gap was also due to the absence of strong rivals and the less-than-stellar performances of those who were present.

Skater	Event	Tot
Hanyu	GPF 15	330.43
Fernandez	EC 16	302.77
Chan	IdF 13	295.27
Fernandez	GPF 15	292.95
Ten	4CC 2015	289.46
Machida	WC 14	282.26
Uno	GPF 15	276,79
Takahashi	WTT 12	276.72
Jin	NHK 15	266.43
Brown	WTT 15	263.17
Plushenko	EC 12	261.23
Farris	4CC 15	260.01
Kozuka	WC 11	258.41
Lysacek	OG 10	257.67
Murakami	4CC 15	256.47
Oda	GPF 13	255.96
Mura	SC 14	255.81
Voronov	EC 14	252.55
Reynolds	4CC 13	250.55
Amodio	EC 13	250.53
Pitkeev	CoR 15	250.47
Miner	CoR 15	248.92
Rippon	CoR 15	248.63
Kolyada	CoR 15	247.97
Dmitriev	Ice Ch. 15	247.57
Kovtun	WC 14	247.37
Lambiel	OG 10	246.72
Abbott	WC 14	246.35
Gachinski	EC 12	246.27
Yan	OG 14	246.20
Buttle	WC 08	245.17
Joubert	WC 12	244.58
Brezina	EC 13	243.52
Nguyen	WC 15	242.59
Bychenko	EC 16	242.56

In italics I highlighted Fernandez’s previous personal best. In the other tables I do the same for the personal best of the winner of the silver if his score is not a personal best. In italics and blue I highlighted the scores of the competition I’m talking about.

From here on out, and up until the headline “Skate Canada 2025,” I’ll look at all the scores, just as I did with the 2016 European Championships.

The next highest win margin is the one Shoma Uno won the 2017 Lombardia Trophy with. Uno also set a personal best, improving by just 0.53 points and falling short of Hanyu’s world record of 10.59 points. Uno’s score is a very high one, but it wasn’t particularly surprising. As for Jason Brown, who finished second, he was 13.79 points below his personal best. Even without Hanyu, 16 skaters (including Brown) achieved a higher score than Brown that day.

Skater	Event	Tot
Hanyu	GPF 15	330.43
Uno	Lomb. 17	319.84
Uno	WC 17	319.31
Chen	4CC 17	307.46
Fernandez	WC 16	303.58
Chan	IdF 13	295.27
Ten	4CC 15	289.46
Machida	WC 14	282.26
Kolyada	GPF 17	282.00
Takahashi	WTT 12	276.72
Zhou	OG 18	276.69
Aliev	EC 18	274.06
Brown	WTT 17	273.67
Yan	4CC 16	271.55
Mura	4CC 16	268.43
Rippon	IdF 16	267.53
Kovtun	EC 17	266.80
Aaron	US Cl. 17	261.56
Plushenko	EC 12	261.23
Brown	Lomb. 17	259.88

In 2019, Hanyu won Skate Canada with a 59.82-point lead over Nam Nguyen. Recall that until the 2017-18 season, the scoring system used was +3/-3, but since the 2018-19 season, the scoring system has been +5/-5, so the world record and personal best are different in the two periods.

Compared to Fernandez and especially Uno, Hanyu significantly improved his personal best, a whopping 21.62 points. He still remained 0.38 points below the record set by Nathan Chen a few months earlier. Compared to previous cases, this time, the total score is not far from the maximum. However, one skater had achieved a higher score than Hanyu on that occasion, and nine skaters had achieved a higher score than Nguyen, who also achieved his personal best.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	WC 19	323.42
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Hanyu	WC 19	300.97
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Uno	4CC 19	289.12
Brown	Gold. Sp. 18	263.42
Kolyada	Nep. 18	274.37
Jin	4CC 19	273.51
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Messing	4CC 19	267.61
Cha	GPF 18	263.49
Nguyen	SC 19	262.77

In the next competition, Hanyu almost repeated his feat. His lead over the second-place finisher was slightly smaller, 55.03 points more than Kevin Aymoz, but this time he didn’t set a new personal best. And 16 skaters—aside from Chen and Hanyu himself—had a higher personal best than Aymoz.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	WC 19	323.42
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Hanyu	NHK 19	305.05
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Uno	4CC 19	289.12
Brown	Gold. Sp. 18	263.42
Kolyada	Nep. 18	274.37
Jin	4CC 19	273.51
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Messing	4CC 19	267.61
Cha	GPF 18	263.49
Nguyen	SC 19	262.77
Rizzo	WTT 19	260.53
Tanaka	WTT 19	258.84
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98
Voronov	NHK 18	254.28
Ignatov	CoR 19	252.87
Samsonov	JGP POL 19	250.51
Aymoz	NHK 19	250.02

Chen won the 2018 World Championships by a margin of 47.63 points over Uno. He set a personal best, but was 8.97 points shy of the world record held by Hanyu, who was absent. Uno, who was injured, was also 47.63 points shy of his personal best. Eight other skaters had previously achieved a higher score than Uno (plus Uno himself).

Skater	Event	Tot
Hanyu	GPF 15	330.43
Chen	WC 18	321.40
Uno	Lomb. 17	319.84
Chen	4CC 17	307.46
Fernandez	WC 16	303.58
Chan	IdF 13	295.27
Ten	4CC 15	289.46
Machida	WC 14	282.26
Kolyada	GPF 17	282.00
Takahashi	WTT 12	276.72
Zhou	OG 18	276.69
Aliev	EC 18	274.06
Uno	WC 18	273.77

Again Chen, but under the new scoring system, won Skate Canada in 2021 with a 47.63-point lead over Brown. He didn’t improve his personal best; that score wasn’t that high for him, and Hanyu also achieved a higher score than Chen on that occasion. Not that Brown improved his personal best—in fact, he was far from his best performance—but 13 other skaters achieved higher scores than Brown that day.

A note on the asterisks I placed next to Mikhail Kolyada and Boyang Jin’s names: the former achieved a higher score at the 2020 Rostelecom Cup, the latter at the Cup of China that same year. That year, however, the two competitions were held as local events only, with only Russian judges in the former and only Chinese judges in the latter. The ISU does not recognize scores achieved in these competitions as personal bests, and I, here as on other occasions, ignored them.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Chen	SC 21	307.18
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Kagiyama	WC 21	291.77
Uno	4CC 19	289.12
Aymoz	GPF 19	275.63
Brown	4CC 20	274.82
Kolyada*	Nep. 18	274.37
Jin*	4CC 19	273.51
Aliev	EC 20	272.89
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Messing	WC 21	270.26
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Nguyen	SC 19	262.77
Cha	4CC 20	265.43
Rizzo	WTT 19	260.53
Brown	SC 21	259.55

Malinin had previously won Skate Canada by a huge margin. In 2023, he had 44.33 points separating him from Aymoz. A huge gap, in a competition where both were far from their personal bests. Malinin was 6.76 points below his personal best, while Aymoz was a whopping 45.60 points below his personal best. In essence, Aymoz’s personal best was higher than Malinin’s winning score. Malinin’s victory with this advantage was not only due to his own merit, but also to the demerits of those competing against him. Nine skaters—including Malinin and Aymoz—had a personal best score higher than Malinin’s, while 43 others had a score higher than Aymoz’s.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Uno	WC 22	312.48
Kagiyama	OG 22	310.05
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Cha	WC 23	296.03
Malinin	WC 22	288.44
Kondratiuk	EC 22	286.56
Aymoz	WC 23	282.95
Malinin	Aut. Cl. 23	281.68
Miura	4CC 23	281.53
Brown	OG 22	281.24
Grassl	OG 22	278.07
Messing	4CC 23	275.57
Rizzo	WTT 23	275.36
Kolyada*	Nep. 18	274.37
Yamamoto	GPF 22	274.35
Semenenko	OG 22	274.13
Jin*	4CC 19	273.51
Tomono	WC 23	273.41
Aliev	EC 20	272.89
Vasiljevs	EC 22	272.08
Kvitelashvili*	WC 22	272.03
Pulkinen	WC 22	271.69
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Siao Him Fa	IdF 22	268.48
Mozalev*	EC 22	265.69
Sato	IdF 21	264.99
Gumennik*	Ten 21	263.14
Nguyen	SC 19	262.77
Tanaka	WTT 19	258.84
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98
Britschgi	WC 23	257.34
Ignatov*	NHK 21	257.20
Voronov	NHK 18	254.28
Sadovsky	CoR 21	253.80
Litvintsev	WC 23	251.76
Ma	Gold. Sp. 21	250.97
Samsonov	JGP POL 19	250.51
Yan*	CoC 19	249.45
Frangipani	Nep. 22	244.57
Lazukin	WTT 19	249.33
Kovtun	Tall. 18	247.55
Shimada	GP GB 22	247.17
Danielian	EC 20	246.74
Tsuboi	GP FIN 22	244.90
Kerry	OG 22	244.80
Egadze	Lomb. 23	243.35
Lee S.Y	IdF 23	242.62
Hiwatashi*	4CC 20	240.78
Miyake	4CC 22	240.02
Selevko A.	Gold. Sp. 21	238.42
Aymoz	Aut. Cl. 23	237.35

Another huge gap, 44.00 points, was the one Chen beat Brown by at Skate America 2019. Both had higher personal bests, another skater, Hanyu, had a higher personal best than Chen’s score that day, while 11 others had higher personal bests than Brown’s. As with all the other competitions listed here, the huge gap is there, but it’s the result of circumstance.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	WC 19	323.42
Hanyu	WC 19	300.97
Chen	SA 19	299.09
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Uno	4CC 19	289.12
Brown	Gold. Sp. 18	263.42
Kolyada	Nep. 18	274.37
Jin	4CC 19	273.51
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Messing	4CC 19	267.61
Cha	GPF 18	263.49
Rizzo	WTT 19	260.53
Tanaka	WTT 19	258.84
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98
Brown	SA 19	255.09

There’s a lot to say about the 2019 Grand Prix Final scores, but let’s leave it at that. Chen set what is still the world record, improving his previous record by 11.88 points. His lead over Hanyu was 43.87 points, partly because Hanyu made some mistakes. In fact, if we look at Hanyu’s personal best, the difference is 12.71 points, large but not all that impressive. There’s also a third skater, Vincent Zhou, who had a higher personal best score than the score obtained by Hanyu that day.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Chen	WC 19	323.42
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Hanyu	GPF 19	291.43

For the 2006 Rostelecom Cup, the check was a bit more elaborate, because on two occasions the World Championships’ total scores were based on the performance of a qualifying program too, a program I excluded by recalculating the totals based solely on the short and free programs.

Brian Joubert set a personal best, improving by 1.05 points—a small improvement—beating Johnny Weir by 41.55 points, who, however, remained far from his personal best. Joubert’s score, however, wasn’t a particularly high one, considering Plushenko had set a much higher record a few months earlier. And between Joubert’s winning score and Weir’s second-place finish, there were the personal bests of 20 other skaters.

Skater	Event	Tot
Plushenko	OG 06	258.33
Joubert	CoR 06	237.83
Joubert	WC 06	236.78
Lambiel	WC 06	233.99
Oda	SA 06	231.39
Sandhu	GPF 03	228.29
Buttle	OG 06	227.59
Lysacek	SA 06	221.09
Weir	NHK 04	220.25
Takahashi	SA 05	218.54
Preaubert	SA 06	212.67
Li	CoR 03	210.94
Goebel	NHK 04	208.28
Honda	SC 03	207.78
Weiss	SA 03	206.94
Savoie	OG 06	206.67
Dambier	CoR 03	201.55
Griazev	CoC 06	200.60
Lindemann	EC 05	200.54
Ferreira	SC 06	200.46
van der Perren	WC 05	200.02
Davydov	CoC 06	199.11
Mabee	4CC 06	198.69
Klimkin	EC 06	197.42
Weir	CoR 06	196.28

In 2018, Chen won Skate America with a 41.06-point lead over Michal Brezina. Chen’s score that day was inevitably a personal best, as it was his first competition under the +5/-5 scoring system. Brezina, on his second competition, improved on his previous score. Seven Challenger Series events had already taken place, but Skate America was the first senior Grand Prix competition. With only a handful of top skaters competing, nine of them had already scored higher than Brezina.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	SA 18	280.57
Uno	Lomb. 18	276.20
Kolyada	Nep. 18	274.37
Hanyu	Aut. Cl. 18	263.65
Cha	Aut. Cl. 18	259.78
Messing	Neb. 18	257.16
Jin	Fin 18	252.60
Aliev	Lomb. 18	250.55
Zhou	Fin 18	250.01
Lazukin	Lomb. 18	243.45
Brezina	SA 18	239.81

At Skate Canada in 2024, the gap between Malinin and second-place finisher Shun Sato was also high, 40.66 points. Neither skater set a personal best; in fact, both were far behind. These scores, therefore, aren’t particularly significant, especially considering that five skaters in their careers had set personal bests higher than Malinin’s score that day (six skaters, if we count Malinin himself), and that 34 skaters (35 including Sato) had achieved scores higher than Sato’s score for second place.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Malinin	WC 24	333.76
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Uno	WC 22	312.48
Kagiyama	OG 22	310.05
Siao Him Fa	IdF 23	306.78
Malinin	SC 24	301.82
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Cha	WC 23	296.03
Kondratiuk	EC 22	286.56
Sato	Lomb. 24	285.88
Aymoz	WC 23	282.97
Miura	4CC 23	281.53
Brown	OG 22	281.24
Grassl	OG 22	278.07
Messing	4CC 23	275.57
Rizzo	WTT 23	275.36
Kolyada*	Nep. 18	274.37
Yamamoto	GPF 22	274.35
Semenenko	OG 22	274.13
Britschgi	WC 24	274.09
Jin*	4CC 19	273.51
Tomono	WC 23	273.41
Aliev	EC 20	272.89
Vasiljevs	EC 22	272.08
Kvitelashvili*	WC 22	272.03
Pulkinen	WC 22	271.69
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Mozalev*	EC 22	265.69
Shaidorov	CoC 23	264.46
Gumennik*	Ten 21	263.14
Nguyen	SC 19	262.77
Tanaka	WTT 19	258.84
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98
Ignatov*	NHK 21	257.20
Selevko A.	EC 24	256.99
Voronov	NHK 18	254.28
Sadovsky	CoR 21	253.80
Memola	WC 23	253.12
Litvintsev	WC 23	251.76
Frangipani	CoC 23	251.59
Sato	SC 24	251.16

At the 2021 Nebelhorn Trophy, Zhou won by a significant margin over the second-place finisher, 40.45 points. Zhou remained below his personal best, while Adam Siao Him Fa improved on his previous competitions. This does not change the fact that four skaters other than Zhou had a higher personal best than Zhou’s score that day, and that 27 others had higher scores than Siao Him Fa.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Kagiyama	WC 21	291.77
Uno	4CC 19	289.12
Zhou	Neb. 21	284.23
Aymoz	GPF 29	275.63
Brown	4CC 20	274.82
Kolyada*	Nep. 18	274.37
Jin*	4CC 19	273.51
Aliev	EC 20	272.89
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Messing	WC 21	270.26
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Ngoyen	SC 19	262.77
Cha	4CC 20	265.43
Rizzo	WTT 19	260.53
Tanaka	WTT 19	258.84
Semenenko	WC 21	258.45
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98
Sato	JGPF 19	255.11
Voronov	NHK 18	254.28
Tomono	4CC 20	251.05
Samsonov	JGP POL 19	250.51
Yan*	CoC 19	249.45
Lazukin	WTT 19	249.33
Kvitelashvili*	CoR 18	248.58
Grassl	Lomb. 21	247.80
Kovtun	Tall. 18	247.55
Sadovsky	NHL 19	247.50
Danielian	EC 20	246.74
Mozalev	JWC 20	245.09
Pulkinen	SC 19	244.78
Siao Him Fa	Neb. 21	243.78

Malinin had already won a competition by a significant margin this season. At the Internationaux de France, he edged Siao Him Fa by 40.05 points. Neither of them achieved a personal best. Two skaters have a higher personal best than Malinin’s score that day, and the fact that neither of them competes anymore is not important to me. A score has a real impact when it surpasses what has already been achieved in the past; otherwise, it’s simply the best performance of the day. And 10 other skaters had previously achieved a score higher than the one Siao Him Fa achieved that day.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Malinin	WC 24	333.76
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Malinin	IdF 25	321.00
Uno	WC 22	312.48
Kagiyama	OG 22	310.05
Siao Him Fa	IdF 23	306.78
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Cha	WC 23	296.03
Shaidorov	WC 25	287.47
Kondratiuk	EC 22	286.56
Sato	Lomb. 24	285.88
Aymoz	WC 23	282.97
Miura	4CC 23	281.53
Brown	OG 22	281.24
Siao Him Fa	IdF 25	280.95

Not long after dominating the 2017 Lombardia Trophy ahead of Brown, Uno dominated Skate Canada, also ahead of Brown. This time, the gap was 39.96 points, in a competition in which neither skater set a personal best. Three skaters, plus Uno himself, had previously scored higher than Uno. Another 13 skaters, plus Brown himself, had previously scored higher than Brown.

Skater	Event	Tot
Hanyu	GPF 15	330.43
Uno	Lomb. 17	319.84
Chen	4CC 17	307.46
Fernandez	WC 16	303.58
Uno	SC 17	301.10
Chan	IdF 13	295.27
Ten	4CC 15	289.46
Machida	WC 14	282.26
Kolyada	GPF 17	282.00
Takahashi	WTT 12	276.72
Zhou	OG 18	276.69
Aliev	EC 18	274.06
Brown	WTT 17	273.67
Yan	4CC 16	271.55
Mura	4CC 16	268.43
Rippon	IdF 16	267.53
Kovtun	EC 17	266.80
Aaron	US Cl. 17	261.56
Plushenko	EC 12	261.23
Brown	SC 17	261.14

Siao Him Fa also won a competition with a significant lead over second-place finisher Lukas Britschgi. At the 2024 Cup of Nice, the difference was 39.16 points. Neither skater set a personal best, and in fact, Britschgi’s personal best is higher than Siao Him Fa’s winning score. Twenty-two skaters (including Britschgi, plus Siao Him Fa) had a higher personal best than Siao Him Fa’s winning score. Another 41 skaters (including some juniors) had a higher personal best than Britschgi’s score. The difference between the two skaters is significant, but it’s the only notable aspect of a competition in which neither skater performed at their best and which doesn’t stand out for its high scores.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Malinin	WC 24	333.76
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Uno	WC 22	312.48
Kagiyama	OG 22	310.05
Siao Him Fa	IdF 23	306.78
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Cha	WC 23	296.03
Kondratiuk	EC 22	286.56
Sato	Lomb. 24	285.88
Aymoz	WC 23	282.97
Miura	4CC 23	281.53
Brown	OG 22	281.24
Grassl	OG 22	278.07
Messing	4CC 23	275.57
Rizzo	WTT 23	275.36
Kolyada*	Nep. 18	274.37
Yamamoto	GPF 23	274.35
Semenenko	OG 22	274.13
Britschgi	WC 24	274.09
Jin*	4CC 19	273.51
Tomono	WC 23	273.41
Aliev	EC 20	272.89
Siao Him Fa	Nice 24	272.38
Vasiljevs	EC 22	272.08
Kvitelashvili*	WC 22	272.03
Pulkinen	WC 22	271.69
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Mozalev*	EC 22	265.69
Shaidorov	CoC 23	264.46
Gumennik*	Ten 21	263.14
Nguyen	SC 19	262.77
Tanaka	WTT 19	258.84
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98
Ignatov*	NHK 21	257.20
Selevko A.	EC 24	256.99
Voronov	NHK 18	254.28
Sadovsky	CoR 21	253.80
Memola	WC 23	253.12
Litvintsev	WC 23	251.76
Frangipani	CoC 23	251.59
Ma	Gold. Sp. 21	250.97
Samsonov	JGP POL 19	250.51
Yan*	CoC 19	249.45
Lazukin	WTT 18	249.33
Kovtun	Tall. 18	247.55
Shimada	Neb. 23	247.43
Danielian	EC 20	246.74
Broussard	Cranb. 24	246.48
Tsuboi	GP FIN 22	244.90
Kerry	OG 22	244.80
Egadze	Lomb. 23	243.35
Gorodnitsky	WAR 23	243.29
Lee S.Y.	IdF 22	242.62
Hiwatashi	4CC 20	240.48
Miyake	4CC 22	240.02
Torgashev	4CC 24	237.20
Economides	Cranb. 24	236.87
Lim	Ten 23	234.86
Selevko M.	WC 22	234.72
Kataise	JGP POL2 22	234.24
Gogolev	JGPF 18	233.58
Yoshioka	SA 23	233.56
Nakata	JGP CHN 24	233.53
Britschgi	Nice 24	233.22

The last competition in the table I posted at the beginning is the 2018 GP of Helsinki. Hanyu won by 30.13 points over Brezina, setting a new world record and improving his personal best by 33.47 points. Not that this improvement is truly significant; the GP of Helsinki was only Hanyu’s second competition under the new scoring system, and in the first he had made several mistakes, so despite winning, in the previsous competiton he still earned a low score. Here, he broke the previous world record by 6.52, thus achieving a high score that, throughout the entire season and the following season, only Hanyu and Chen would manage to surpass. Brezina delivered his best performance ever; the score he achieved that day would remain his personal best under this scoring system, but four skaters had achieved a higher score than Brezina’s.

Skater	Event	Tot
Hanyu	GP FIN 18	297.12
Chen	SA 18	280.57
Uno	SC 18	277.25
Kolyada	Nep. 18	274.37
Hanyu	Aut. Cl. 18	263.65
Cha	Aut. Cl. 18	259.78
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98

Skate Canada 2025

I looked at the scores of the top two finishers at the last Skate Canada, and the personal bests of all the skaters, following the same method I used for the other competitions.

Malinin set a new world record in the free skate, not in the total score of the competition; that still belongs to Chen. Malinin landed two quadruple jumps in the short program and six in the free skate, something he’d done several times in the past. In the free skate, he improved by 1.18 points, breaking a record he already held; in the total he improved by 0.05 points. Hats off to him for what he did, but what he did surprised no one. He’d already achieved similar scores; we knew he could reach them. And before he did, Chen had already achieved a higher score; we knew it was possible to reach that score. Hanyu’s personal best is 11.22 points lower; Malinin surpassed Hanyu (remember, I’m talking exclusively about higher scores; everything else isn’t relevant to this post), but the difference isn’t that big. Malinin’s huge advantage over Alexander Selevko is due to his high score, but also to the fact that certain strong skaters were missing, and those who were present did not perform to their full potential.

Skater	Event	Tot
Chen	GPF 19	335.30
Malinin	SC 25	333.81
Malinin	WC 24	333.76
Hanyu	SC 19	322.59
Uno	WC 22	312.48
Kagiyama	OG 22	310.05
Siao Him Fa	IdF 23	306.78
Zhou	WTT 19	299.01
Cha	WC 23	296.03
Shaidorov	WC 25	287.47
Kondratiuk	EC 22	286.56
Sato	Lomb. 24	285.88
Aymoz	WC 23	282.97
Miura	4CC 23	281.53
Brown	OG 22	281.24
Grassl	OG 22	278.07
Messing	4CC 23	275.57
Rizzo	WTT 23	275.36
Kolyada*	Nep. 18	274.37
Yamamoto	GPF 22	274.35
Semenenko	OG 22	274.13
Britschgi	WC 24	274.09
Jin*	4CC 2019	273.51
Tomono	WC 23	273.41
Aliev	EC 19	272.89
Vasiljevs	EC 22	272.08
Kvitelashvili*	WC 22	272.03
Pulkinen	WC 22	271.69
Fernandez	EC 19	271.59
Samarin	EC 19	269.84
Egadze	Ten 25	266.90
Mozalev*	EC 22	265.69
Memola	Lomb. 25	265.37
Gumennik*	Ten 21	263.14
Nguyen	SC 19	262.77
Tanaka	WTT 19	258.84
Brezina	GP FIN 18	257.98
Selevko A.	SC 25	257.21

Malinin won by a huge margin. He did so after years of gradually increasing his scores. No one could have known in advance how much of a lead he would have at Skate Canada, but we all expected him to win without difficulty. It’s not as if Malinin’s score was a surprise, or that it changed our perception of what a high score is. At the 2019 Grand Prix Final, Chen achieved a higher total score than Malinin had just achieved, and if Chen won by a smaller margin, it’s only because there were stronger skaters at that event than at Skate Canada 2025 (although Hanyu made mistakes there, at no event under the +5/-5 scoring system has Hanyu ever achieved a score as low as Selevko’s at the last Skate Canada, while Aymoz set what was then a personal best, scoring 18.42 points more than Selevko).

If Malinin completes clean programs, with his base value, this scoring system, and this way of award marks by the judges, he wins. Currently, no one can achieve the same scores. Once someone else manages to raise their BV enough and complete clean programs, things could change, but for now, Malinin’s win is not surprising. To get a better idea of ​​his margin, I checked SkatingScores for the highest BV in the free skate at major international competitions (including the WTT) from the 2018-19 season onward. The eight highest BVs, and 14 of the fifteen highest, belong to Malinin. The only infiltrator is Chen, who had the 9th and 16th highest BV, then gradually Shaidorov (17th), Zhou (18th), Siao Him Fa (19th), Kagiyama (25th), Uno (30th), Hanyu (32nd), Grassl (33rd) and Egadze (35th) begin to appear. You can find the rankings here.

In the short program too Malinin has the highest BV, and 7 of the 9 highest BVs. Chen took the second and third places, then Samarin is 10th, Grassl 19th, Zhou 20th, Jin 25th, Sato 32nd, and Siao Him Fa 33rd.

That said, knowing Malinin won, was anyone surprised by the result? Does Malinin’s score have any relevance to figure skating?

Earlier, when I looked at skaters’ personal bests at a time when a competition had a very large difference between the first-place and second-place scores, I left out one competition. I’m bringing it up now. That competition was the 2015 NHK Trophy. That day, Hanyu won ahead of Jin by what was then the largest margin ever recorded in a competition: 55.97 points. Of course, there were 6 skaters (besides Hanyu himself) who had already scored higher than Jin’s score, and that margin, 55.97 points, was later surpassed by four skaters, Fernandez a couple of months later, Uno almost two years later, Hanyu himself four years later, and now Malinin.

Skater	Event	Tot
Hanyu	GPF 15	330.43
Chan	IdF 13	295.27
Hanyu	GPF 13	293.25
Ten	4CC 2015	289.46
Machida	WC 14	282.26
Uno	GPF 15	276.79
Takahashi	WTT 12	276.72
Fernandez	WC 14	275.93
Jin	NHK 15	266.43

So, here too, am I repeating what I’ve written so far? Not really, because there’s something that hasn’t been overcome. That day, Hanyu set a new world record. And he surpassed the previous world record by a lot.

I’ve created a final table that includes all the events listed by SkatingScores, including the women’s, pairs, and ice dance events. I’ve highlighted these events by writing the data in red. In the first six columns, from left to right, I’ve listed the skater’s name, the event name, the winner’s score, the margin by which he won over the second-place finisher, that skater’s personal best updated to the previous event, and the difference between the score with which that skater won the event in question and their personal best. In some cases, the number is negative because, despite having won by a huge margin, the skater didn’t improve. There are two rows in gray. In this case, the skaters set a new world record, but he did so in the first season that a new scoring system was used. This is no small detail.

If we look at the lists of all those who have set a record in total points using the +3/-3 system and a record in total points using the +5/-5 system, we see that there were quite a few records at the beginning. Naturally, in the first competition (under either system), as soon as a skater who was slightly stronger than the previous skater, or who had a slightly better program that day, took to the rink, they set a new record. And, throughout the entire season, there were quite a few records. Setting a record in the first season under a new scoring system isn’t particularly difficult. Not that it’s easy, with the exception of the first skater to take to the rink in the first competition, but in the first season, whether 2003-04 or 2018-19, excluding the first competition, eight world records were set. In the subsequent 14 seasons in which the +3/-3 system was used, the record was broken seven times, on average once every two years. In the slightly more than six seasons in which the +5/-5 system was used, the record was broken only once. If we want, we can say that there were only five seasons, given the number of competitions cancelled between 2020 and 2021, but in fact only one record was set. Therefore, the two records in the gray rows are slightly less significant, with Chen’s lasting two weeks and Hanyu’s lasting four and a half months.

In the last two columns, I’ve indicated the world record in effect until the previous competition, and the difference between the skater’s score that day and the previous world record. The skaters are listed according to this column, from greatest to smallest difference.

Hanyu didn’t just win his competition, with a massive 55.97 points difference on the second-place finisher. Later that difference was surpassed. What makes this competition different, however, is that Hanyu literally shattered the previous world record. Hanyu didn’t just outscore Jin. Hanyu surpassed Patrick Chan’s two-year-old record by a whopping 27.13 points.

What Hanyu did it that day—and repeated two weeks later at the Grand Prix Final in Barcelona, ​​where Hanyu raised the record total to 330.43 points, outscoring by 37.48 points the reigning world champion (who that day set a personal best), not a skater who, at least until now, had never finished in the top 10 at a World Championships—scared Alexander Lakernik, then head of the ISU Technical Commission and, a few months later, ISU Vice President. It’s no coincidence that Lakernik declared that the ISU would change the scoring system. As far as I know, his interview is no longer available online, but a couple of mentions can still be found on Beverley Smith’s blog and on the Gazzetta dello Sport website. For the former, here’s the link:

Scoring changes afoot because of Hanyu

but, in case the page disappears, I took a screenshot of it.

For the second one, the link is this:

https://archiviostorico.gazzetta.it/2015/dicembre/28/Hanyu_oltre_limiti_PERFEZIONE_FATTA_ga_0_20151228_0b033502-ad30-11e5-b8a0-894f768b3b72.shtml.

For those who don’t know Italian, we could translate the passage that interests me like this:

The Russian guru Alexander Lakernik, head of the Technical Committee of the International Skating Union, in a recent interview with R-Sport, admitted that, at this rate, soon (but it will not be possible before the PyeongChang 2018 Games) the performance coefficients of the individual elements will have to be reviewed. Hanyu’s fault, of course. And of programs that have never been so successful

Malinin won by a huge margin, yet the ISU remained unmoved. Malinin’s actions bear no resemblance to the power of what happened on November 28, 2015. If we were to pinpoint a moment when the ISU was shaken and figure skating changed, it was undoubtedly this:

The first image is from the press conference on July 19th. That day, Hanyu later told us, was pitch black. The decision to step away from competition had matured in the preceding months, after years of questioning his future, longing to abandon a competitive circuit that was increasingly restricting him, yet still ensnaring him. There were medals to win, a nation to represent, a jump to conquer, the pride of always pursuing his own path. Until the moment he said enough.

What’s left of an athlete when he leaves his sport? Can he still call himself an athlete? And does he still have something to offer the public? Hanyu believed so. Deep down, he was convinced he still had so much left, and he wanted to share what was inside him with those who had followed his journey, but would his fans continue to follow him? He didn’t know that, he couldn’t know.

There had been signs. At the last Olympic Games, he had finished fourth. After eight years, he was no longer the reigning Olympic champion; after seven and a half years and 31 consecutive competitions—34 if we count team competitions—he had failed to reach the podium for the first time. Yet the fans hadn’t abandoned him; on the contrary, they had rallied around him even more. How would the fans react now? Would Hanyu see again those packed arenas where he had been a star during his competitive years? The sight of the packed Saitama Super Arena, just before the free skate that had won him his sixth national title, had brought him to tears. And now?

After the press conference and several interviews with specialized publications, Hanyu launched his YouTube channel, and the initial public response came from the hundreds of thousands of people who, within a very short time, began following his channel. A couple of short videos, one featuring three jumps and a spin, a training broadcast in front of the press and live online, with over 100,000 people watching. Then, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, skated for 24-hour TV, as per long-standing tradition, some television and entertainment engagements, and another video featuring two programs: Change, one of his classics, and Dreamy Aspiration, a new program choreographed by himself. And the announcement of his first solo show, Prologue.

His first solo show. I wondered how it was possible to put on a solo show. There certainly had to be a few minutes of intermission to allow him to change and catch his breath, probably a few minutes covered by video, but aside from imagining this solution, I had no idea what Hanyu could do. How he could sustain himself athletically for the length of a show. What could he say, all by himself, so that the show wasn’t just a succession of programs (even beautiful ones) disconnected from each other. How could he possibly think this was his first solo show? Why, did he intend to put on more? Really? What did he think he was doing? For me, it was a matter of waiting to find out. For him, it was different.

It was a gamble for him. Would the fans follow him? He booked two arenas, the Pia Arena in Yokohama and Flat Hachinohe. Two days in each city, although he later added a third show in Hachinohe because the demand for tickets was too high to accommodate all the fans. The Pia Arena is huge. How many shows don’t fill arenas with a capacity of a couple of thousand? He sold out both days with 7,900 people, but only because it wasn’t possible to let more people in, because many didn’t win tickets through the lottery he regularly uses to give everyone an equal chance of seeing one of his shows. The second doubt concerned his physical stamina. Hanyu always gives his all. Would he be able to make it through an hour-and-a-half show? Would he be able to do it in a much longer show like Gift? Because even if we didn’t know it, at the same time as Prologue he was working on Gift, and there were certainly many doubts running through his mind. Would viewers have appreciated the videos and the part where he stops to chat? And the six-minute warm-up?

I recently read an interview from the Continue with Wings era. It was 2018, he had just won his second Olympic gold medal, and to mark the occasion, he had decided to produce a celebratory show. Hanyu skated little, his ankle was still injured, and the performers were other skaters who had played a key role in his career in different ways. And, in an interview, Hanyu had stated that he would have liked to include a warm-up within a show. He would do so over four years later, but the idea was already there at the time. And who knows how long other ideas crossed his mind, and he toyed with them, reworking them, perhaps discarding them, or completely transforming them, before arriving at the formula we saw.

Looking back, Prologue seems like a simple show. But we only have this impression because after Prologue, Hanyu created Gift, Re_Pray, and Echoes of Life, shows that were all different, each a step forward on a journey that I hope will continue for many years to come.

Prologue is Hanyu’s story. I already commented the show at the time, although there’s so much more to say. The show begins with the press conference on July 19th. Then comes a step back, the reason why the press conference of an athlete bidding farewell to competition is so important: the second Olympic gold medal. Hanyu begins with the warm-up, because competitions began with the warm-up, and then presents the free program with which he wrote skating history. With that program, he had already destroyed the code of points in the fall of 2015. In 2018, he brought Seimei back to the Olympic Games and definitively established himself as the greatest skater of all time. Not only for the number of wins, but also for the way he won, for what he did on the rink. The Prologue version is slightly different; the program is a little shorter than the competition program and contains three triple axels, a deliberate violation of the Zayak rule, a declaration that he is no longer bound by the rules and that he alone is now the one who decides his own path. Only after presenting the two key turning points of his career does Hanyu return to the beginning and retrace his competitive history through a mix of programs performed on the ice and videos projected on the giant screen.

He spoke of some difficulties, the issues related to the rights to the music he used, working until the last minute to make the videos, the beginning of the collaboration with Mikiko and other professionals who would help him transform his projects into finished works. The tone is conversational, Hanyu and his fans, with whom he interacts via a luminous bracelet, but the technical content is important. And above all, what Prologue is is important. Prologue is a breaking point in many ways. It’s a new way of putting on an ice skating show. It’s not a path others can follow; there are no other skaters capable of filling arenas like Hanyu, and there are no other skaters capable of skating at such a high technical level for such a long time. To understand just how high the technical level was, at the last show in Hachinohe, Hanyu started with the six-minute arm up, landing a 3Lo, a 3A+2T combination, a 2T that was probably a planned 4T popped, and two 4S. He then skated ten programs, some in their entirety, others only in parts, executing these technical elements:

Above all, with Prologue Hanyu had the confirmation of being able to create, of being able to do something new. You have to be a visionary and work like hell to do it, but it’s possible. Prologue introduced the warm-up, the projections on the ice—real projections that interact with the athlete, not just colored spotlights—the unique story, the intertwining of video and live programs, the tension of the competitions that complements the artistic aspect, the role of the audience not as mere passive spectators but as part of the show. These are small seeds that will give life to the wonderful story that is unfolding in the Ice Stories.

Three years ago, Hanyu produced and performed an extraordinary show. Yet for him, it was only a prologue.

[lo stesso testo in italiano si trova qui – notice about the Italian text]

Yuzuru Hanyu has decided to enter a “maintenance” period to take care of his body and continue studying, with the goal of surpassing his past performances in future performances. As for his studies, we know he’s studying dance, but he also has very broad interests that include bioethics and philosophy.

In three years, Hanyu has created five different shows: Prologue, Gift, Re-Pray, Echoes of Life, and Notte stellata. He designed the structure of the shows himself, and for Re_Pray and Echoes of Life, he had to invent a story. He published it as a short story only for Echoes of Life, but Re_Pray also has its own very strong narrative that isn’t autobiographical, unlike Prologue and Gift (even though no one before him had ever thought it possible to create a single show, the creative aspect is important for Prologue and Gift too). Notte stellata is more traditional, with several skaters skating their programs one after the other, but the three collaborations, with Kohei Uchimura, Mao Daichi, and Mansai Nomura, are something significant on an artistic and creative level. And it doesn’t matter that the choreography was done by others—David Wilson, Shae-Lynn Bourne, Rino Masaki, as well as Uchimura and Nomura themselves (and Hanyu) for their parts. The idea of ​​creating something together already requires a considerable creative commitment, as does the idea of ​​collaborations on the big screen between Hanyu and four or five skaters on the rink for Dynamite and Permission to Dance. And then there are all the new programs choreographed by Hanyu over the past three years. I’m only counting those, not the new programs choreographed for him by Wilson, Bourne, or Mikiko. They are Dreamy Aspiration, A Fleeting Dream, Sasanqua, Ashura-chan, All These Things That I’ve Done, If…, Glamorous Sky, Megalovania, The Darkness of Eternity, Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals, Goliath, Aqua’s Journey, Meteor, Last Ambient, First Pulse, First Echo + Circulation, Mass Destruction: Reload, Eclipse/Blue, Gate of Steiner – Aestetics on Ice, Hymn of the Soul, Bow and Arrow. There are 21 programs in all, a significant creative effort spanning three years. And then there are the other new choreographies he had to learn, the old programs he continued to skate, the presence in several traditional shows, the appearances on numerous television and radio programs, the photo shoots, the interviews, the work with sponsors… It’s normal for anyone, after three years like this, to feel the need to take a break to study, improve, and calmly develop new projects. In fact, a normal person wouldn’t even have been able to keep up with Hanyu’s pace. Probably no one else could have maintained that pace for just one year, let alone three. And to all the public appearances, to all the work we see, are added the training sessions, of which we’ve only seen a few snippets. Training sessions in which, in addition to honing his expressive abilities, he has to work on both the stamina needed to complete his shows and the explosiveness required by the jumps.

The explosiveness required by the jumps, yes. Because Hanyu continues to make numerous jumps. He doesn’t always manage to execute them as he would like, just as he didn’t always managed to do so during competitions. We’ve seen several falls over the years, and several jumps with imprecise landings, missing part of the rotation, or resulting in a step-out. Most of the jumps we’ve seen in these three years, if they had been performed in competition, would have deserved a +5 GOE. And this demands a lot from his body. To understand how much, to understand whether the jumps he has made are very few, I looked at his entire career. The first seven tables show all the jumps Hanyu has performed in detail, the last one summarizes them for a better overview. I only looked at the main activity of each season, not to everything else.

What do I mean by main activity? During his time competing, I’m referring to competitions and only competitions. He almost always skated both short program and free skate, although some youth competitions were based on just one of the two programs, and in the Sochi Team Event Hanyu skated only the short program. No training, which is obviously crucial but about which we know almost nothing, and no galas either. The result was based on the jumps in competitions, not those at galas, which he almost always participated in but occasionally skipped without any relevance for the result of the competition (two famous examples are the 2014 Cup of China and the 2018 Rostelecom Cup, competitions in which he was clearly injured). The exclusion of galas from my tables is linked to a practical reason: videos don’t always exist, so it’s impossible to know what he did (and no, knowing which program he performed isn’t enough: at the gala of the 2017 Four Continents Championships, he skated Notte stellata, but instead of the usual 3A, he performed a 3T; at the 2022 Olympic Games, he skated Haru yo, koi, and instead of the usual 3Lo, he performed a 3A). And then there are the jumps competitions he performed so many times at the end of the galas, and the shows he started participating in since he was a child… No. His main activity. He competed to win, and to do that, he had to present one or two programs depending on the type of competition: short program and free skate. This is what I watched.

Hanyu began skating at the age of 4. Little is known about his early years. In February 2000, when he was 5 years old and had been training for about six months, Hanyu participated in his first competition, the Miyagi Prefectural Competition. The minute-long program, set to the music of Ultraman Gaia, was choreographed by his coach, Mami Yamada. The technical elements included a waltz jump (the take-off is an axel, the jump consists of a half-rotation), a three turn, and a upright spin. Hanyu placed second behind Jun Suzuki.

In the 2001-02 season, he won the Shin-Matsudo Daiei OSC Cup, performing his first double salchow in competition. Not only his first in competition, but literally his first landed correctly, as Hanyu himself explained in the Prologue booklet. This means he started performing double jumps between the ages of 6 and 7. In the same season—perhaps earlier, perhaps later, the booklet lists the seasons but not the exact dates—Hanyu also won the UHB Cup. The title of the program, choreographed by Mami Yamada, is something like Grass Horse Race or Amateur Horse Race.

During this period, Yamada left Sendai, and Shoichiro Tsuzuki became Hanyu’s new coach. We know nothing about the 2002-03 season, except that his program was From Russia with Love, choreographed by Tsuzuki and that he performed it again in the following season. At unspecified times during these years, Hanyu passed several Badge tests, as only those who pass them can participate in certain competitions. To participate in Novice B competitions, you must have passed at least the Level 3 Badge Test, which requires at least one single axel, a double-jump-single-jump combination, and three different spins—two of at least five rotations and one of at least six rotations—as well as certain steps.

Since the 2004-05 season, the JSF website has begun listing the results of competitions Hanyu participated in. These may not be all his competitions; it’s possible that the results of some local competitions weren’t posted online. We don’t have the protocol for some competitions, but we do have the scores, because they were judged using the 6.0 system. I looked at the existing protocols and added the layout from the National Novice B Championships in October 2004 and the short program from the Asian Novice Championships in Spring 2005, because we have videos of those programs, so we can see which elements Hanyu performed. I looked at the type of jump, with the corresponding number of rotations, indicated on the protocol, not the quality of execution. What interests me is the type of physical effort, and regardless of whether a 4T is a +5 GOE or a 4T<< with a fall, the physical effort required is the same, even if the quality of execution couldn’t be more different. If the protocol says 1S, even if I know Hanyu wanted to perform a 4S, as happened in the short program at the Beijing Olympics, I count a single salchow as an execution, because considering what Hanyu wanted to do but didn’t do creates complications that aren’t always solvable. In this type of control, I followed what is written in the protocol.

To keep the screens manageable, I’ve divided Hanyu’s competitive career into four sections: the six seasons in which he competed in the novice and junior categories, and his senior career across the three Olympic quadrennials. These are 29, 27, 22, and 15 competitions, respectively. From a certain point on, the number of competitions was limited by a series of significant physical problems and by the pandemic, which, between the end of the 2019-20 season and the start of the next, effectively led to the cancellation of an entire season.

Hanyu began performing double jumps in the 2001-02 season, and the double Axel in the 2004-05 season. The triple Axel entered his program during his first junior season, the quadruple toe loop in his first senior season, and then gradually he introduced other quadruples. Obviously, all single jumps are errors; Hanyu wanted to perform a double or triple, but he only performed one single. The number of 2T is high because that jump is part of the combinations, with one to three 2T in the free skates; he occasionally performed a 2T in the short program as well (from his second junior season onward, he did a 2T in the short program when he popped a planned 3T).

Single jumps, with the exception of the euler used in three-jump combinations, have almost disappeared, and even doubles, in the 12 seasons Hanyu competed in the senior category, are very few, with the obvious exception of 2T. In the future, I will check how many and what quadruple jumps Hanyu and several other skaters performed during their competitive careers to better contextualize what Hanyu did. For now, I’ll look at what he did after turning professional.

Here too, I look at Hanyu’s main activity. What do I mean by this? As a professional, he performs in shows. His shows include the solo shows and also Notte stellata, but also one edition of Stars on Ice, two editions of Fantasy on Ice, the Major’s Cup, Challenge, and The First Skate. Fantasy on Ice, and when he went there, Stars on Ice, were previously a sideline for him, because the focus was on competitions (even though Hanyu always gave his all in his shows, too). Now they’re his main activity. To the shows, I add videos: those for his own channel, like Sasanqua or The Final Time Traveler, those made for others, like Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso for 24 Hour TV or Bow and Arrow for Kenshi Yonezu, but also the short videos featuring a training session or even a single jump posted by Hanyu on his official social media channels. This is because I consider those videos a way to communicate with fans and keep interest in his shows high. I don’t consider the training sessions we’ve seen in all the specials produced by Asahi or in broadcasts like the Switch Interview with Koichi Domoto, because those jumps are part of the training sessions, something necessary for public activity but which isn’t public activity, even when we have some images. I also don’t consider what Hanyu did in the commercials, which, while important, are a collateral activity, just as the shows were collateral until July 19, 2022.

I’ve kept the division into seasons, using the official date indicated by the ISU for the transition from one season to the next. This means that seasons begin on July 1st of one year and end on June 30th of the following year. Given the number of events Hanyu participated in, I’ve dedicated a different screen to each of the three seasons. In some cases, the name of the show is followed by an asterisk. This means I haven’t seen that show, so I’m not sure what Hanyu did. In Fantasy on Ice, Hanyu always performs a 4T in the opening program. I can imagine what he did there and in subsequent programs because I know which program he skated, so I know the layout (not the quality of execution, but the technical elements he performed), but I have no idea how the final part went, where anyone who wanted to perform an element of their choice. Hanyu always performs a 4T (almost always, sometimes he chose a more difficult quadruple), but sometimes after that 4T he performed other jumps, usually 3A and/or 3T. Not knowing what Hanyu actually did, I’ll just include the minimum in my table, a 4T. As for Stars on Ice, in the final presentation Hanyu often performed a sequence of steps, but sometimes he performed a 4T. How many times did he choose to do a quadruple? I don’t know; I only indicated it when I’m sure he did it.

The tables now also include the delayed single axel, a jump that makes no sense in competition due to its very low base value—although with the new rules it has become possible to do it in the choreographic sequence, without this creating problems with the other jumps—but which is one of the breathtaking elements of Hanyu’s programs. In this regard, I recall what Dick Button wrote in his Push Dick’s Button (pages 78-80):

A perfect jump lift up first; then the skater rotates for however many revolutions; and then a really good the skater will pause for a very short hang time and then land […]. Also, a good jump should not only have height, but distance as well.
[…] the jump should impact the audience. It should inspire a small burst of exhilaration in us.
[…]
Also look for ballon! Ballon is that effervescent nanosecond of movement that you see when a dancer jumps and at the peak of the jump there is a sudden and very slight added suspension, a split second of delay. […]
Ballon is an appearance as well as the feeling of weiightlessness. It’s French for hang time. Skaters attempt to achieve the extra effect of ballon in a variation called a “delayed Axel.” […]
Delayed Axels were seen more frequently during the time single Axels were still of value. In actuality, the delayed Axel is extremely difficult, require a greater level of control […]
For some of us, it isthe overall quality—the smooth entry, the height, the distance, the turns, any space or delay between the turns, and the landing—that remain the most valuable elements in a jump […].

In the 2024-25 season chart, the number of jumps with few rotations increases. This is a deliberate choice by Hanyu, who prioritized the expressive aspect of the jumps rather than the number of rotations in the Piano Collection of Echoes of Life, during which he deliberately performed a single loop and a double toe loop.

I’ve put an asterisk next to three dates. In Echoes of Life, between the Piano Collection and Chopin’s Ballade, for three minutes Hanyu skates in the dark while the Elevenplay dance. What the Elevenplay do is wonderful, but Hanyu is on the ice, before the spectators’ eyes, even when the cameras aren’t on him. I was in the arena in Chiba; both days he performed a perfect 4T+1Eu+3S combination; on the second day he also performed a salchow deliberately double. I assume he was thinking about the axis of rotation; in fact, everyone there saw it. Hanyu was performing at that moment too. Well, in all the shows Hanyu did the same kind of warm-up in the dark, but on three occasions I have no idea what jumps he performed, so I didn’t calculate anything for those minutes.

Below this table I added another one-line table in which I indicated the sum of all the jumps performed by Hanyu in these three seasons.

These are the complete figures. To better understand the scope of Hanyu’s accomplishments in his three professional seasons, I’ve compiled the numbers into a few broad categories. Three periods: novice and junior categories, senior category, and professional career. Jumps separated into single delayed axels, single jumps, double jumps, triple jumps, 3A, which is always a jump in itself (and anyone who’s unsure can ask Nathan Chen whether any of the four types of quadruple jumps he usually did or 3A were more difficult for him, or he can ask Alexandra Trusova the same question), and quadruple jumps. While I was at it, I also added the number of spins. Some are simple, but the Piano Collection includes a one-minute spin, and Megalovania, with its spins, is a program both difficult and tiring.

Yuzuru Hanyu has decided to enter a period of “maintenance.” I’d say he’s well deserved it. I don’t know when he’ll return or what he’ll do, but judging by everything he’s done in the past, I’m sure whatever he does will be extraordinary.

The ISU has officially recognized six types of jumps. In order of base value, they are toe loop, salchow, loop, flip, lutz, and axel. While jumps were initially not essential in figure skating competitions, rotations increased over time, with the transition from single jumps to doubles, triples, and quadruples, and their importance grew steadily. In men’s figure skating, now results are primarily tied to the number of quadruples successfully completed during competitions. But who was the first skater to land the various types of quadruples? And what impact did the quadruple jump have on their careers?

Toe loop (T)

The first quadruple to be officially recognized by the ISU was the quadruple toe loop landed by Kurt Browning at the 1988 World Championship. It’s not the first quadruple attempted in competition. In 1986, Jozef Sabovčík landed a quadruple toe loop at the European Championship, but the ISU didn’t recognize the jump because Sabovčík touched the ice with his free foot. Brian Boitano, the reigning world champion, attempted a quadruple toe loop at the 1987 World Championship, fell, and lost the title to Brian Orser. Would Orser still have won if Boitano hadn’t fallen? It’s possible. What’s certain is that Boitano took a huge risk that didn’t pay off.

Kurt Browning was a young and promising skater in 1988. The year before, he had competed in the World Championships for the first time, finishing fifteenth. No one expected him to achieve a major result. He wasn’t in contention for medals at the 1988 Olympic Games, when he attempted his quadruple toe loop and fell. He ultimately placed eighth (11th in the compulsory figures, 7th in the short program, 6th in the free skate). At the 1988 World Championships, he wasn’t in a better position after placing 12th in the figures and 7th in the short program. He attempted the quadruple toe loop again, and this time he completed it. With the third free skate, he climbed to sixth place. The following year, Browning would win the first of his four world gold medals. The quadruple toe loop was what brought him fame.

In this table, I’ve listed all of Browning’s Olympic and World Championship appearances, along with the results. I’ve highlighted in green the event where Browning landed the first quadruple toe loop. First came the jump, and then the champion.

Browning never landed a quadruple toe loop combination, he never even attempted it. The first to land a quadruple toe loop combination (4T+2T) was Elvis Stojko at the 1991 World Championship, his second appearance. Stojko finished that competition in sixth place. His first medal, a bronze, came a year later. He, too, built a reputation for his jumps before he started to win.

Salchow (S)

The first skater to land the quadruple salchow was Timothy Goebel. Once nicknamed “Quad King,” Goebel landed the jump for the first time in 1998 in a junior competition, the Junior Grand Prix Final. And, just to be sure, he immediately performed it in combination. After adding the quadruple toe loop to his program, in the fall of 1999 at Skate America Goebel became the first skater to complete three quadruple jumps in a free skate. His three most important medals, the Olympic bronze and two World Championship silvers, came between 2002 and 2003, so years after he landed his quads for the first time.

In the table I also decided to indicate other significant changes regarding the jumps, such as the increase in the number of quadruples included in the layout, another change Gobel made before winning the medals. For Goebel the quadruples were something he needed to compete with the best skaters (Goebel won his Olympic bronze behind Alexei Yagudin and Evgeni Plushenko, skaters who could perform the quadruple toe loop in combination).

Lutz (Lz)

How many people remember the name Brandon Mroz? As a lot of skaters of his era, Mroz landed the quadruple toe loop a few times, but that jump clearly wasn’t enough to get results. In his first senior season, Mroz won silver at the US National Championships, which earned him a spot at the World Championships. There Mroz placed eighth. The two following National Championships, however, didn’t go well; a sixth- and seventh-place finish prevented him to be sent to the major competitions. If Mroz wanted to get results, he had to change something. What did he do? He added the quadruple Lutz to his programs.

He landed the 4Lz with a positive GOE only at the Colorado Spring Invitational, a local competition of minimal importance with only three participants. However, after watching the video of the jump, the ISU ratified it. Mroz attempted the 4Lz three more times, at the 2011 NHK Trophy and at the 2011 Rostelecom Cup. The first time, he was a bit off-balance, nothing terrible, but he still had a negative GOE. The other two times, he fell on underrotated jumps. End of attempts. As for Mroz’s career, with three placings—14th, 9th, and 9th—at the National Championships, he never returned to the World Championships. It’s no coincidence that I listed a single World Championship and then a series of National Championships in my table, to explain why there aren’t other World Chanpionship results.

Mroz added a new quadruple jump to his program in an attempt to achieve some results, but all he got was a quick mention in the history of figure skating jumps. Better than nothing, but he was never a champion.

As for the 4Lz in combination, the first to try it (and, while he was at it, land it with a positive GOE) was Boyang Jin at the 2015 Cup of China, his first senior international competition. The combination was important for Jin’s reputation before the results arrived, two world bronze medals in 2016 and 2017.

Flip (F)

The first skater to land a quadruple flip was Shoma Uno, in a competition that felt much more like an exhibition than a real competition, even though the ISU sent judges and there is an official protocol: the 2016 Team Challenge Cup.

Up until that point, 18-year-old Uno, in his first senior season, had won a bronze medal at the Grand Prix final, but had also finished seventh in his only appearance at the World Championships. Even at the Four Continents Championships, where he had competed twice (the first time when he was still competing in the junior category), he had failed to reach the podium, finishing fifth and fourth. The quadruple flip put him on the figure skating map and gave him the chance to compete for major medals.

By becoming the first skater to complete the 4F Uno entered the medal contention, but despite of the increased number of quadruples, he could only gain prominence once stronger skaters of his era left the competitive stage.

The first skater to attempt (and complete) a 4F combination was seventeen-year-old Nathan Chen in 2017, in his third senior competition. For him, too, quadruples were essential to starting to achieve results.

Loop (Lo)

The first skater to complete a 4Lo was Yuzuru Hanyu in 2016. In 2014, Hanyu had won back-to-back Grand Prix Final, Olympic gold, and World Championship. What motivation could he have had to keep going? The number of skaters who retire immediately after the Olympic success is incredibly high, though I’ll get back to that another day. Hanyu kept going. In 2015, after overcoming a season in which he faced enormous physical problems, in two competitions, in the span of two weeks, he broke six world records. He didn’t just break them, he literally shattered them. What motivation could Hanyu have had to keep going, to learn difficult things, to risk injury, or to risk ruining his image as a champion with falls and—perhaps—inferior results compared to the past?

Hanyu was 21 at the time. How old were the skaters I’ve mentioned so far? Browning was 21, at a time when they were older when they won because it took years to learn how to correctly draw compulsory figures; Stojko was 19 (and he too started competing during the compulsory figures era); Mroz was 20; Goebel, Uno, and Chen were 17; and Jin was 18.

Hanyu found within himself the motivation to continue despite his extraordinary successes, and the courage to do so when everything, from his age to several very concrete reasons, told him it would be easier not to. We can’t know the future, but in 2015, with a free program that included only two quadruple toe loops and a quadruple salchow, Hanyu twice achieved a higher score than he would have needed to win Olympic gold in 2018. The 4Lo was not necessary for him to compete with the best. He was the best, and precisely because he was the best, he felt the desire to venture into uncharted territories and bring something to figure skating that hadn’t existed before, a new quadruple jump.

From the table, we see that Hanyu had already won about half of his total medals (including his first Olympic gold medal and his first World Championship gold medal) before landing that quadruple loop. But for him that wasn’t enough. Even before attempting the quadruple loop, but after his first Olympic and World Championship gold medal, Hanyu had added a quadruple loop to his free skate (and one to his short program), demonstrating a rare desire to improve even when he was already at the top.

After landing the quadruple loop, he added another quadruple loop to his free skate (actually, the two things should have happened simultaneously, but he made some mistakes in the first competition). Then he won his second World Championship gold medal and his second Olympic gold medal, learning a fourth type of quadruple jump between those two medals (I didn’t include the 4Lz, which Hanyu completed in the fall of 2017, in the table).

He could have retired. It would have been easier. Anyone else in his place probably would have done so. He kept going, continued to climb the world podium, and presented a program with five quadruples.
Is that enough? No, between the end of 2021 and February 2022, he attempted the quadruple axel. He couldn’t complete it, but he tried anyway. He was 27 years old.

How many skaters attempt a new jump—one that no one has ever landed before, by the way—at 27? There is Artur Dmitriev Jr., I haven’t forgotten about him. Dmitriev tried the 4A exactly at 27 (in fact, he made his first attempt in a Russian domestic circuit competition when he was still 26).

Dmitriev has never competed in the World Championship or the European Championship. The best result in his three Grand Prix competitions was a ninth place. Dmitriev knew that if he wanted to leave his mark on the history of figure skating, he could only do so by becoming the first skater to complete a certain jump. He was the first (and still is the only one) to complete the 3Lz+3F combination, but that wasn’t enough for him. In his case, the 4A was just to get people talking about him.

Hanyu could have landed a 4Lo or a 4Lz at the Olympic Games had he wanted to, and I’ll probably have to talk about his Olympic layout one day. A third gold medal was at stake, and, in the worst-case scenario, a third medal. Hanyu tried the 4A on the biggest stage. He had the courage to take the risk, because for him, discovery, trying something new, has always been more important than settling for the safe.

Daniel Grassl is currently the only skater to have landed a 4Lo combined with a positive GOE in international competitions. He did so twice in the 2021-22 season (4Lo+1Eu+3S). Grassl’s best results so far are two seventh-place finishes, at the Olympic Games and at one World Championship. Hanyu could have done it if he wanted to. During SharePractice, he landed a perfect 4Lo+3T combination, and on three occasions he posted videos of himself landing the 4Lo+3A sequence in the paid area of his channel.

However, in the 2018-19 season, after winning his second Olympic gold medal, when he no longer had to prove anything to anyone, Hanyu became the first skater to land the 4T+3A sequence (and is still the only one to have done so, although Ilia Malinin landed the 4S+3A sequence in the 2024-25 season). And, in the 2019-20 season, Hanyu became the first skater to land the 4T+1Eu+3F combination. Even after winning everything (twice), he continued to raise the bar. No one like him.

Axel (A)

The first skater to land the quadruple axel (and still the only one, even considering national competitions) was Ilia Malinin. Despite all the practice videos that some skater occasionally post, so far only two other skaters, Dmitriev (four times) and Hanyu (twice), have attempted the jump in competition.

When did Malinin first land a 4A? In a minor competition (a Challenger Series) in his first senior season, after finishing ninth in his only World Championship appearance. Malinin, like all skaters except Hanyu, stood out for his jumps, and only then did he start winning. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s important to note Hanyu’s exceptional career.

In his first World Championship, in 2011, Hanyu was the one who obtained the highest score from the jumps, ahead of Patrick Chan and Javier Fernandez. At the 2012 World Championship (at age 17), he not only obtained the highest score from the jumps, but he also had the highest TES. This is normal in itself; it takes time to hone the interpretation and skating skills, but Hanyu was already at a very high level in this area at a very young age. He continued to perfect it, and at the same time, he perfected his jumps even when he didn’t need them. Just because he wanted to. And that’s extraordinary.

After his first world medal, a bronze, Malinin became the first skater in history to land all types of quadruples, and only then did he win his first world gold.

I conclude with two tables. The first summarizes the data I listed above. On the left, we see all the results achieved at the Olympic Games and World Championships by the six skaters I mentioned before landing their first quadruple jump of each type. On the right, we see their results after landing the jump. Hanyu is the only one who didn’t need a jump to get people interested in him, and he continued to achieve results even afterward.

The second is dedicated to the skaters who have won at least one Olympic or World Championship gold medal since the first quadruple jump was landed. Almost all of the skaters stopped to improve after winning and maintained their level. Only one continued to work to improve because he wanted to.

As I wrote, Hanyu always stands out. No one like him.

Yuzuru Hanyu started skating at the age of 4, competed in his first competition about six months later, and continued competing until two months after turning 27. If we add the three years of his professional career to that total, Hanyu has dedicated 26 of his 30 years to figure skating. I’ve summarized his professional career data in three posts (one, two, three); now I’ll go back and look at what he accomplished during his competitive career.

I’ve done my best to keep this list as complete as possible. It’s not everything, at least not for his younger years. Hanyu officially began competing in the 2004-05 season, when he was 9, and first competed in the Novice B category. What did he do before that? We know very little. The JSF website doesn’t record competitions below the Novice B level, and sometimes it doesn’t even record regional youth competitions. There’s some evidence of a couple of competitions, but for others… maybe someone who speaks Japanese can find them, but not me. This is what I’ve found:

Season 1999-00

Coach: Mami Yamada
Music: Ultraman Gaia (choreography: Mami Yamada)

Miyagi Prefectural Tournement: 2nd (the winner was Jun Suzuki)

Season 2001-2002

Music: Amateur Horse Race (choreography: Mami Yamada)

There’s a short video from Hanyu’s first grade days, showing him wearing a cowboy costume. It could be this season or the end of the previous season.

Shin-Matsudo Daiei OSC Cup Tournement: 1st

UHB Cup: 1st

Season: 2003-04

Coach: Shoichiro Tsuzuki (probably form the previous season)
Music: From Russia with Love (choreography: Shoichiro Tsuzuki)

Badge Test Level 3 for Novice B

Competitions aside, there are the Badge Tests. If you don’t know what they are, they’re mentioned in the anime (and manga) Medalist. They’re tests skaters must pass before competing in a certain category. To register for the Tohoku-Hokkaido Championships in the Novice B category, Hanyu (like all the other participants) must have passed the relevant Badge Test. When did he do it? I have no idea. These are the requirements established by the JSF (in 2010, I don’t know if the requirements were lower in 2004) to obtain the Level 3 Badge Test, the one needed to compete in the Novice B category:

Mandatory elements:

① Axel Paulsen Jump ② Any double jump ③ Jump combination (2+1 or more). Double jumps can be combined with ②. ④ Camel Spin (5 or more rotations) ⑤ Flying spin (any type; 5 or more rotations after landing) ⑥ Spin combination (no change of foot, 6 or more revolutions, but 2 or more revolutions in one position)

Set pattern steps:

① Back Change Half Circle (Starting foot is chosen by lottery) ② Bracket turn step (out/in is determined by lottery) ③ One-Footed Snaking (Forehand) – Starting foot is chosen by lottery ④ One-foot snaking (back) – the foot opposite to the fore

Free skate:

Time: 2’00” for both men and women ●Include at least the required jump elements. ●Select two or more of the required spin elements. ●Include a step sequence.

Season 2004-05

Coach: Shoichiro Tsuzuki until December, Tatsuyoshi Matsuda from January
SP: Spartacus (choreography: Shoichiro Tsuzuki)
FS: From Russia with Love (choreography: Shoichiro Tsuzuki)

Tohoku-Hokkaido Regional Novice B: 1st (FS only)

National Championship Novice B: 1st (FS only)
To understand Hanyu’s skating level compared to the requirements, the minimum requirement for jumps was 1A and a double jump+single jump combination. Without looking at the quality details (pre- and under-rotations, which perhaps weren’t looked at at the time, and in any case we don’t know anything about what other skaters did), Hanyu’s layout was this: 2A; 2S; 2Lz+2Lo+2T; 2T+2T, 2Lo, 2Lz+2T (or it was 2F+2T? bad camera shot and not so clear edge), 2A.

Santa Claus Cup (Tampere, Finland), Novice A: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Asian Novice Championship (Hong Kong): SP 4th – FS 4th – Final rank 4th

Season 2005-06

Coach: Tatsuyoshi Matsuda
SP: Amazonic/Totentanz (choreography: Megumu Seki)
FS: Summer Storm (choreography: Meguymu Seki) and From Russia with Love (National Championship only, choreography: Shoichiro Tsuzuki)

Tohoku-Hokkaido Regional Novice B: 1st (FS only)

National Championship Novice B: 2nd (FS only)

Asian Novice Chapionship: performed as a guest skater

Badge Test Level 4 Novice A

Mandatory elements:

①. Double Toe Loop Jump ② Double Salchow Jump ③ Double Loop Jump ④ Jump Combination (2+2) ⑤ Spins Women: Layback spin or Sideways Leaning spin (minimum 5 revolutions) Men: Sit spin or Camel spin (with change of foot) including at least one difficult variation (minimum 5 revolutions/minimum 5 revolutions) ⑥ Spin combination (with change of foot, 6/6 or more rotations)

Set pattern steps:

① Open Choctaw and Three Turn Steps ② Toe Step (2 or more rotations) ③ Twizzle Step Four (Out/In determined by lottery) ④ Twizzle Step Back (Out/In determined by lottery)

Free skate:

Time: Women’s 2’30”, Men’s 3’00”. The number of elements is the same as for Novice B. ● Includes at least three types of double jumps (including both toe jumps and edge jumps) ● Includes jump combinations (2+2) ● Spins (including flying, one position (men), layback (women) spin combinations) ●Women: Spiral Sequence, Men’s: Step sequence

Badge Test Level 6 Junior

Mandatory elenents:

① Double Axel Paulsen Jump ② Jump combinations – Women: combination of 3 consecutive jumps of your choice (2+2+2), Men: 3+2 or more ③ A free jump immediately following a connecting step or other comparable free skating movement (in accordance with the Junior SP program of the current year). ④ Spin Combination (including 3 positions, back entrance, and change of foot) (6 rotations/6 or more rotations) ⑤ Flying spin (correct position in the air. 8 or more revolutions without changing position). In addition, this must be the flying spin specified in the Junior SP for that year.

Second test:

Time: Within 2’50”. ISU Junior Short Program for the current year

Free skate:

Time: Women’s 3’30”, Men’s 4’00” Based on the ISU Junior Free Skating of the current year The jump must include at least the following elements: Women: Includes double axel and double+double or higher jump combinations (2 or more consecutive). Men’s: Includes a double axel and one triple.

Season 2006-07

Coach: Tatsuyoshi Matsuda until October, Nanami Abe from October (Soshi Tanaka, who was specialized in jumps, collaborated with Abe, I don’t know if for the entire period Abe trained Hanyu or for a shorter period)
SP: Amazonic/Totentanz (choreography: Megumu Seki)
FS: Summer Storm (choreography: Megumu Seki)

Hanyu did not compete in the Tohoku-Hokkaido Championships, which are usually required for skaters registered with a club in Miyagi Prefecture to participate in the National Championships. His absence from the Tohoku-Hokkaido Championships suggests that Hanyu achieved such exceptional results in the tests held at the Nobeyama Camp that the federation seeded him and excluded him from participating in the qualifying competition.

National Championship Novice A: 3rd (FS only)
Layout of Hanyu’s program: 2A+2T, 3Lo<, 3S<, 3T (fall), 2A, 2F, 2Lz (fall). At the time, there was no distinction between underrotated and downgraded jumps; the < sign assigned the jump the base value of a jump with one less rotation. It is unknown when Hanyu passed the Badge Tests, but the layout of the program he competed with at the Novice Championships (if executed correctly) would have allowed him to pass the Badge Test in the junior category. Riuju Hino, who won the competition, landed three triples (a toe loop and two salchows) and seven doubles, including two 2A, without falling or having any problems with the rotations. Keiji Tanaka, who finished second, correctly completed two triples (a toe loop and a salchow) and nine doubles, including two 2A.

Junior National Championship: SP 18th – FS 4th – Final rank 7th

Junior North Japan Figure Skating Games: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Mladost Trophy Novice A: SP 1st – FS 2nd – Final rank 1st

Season 2007-08

SP: Sing Sing, Sing (choreography: Nanami Abe)
FS: The Firebird (choreography: Nanami Abe)
Gala: Sing, Sing, Sing (choreography: Nanami Abe – different from the SP version)
When a program originally intended for competition is presented as an exhibition program, it’s usually performed without the most difficult jumps, and in the case of free skate programs, only a part of them is skated. For programs used in competition for more than one season, there are always some changes to the steps and perhaps even the layout. I only note where there are significant changes.

Tohoku-Hokkaido Championship Novice A: 1st (FS only)

Miyagi Prefecture Junior High School General Sports Festival: 1st (SP only)

National Championship Novice A: 1st (FS only)

Junior National Championship: SP 7th – FS 1st – Final rank 3rd

Tohoku Junior High School Skating: 1st (FS only)

Tohoku Skating Championship Novice A: 1st (SP only)

Japan Junior High School Championship: 1st (SP only)

Skate Copenhagen Novice A: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Season 2008-09

SP: Bolero (choreography: Nanami Abe)
FS: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (choreography: Nanami Abe. Program created in two partially different versions because it was skated in the Junior and Senior categories, which have different requirements on the length of the program)
Gala: Change (choreography: Nanami Abe)

JGP Merano: SP 6th – FS 4th – Final rank 5th

Tohoku-Hokkaido Championship Junior: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

East Japan Kunior Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank

Junior National Championship: SP 4th – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

National Championship: SP 8th – FS 5th – Final rank 8th

Junior High School Championship: 1st (only SP)

Junior World Championship: SP 11th – FS 13th – Final rank 12th

Junior North Japan Figure Skating Games: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Season 2009-10

SP: Mission: Impossible II (choreography: Nanami Abe)
FS: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (choreography: Nanami Abe)
Gala: Change (choreography: Nanami Abe)

JGP Poland: SP 1st – FS 1st- Final rank 1st

Tohoku-Hokkaido JuniorChampionship: SP

JGP Croatia: Sp 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

East Japan Junior Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final Rank 1st

Junior National Championship: SP 1st – FS 2nd – Final rank 1st

JGP Final: SP 3rd – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

National Championship: SP 13th – FS 5th – Final rank 6th

Junior High School Championship: 1st (SP only)

Junior World Championship: SP 3rd – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Badge Test Level 7 Senior International competitions

Required elements:

① Double Axel Paulsen Jump ② A triple jump immediately following a connecting step or other comparable free skating movement. ③ An isolated triple jump (a jump different from 2). ④ Jump combination (3+2 or more) ⑤ Any flying spin. After 8 rotations without changing the position/variation, a flying spin with a difficult variation or change edge. ⑥ Spin combination (with change of foot). At least three positions must be performed from the spin combo with change of foot on the ISU difficulty level table for the current year, and three features must be satisfied (6 rotations/6 or more rotations)

Second test:

Time: Within 2’50”. ISU Senior Short Program for the current year

Free skate:

Time: Women’s 4’00”, Men’s 4’30” Based on the ISU Senior Free Skating of the current year. Furthermore, for jumps, the minimum required elements enter the assignment.

Not knowing the JSF rules, I don’t know if Hanyu ever took the Badge test to compete in senior international competitions. He was already capable of completing these types of elements during his first season in the Novice A category. Could it be that, having already completed the elements in competitions where the elements weren’t required, the JSF decided not to require him to take the test? This happened to Canadian Kurt Browning: he was granted permission to participate in some international competitions without having him take the tests that were supposed to determine whether he was fit to participate in those competitions, and his results were such that Browning never took the final tests, which, according to Skate Canada, are mandatory. Japan has made exceptions for the National Championship in some cases: participation is mandatory for assignments to the Four Continents Championship, the World Championship, and the Olympic Games, but sometimes skaters are assigned to competitions thanks to an exemption. This is what happened to Hanyu in three seasons, when he skipped three straight National Championships but was still assigned to the 2017 4CC, the 2017 WC, the 2018 OG, and the 2019 WC based on his previous results. The same goes for Riku Miura/Ryuichi Kihara, who skipped the National Championships for four years in a row but were regularly assigned to the 4CC, WC, and OG because there’s no doubt they are the strongest Japanese pair. As for the regional qualifying competitions for the National Championships, if a skater were to participate in one of these competitions while simultaneously registered for an international competition, they are granted an exemption. So, did Hanyu take this Badge Test? Perhaps, or perhaps the JSF decided it was unnecessary because he had already proven he could compete at the senior international level.

Season 2010-11

SP: White Legend (choreography: Nanami Abe)
FS: Zigeunerweisen (choreography: Nanami Abe)
Gala: Vertigo /choreography: Nanami Abe)

GP NHK Trophy: SP 5th – FS 4th – Final rank 4th

East Japan Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Rostelecom Cup: SP 6th – FS 6th – Final rank 7th

National Championship: SP 2nd – FS 4th – Final rank 4th

Four Continents Championship: SP 3rd – FS 3rd – Final rank 2nd

Season 2011-12

SP: Étude in D-sharp minor (choreography: Nanami Abe, Natalia Bestemianova, Igor Bobrin)
FS: Romeo+Juliet (choreography: Nanami Abe, Natalia Bestemianova, Igor Bobrin)
Gala: 1) Vertigo (choreography: Nanami Abe) 2) Somebody to Love (choreography: Nanami Abe) 3) White Legend (choreography: Nanami Abe – differenf from the SP version)

Nebelhorn Trophy: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Tohoku-Hokkaido Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Cup of China: SP 2nd – FS 4th – Final rank 4th

GP Rostelecom Cup: SP 2nd – FS 2nd – Final rank 1st

GP Final: SP 4th – FS 3rd – Final rank 4st

National Championship: SP 4th – FS 1st – Final rank 3rd

World Championship: SP 7th – FS 2nd – Final rank 3rd

Season 2012-13

Coach: Brian Orser and Tracy Wilson
SP: Parisienne Walkways (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: Notre-Dame de Paris (choreography: David Wilson)
Gala: 1) Hello, I Love You (choreography: Kurt Browning) 2) Hana ni nare (choreography: Kenji Miyamoto)
I add the abbreviation WR on occasions when Hanyu set a world record for the highest score.

Finlandia Trophy: SP 2nd – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Skate America: SP 1st (WR) – FS 3rd – Final rank 2nd

GP NHK Trophy: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Final: SP 3rd – FS 2nd – Final rank 2nd

National Championship: SP 1st – FS 2nd – Final rank 1st

Four Continents Championship: SP 1st – FS 3rd – Final rank 2nd

World championship: SP 9th – FS 3rd – Final rank 4th

Season 2013-14

Since the end of this season, Ghislain Briand has been added to Brian Orser and Tracy Wilson’s list of coaches.
SP: Parisienne Walkways (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: Romeo and Juliet (choreography: David Wilson)
Gala: 1) Étude in D-sharp minor (choreography: Nanami Abe, Natalia Bestemianova, Igor Bobrin) 2) Notre-Dame de Paris (choreography: David Wilson) 3) Story (choreography: Kenji Miyamoto) 4) Hana ni nare (choreography: Kenji Miyamaoto) 5) White Legend (choreography: Nanami Abe) 6) Romeo+Juliet (choreography: Nanami Abe, Natalia Bestemianova, Igor Bobrin)

Finlandia Trophy: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Skate Canada: SP 3rd – FS 2nd – Final rank 2nd

GP Trophée Eric Bompard: SP 2nd – FS 2nd – Final rank 2nd

GP Final: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

National Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Olympic Games (Team Event): SP 1st – Final rank Team Japan 5th

Olympic Games: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

World Championship: SP 3rd – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Season 2014-15

SP: Ballade No. 1 in G minor (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: The Phantom of the Opera (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
– Gala: 1) Hana wa saku (choreography: Nanami Abe) 2) The Final Time Traveler (choreography: Kenji Miyamoto) 3) Parisienne Walkways (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)

GP Cup of China: SP 2nd – FS 2nd – final rank 2nd

GP NHK Trophy: SP 5th – FS 3rd – Final rank 4th

GP Final: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

National Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

World Championship: SP 1st – FS 3rd – Final rank 2nd

World Team Trophy: SP 1st – FS 1st – Unofficial rank 1st – Rank Team Japan 3rd

Season 2015-16

SP: Ballade No. 1 in G minor (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: Seimei (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
Gala: Requiem of Heaven and Earth (choreography: Kenji Miyamoto)

Autumn Classic International: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Skate Canada: SP 6th – FS 2nd – Final rank 2nd

GP NHK Trophy: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st (WR) – Final rank 1st (WR)

GP Final: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st (WR) – Final rank 1st (WR)

National Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

World Championship: SP 1st – FS 2nd – Final rank 2nd

Season 2016-17

SP: Let’s Go Crazy (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: Hope and Legacy (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
Gala: Notte stellata (the Swan) (choreography: David Wilson)

CS Autumn Classic International : SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Skate Canada: SP 4th – FS 1st – Final rank 2nd

GP Final: SP 1st – FS 3rd – Final rank 1st

Four Continents Championship: SP 3rd – FS 1st – Final rank 2nd

World Championship: SP 5th – FS 1st (WR) – Final rank 1st

World Team Trophy: SP 7th – FS 1st – Unofficial rank 3rd – Rank Team Japan 1st

Season 2017-18

SP: Ballade No. 1 in G minor (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: Seimei (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
Gala: Notte stellata (The Swan) (choreography: David Wilson)

CS Autumn Classic International: SP 1st (WR) – FS 5th – Final rank 2nd

GP Rostelecom Cup: SP 2nd – FS 1st – Final rank 2nd

Olympic Games: SP 1st – FS 2nd – Final rank 1st

Season 2018-19

SP: Otoñal (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: Origin (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
Gala: Haru yo, koi (choreography: David Wilson)

CS Autumn Classic International: SP 1st – FS 2nd – Final rank 1st

GP Helsinki: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st (WR) – Final rank 1st (WR)

GP Rostelecom Cup: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

World Championhip: SP 3rd – FS 2nd (WR) – Final rank 2nd (WR)

Season 2019-20

SP: 1) Otoñal (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle) 2) Ballade No. 1 in G minor (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: 1) Origin (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne) 2) Seimei (new version – choreography: SDhae-Lynn Bourne)
Gala: 1) Parisienne Walkways (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle) 2) Haru yo, koi (choreography: David Wilson) 3) Notte stellata (The Swan) (choreography: David Wilson) 4) Seimei (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne) 5) Hope and legacy (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)

CS: Autumn Classic International: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Skate Canada: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP NHK Trophy: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

GP Final: SP 2nd – FS 2nd – Final rank 2nd

National Championship: SP 1st – FS 3rd – Final rank 2nd

Four Continents Chapionship: SP 1st (WR) – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Season 2020-21

SP: Let Me Entertain You (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle)
FS: Ten to chi to (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
Gala: 1) Haru yo, koi /choreography: David Wilson) 2) Hana wa saku (choreography: Nanami Abe)

National Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st- Final rank 1st

World Championship: SP 1st – FS 4th – Final rank 3rd

World Team Trophy: SP 2nd – FS 2nd – Unofficial rank 2nd – Rank Team Japan 3rd

Season 2021-22

SP: Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle and Shae-Lynn Bourne)
FS: Ten to chi to (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
Gala: 1) Let Me Entertain You (choreography: Jeffrey Buttle) 2) Haru yo, koi (choreography: David Wilson)

National Championship: SP 1st – FS 1st – Final rank 1st

Olympic Games: SP 8th – FS 3rd – Final rank 4th

Timeless grace! 💫

A masterpiece from Yuzuru Hanyu at Beijing 2022 figure skating gala. ❄️ pic.twitter.com/5ueTA0mhCx

— Olympic Khel (@OlympicKhel) March 20, 2025

Throughout his career, Hanyu has also participated in numerous exhibitions. He has almost always been present at the final gala of the competitions he has competed in. He began competing in the gala of the National Championships, Medalist on Ice, in 2007, as the national champion in the Novice category. He certainly participated in the gala of the 2009 JGPF and 2010 JWC. Amond senior, in 2010 he did not participate in the gala of the Rostelecom Cup, where he was not invited, and due to various physical problems he did not participate in the gala of the 2012 GPF, 2013 WC (I think), 2014 Cup of China, 2014 National Championship, and 2018 Rostelecom Cup. Otherwise, he should have always participated, which is not surprising given that he almost always finished on the podium.

Regarding these shows, I tried to figure out which shows Hanyu performed in each year, how many shows each tour/show consisted of, and whether Hanyu performed in all of them. The number indicates the number of shows. I’ve written an “x” where I couldn’t find the number of shows. The list is certainly incomplete. In 2011, after the earthquake, Hanyu performed in 60 shows, and I found a lower number. Is there anything else missing? It’s possible, but I have no idea. I’ve highlighted the solo shows in yellow, and the shows where Hanyu served as chairperson in light yellow.

In addition to the programs performed in competitions or at competition galas that I have already listed, and which Hanyu has occasionally performed at shows in Japan, there are several programs that Hanyu has performed exclusively at shows in Japan. These are the ones he has performed over the years of his competitive career:

• True Love (choreography: Kenji Miyamoto)
• Ienai yo (choreography: Pasquale Camerlengo)
• Believe (choreography: Kenji Miyamoto)
• Wings of Words
• Masquerade (choreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
• Crystal Memories (choreography: David Wilson)
• Real Face (Coreography: Shae-Lynn Bourne)
• Raison (Choreography: David Wilson)

A very intense competitive career. Just to underscore the intensity with which Hanyu has approached skating over these 26 years, I’ll include a list of the shows he’s participated in since turning professional. For the solo shows and for Notte stellata, he didn’t just skate; he had to structure the shows, tell a story, and take care of countless other aspects, all essential to the success.

• Prologue – 5 shows between November and December 2022
• Major’s Cup – 1 show, December 2022 (there was an audience, so for me this is a performance like the ones he did in competitions gala)
• Gift – 1 show, February 2023
• Notte stellata – 3 shows, March 2023
• Stars on Ice – 10 shows, March-April 2023
• Fantasy on Ice – 12 shows, May-June 2023
• Re_Pray – 8 shows, November 2023-April 2024
• Notte stellata – 3 shows, March 2024
• Fantasy on Ice – 6 shows, May-June 2024
• Challenge – 1 show, September 2024
• Echoes of Life – 7 shows, December 2024-February 2025
• Notte stellata – 3 shows, March 2025
• The First Skate – 1 show, July 2025

To understand how intense these last three years have been, I’ve included a list of the programs skated by Hanyu. In the left column, I’ve listed the programs skated by Hanyu in competition. I’ve highlighted in yellow the programs that Hanyu has performed in full (in bold) or in part over these three years. In the center column, I’ve listed the programs from the shows during his competitive era, again highlighting which ones he performed in the last three years. In the left column, I’ve listed the new programs. Where the choreographer isn’t listed, it’s because the choreography is by Hanyu. I’ve listed some group numbers either because the choreography is by Hanyu, and therefore the creative aspect is added to the performative aspect, or because they are programs for shows where Hanyu is the chairperson. I ignored the group numbers of Fantasy on Ice, even though the main focus is on Hanyu and he has a solo part of some importance, because otherwise I would have had to consider the similar programs made in the old editions of the traditional shows in which Hanyu took part, and the information I have is incomplete.

What Hanyu has accomplished in these 26 years is incredible. And while I have no idea when it will happen, I’m sure he will amaze us again.

The Italian version is here.

The third and final part of my very long post, dedicated to what Yuzuru Hanyu has accomplished since turning professional. When I wrote the post, only two years and nine months had passed, not three, but the exact title would have been a bit ugly. And since the title I chose refers to three years, I edited the post to add some things Hanyu did in the last three months of his third year as a professional. The first part of the post, dedicated to the programs we can watch on the internet, is here. The second part is here.

Some numbers

I decided to add this section to summarize in some numbers and data what Hanyu did.

Show:

• Prologue – 5 shows between November and December 2022
• Major’s Cup – 1 show, December 2022 (there was an audience, so this is a performance like the ones he did in competitions gala)
• Gift – 1 show, February 2023
• Notte stellata – 3 shows, March 2023
• Stars on Ice – 10 shows, March-April 2023
• Fantasy on Ice – 12 shows, May-June 2023
• Re_Pray – 8 shows, November 2023-April 2024
• Notte stellata – 3 shows, March 2024 (bonus: the audience can attend two rehearsals)
• Fantasy on Ice – 6 shows, May-June 2024
• Challenge – 1 show, September 2024
• Echoes of Life – 7 shows, December 2024-February 2025
• Notte stellata – 3 shows, March 2025 (bonus: the audience can attend two rehearsals)
• The First Skate – 1 show, July 2025 (notice of the edit: I added this show to the list after I posted this text)

The total says 13 shows or tour, 61 performances. Hanyu certainly hasn’t relaxed after stepping away from the competitions, on the contrary, he works harder than before, and creates shows, or even single programs, extraordinary. Of these shows, eight were broadcast live internationally, four exist on DVD or Blu-ray. Better than nothing, even if for my tastes it’s too little. It’s not for nothing that I’m asking the streaming platforms to include Hanyu’s shows in their catalog, the solo shows and also Notte stellata. Or, if not the streaming platforms, it would be nice if Japanese televisions gave us the possibility to buy a ticket for the livestream, for Notte stellata or even for any other shows that Hanyu might participate in, because even in group programs he always gives his best, and If…, Glamorous Sky and Meteor, programs that Hanyu will hardly propose on other occasions, are wonderful.

These are the programs skated entirely or in part by Hanyu in these three years (I do not count the ones on which he simply performed a jump, such as Ten to chi to during the SharePractice). In the list I specify if it is a program created in these three seasons and, if a choreographer other than Hanyu is known, the name of the choreographer. I also count the group programs not only because Hanyu had to learn the choreography, but also because he is always in a prominent position, with the eyes of the entire audience on him. If there is an official video online, I will post the link.

• Hana ni nare
• Seimei [2018 Olympic Games]
• White Legend [2014 Olympic Games]
• Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso
• Change
• Dreamy Aspiration (new program)
• Let’s Go Crazy
• Otoñal [2019 National Championship]
• Étude in D-sharp minor
• Spartacus [2005 Asian Novice Championship]
• Hello, I Love You
• Mission: Impossible II
• Somebody to Love
• Sing, Sing, Sing
• Romeo + Juliet
• A Fleeting Dream (new program. I don’t consider A Fleeting Dream_RE as a different program, although the way Hanyu interprets the program is different)
• Haru yo, koi [2022 Olympic Games]
• Parisienne Walkways [2014 Olympic Games]
• From Russia with Love
• Sasanqua (new program)
• The Final Time Traveler
• The Firebird
• Hope and Legacy [2017 World Championship]
• One Summer’s Day (new program, choreography by David Wilson)
• Ballade No. 1 in G minor by Chopin [2018 Olympic Games]
• Let Me Entertain You [2021 World Championship]
• Ashura-chan (new program)
• The Phantom of the Opera
• Notte stellata [2018 Olympic Games]
• Boku no koto
• Conquest of Paradise (new program in collaboration with Kohei Uchimura, partly choreographed by David Wilson – an almost 20 seconds fragment without music)
• Dynamite (new program performed in the studio)
• Song of Hope (new group program choreographed by David Wilson)
• Requiem of Heaven and Earth
• All These Things That I’ve Done (technically a group program, but for his part, about a minute choreographed by himself, Hanyu is on the ice alone)
• Notre-Dame de Paris
• Ain’t no mountain high enough/Rising Heart (new group number choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle)
• If… (new program choreographed by Hanyu, with suggestions from Mikiko)
• USA (new group number choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle)
• History Maker (new group number choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle)
• Glamorous Sky (new program)
• Stars (new group number choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle)
• Gate of Living (new program new choreographed by Mikiko)
• Megalovania (new program)
• The Darkness of Eternity (new program)
• Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals (new program)
• Goliath (new program)
• Aqua’s Journey (new program)
• Carmina Burana (new program in collaboration with Mao Daichi, choreographed by Shae-Lynn Bourne and Rino Masaki – 4 minutes of the program)
• Permission to Dance (new program performed in the studio – a 10 second fragment)
• Danny Boy (new program choreographed by David Wilson – a 8 seconds fragment without music + After I wrote this post Hanyu uploaded to his channel two versions of Danny Boy that he recorded in April at the Ice Rink Sandai: full version and short version)
• Ray of Light (new group number choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle)
• Meteor (new program)
• High Pressure (new group number choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle)
• Taiko drum (in the absence of an official name I call in this way the group number choreographed by Akiko Suzuki and refined by Hanyu on the sound of taiko for the show Challenge – here we can see 28 seconds on a different music)
• Que sera sera (new group number choreographed by Akiko Suzuki and refined by Hanyu)
• Last Ambient (new program)
• First Pulse (new program – In this video we can hear the music and see some footage from the show.)
• “First Echo” and “Circulation” (new program)
• Utai IV: Reawakening (new program choreographed by Mikiko)
• Mass Destruction: Reload (new program choreographed by emmy, Mikiko and Hanyu)
• Piano Collection (new program choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle)
• Eclipse/Blue (new program)
• Gate of Steiner – Aesthetics on Ice (new program)
• Hymn of the Soul (new program)
• Bow and Arrow (new program)
• Bolero (new program in collaboration with Mansai Nomura and Shae-Lynn Bourne, Takahito Mura, Satoko Miyahara, Akiko Suzuki and Keiji Tanaka, choreographed by Shae-Lynn Bourne – at the moment you can see a minute and a half of the program here)
• Seimei (new version in collaboration with Mansai Nomura – here there is a 2:40 part of the program – here is the English version of the video)

If I haven’t lost count, there are 68 programs, more than half of which are new programs and many were choreographed by him. If we add to this the conception of four solo shows, the editing of the videos of his channel, the role he has in Notte stellata, we see that the creative effort is enormous. A creative effort that also led to the birth of a children’s book illustrated by Clamp for Gift.

This is the official website for the book Gift: https://sp.clamp-fans.com/ja/gift/

For this collaboration it was shot a video:

For Echoes of Life Hanyu wrote a short story.

The number and variety of programs can only give an idea of ​​Hanyu’s interpretative skills, refined through continuous study and continuous improvement work. In the case of the tours, those who watch all the shows are able to appreciate the changes made by Hanyu to try to improve what he offers to the public, just as when he competed he continued to perfect the programs throughout the competitive season. On a technical/athletic level, let’s look at some numbers.

A competition consists of a short program and a free program, which are skated on two different days and last less than 7 minutes in total. In Prologue the skating time is around 30 minutes, in Gift it is almost 43, more or less the same as in Re_Pray, in Echoes of Life it is almost 50 minutes. The spins in Prologue were 11, in Gift they became 16, in Re_Pray 20, Megalovania alone contains 6, in Echoes of Life there are 15, one of which is one minute long. Adding the two programs, in competition the skaters do 6 spins. And spins are more tiring than jumps.

The number of jump elements in a competition is 10, three in the short program (for the best skaters it is a quadruple+triple combination, another quadruple and a 3A), and 7 in the free skate (three combinations, only one can be of three jumps, at least a 3A, with one exception the best skaters do 4 or 5 quadruples, the others are triple jumps). In each solo show there are at least 4 quadruples, several 3A and several other triples, and the number of jumps with at least three rotations is higher than the number of triple or quadruple jumps that a skater can perform by adding the two competition programs. And then there is everything else.

These are the different types of jumps performed by Hanyu after his turn to professionalism (I’m not considering how many times he did them, only the variety of jumps and combinations, and I’m not even considering the transition he often does immediately before or after the jump):

• 1Lo delayed
• 1A delayed
• 2T with arms outstretched by choreographic choice
• 3T
• 3S
• 3Lo
• 3Lo+1Eu+3S
• 3F
• 3Lz
• 3Lz+2T+2T
• 3A
• 3A+2T rippon
• 3A+3T
• 3A+3T+3Lo
• 3A+1Eu+3S
• 3A+1Eu+3S+1Eu+3S
• 4T
• 4T+2T
• 4T+3T
• 4T+1Eu+3S (we last saw it in February 2025)
• 4T+1Eu+3S+1Eu+3S
• 4T+3A
• 4S
• 4S+3T (we last saw it in March 2025)
• 4Lo (he doesn’t perform it in shows, but we last saw it in March 2025)
• 4Lo+3T
• 4Lo+3A (we last saw it in July 2024)
• 4Lz (March 2025)
• 4A<< (we last saw it in December 2022)

Jumps are not the most important thing for me, but Hanyu is still able to do four different types of quadruples, and three in difficult combinations, in addition to having completed combinations that in competition are very rare or prohibited by the rules. And while it is true that he fell a few times, it is also true that he managed to complete at least one date in all the shows (with the exception of Gift, which had only one date) without making mistakes.

Television and other commitments

Aside from skating, whether it’s shows or videos, Hanyu has done a lot of other things. One not surprising thing is that he has worked with his sponsors. Some of them have ended their collaborations. ANA is one of them, which is a pity, because they had made several very nice videos. Collaborations with Nishikawa Down and Sekkisei have also ended, while those with Ajinomoto, Citizen, Phiten and Towa Pharmaceutical continue. Two new sponsors, Haier and Aqua, have made commercials at Ice Rink Sendai:

Another new sponsor is Gucci, for which Hanyu first made a short video

and then the classic “what’s in my bag” in collaboration with Elle:

For Gucci Hanyu has been the protagonist of two photographic exhibitions, YUZURU HANYU: A JOURNEY BEYOND DREAMS featured by ELLE and In Focus: Yuzuru Hanyu Lensed by Jiro Konami (here you can see a short video). He has also been interviewed by newspapers that do not normally write about figure skating such as Elle Japan, GQ, Neewsweek, Brutus, Ginza, Goethe, Kateigaho, Toyo Keizai and SO-EN.

発売中の『GQ JAPAN』6月号 特別版の表紙には、羽生結弦が登場。

撮影の様子をおさめたショートムービーをお届け！https://t.co/Hr2sgbhAbg#GQJAPAN #羽生結弦 #YuzuruHanyu #GUCCI #グッチ pic.twitter.com/IusVYDtv1W

— GQ JAPAN (@GQJAPAN) May 2, 2024

Another beautiful video was published on Gucci’s official site.

Sometimes magazines that did a photoshoot on Hanyu published a behind the scenes video. This is the one from Figure Skating Life Extra.

🎥【メイキング動画公開！】 8/29発売 フィギュアスケートLife Extra『羽生結弦 PROFESSIONAL Season2』#羽生結弦 さんが魅せる変幻自在の動きや表情。カメラマンが切り取った瞬間がどんな形になるのか、誌面をお楽しみに✨
Photo: 矢口亨
Styling: 柳翔吾
Hair&Make: 柿崎友美#YuzuruHanyuPRO2 pic.twitter.com/wAArNJKRJe

— フィギュアスケートLife (@fskating_Life) August 27, 2024

This is the one from Aera. The photographer is Mika Ninagawa.

Another video uploaded by Aera is here.

On September 29, 2022, Hanyu attended the ceremony marking the 50th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan.

In December of the same year, he was awarded the Kikuchi Kan Award for contributing to the knowledge of Japanese culture, although, due to his commitment to Prologue, Hanyu was unable to attend the ceremony and sent a short video to thank for the award. The awards he has received are numerous, among other things in 2023 he was named “Person of the Year” by the Public Relations Society of Japan and received the Special Achievement Awards from the Japan Skating Federation.

Hanyu has been included in several prestigious lists, he was among the most searched athletes on Google in 2022, among the most representative Olympic athletes of the 21st century drawn up by ESPN, among the 10 most important athletes according to the Association of Professional Journalists and among the 30 extraordinary leaders under 30 of the Asia Pacific Young Leaders in the category “Culture/sports/arts”.

He has also appeared on numerous television shows. The most important for continuity and its meaning is that of News Every, where he plays the role of Special Messenger. On several occasions, Hanyu spoke about natural disasters, disaster prevention, and visited areas that had suffered a disaster. Some of these broadcasts were uploaded as videos on YouTube with English subtitles.

The Chinese version of the video is here.

The Chinese version of this video is here.

Additional videos of his appearances on News Every, in Japanese only, were uploaded on their YouTube channel in August 2022, December 2022, January 2023, March 2023, July (1 and 2) 2023, and December 2023. This list is not complete, you can find all the videos about Hanyu uploaded on the channel here.

The News Every channel also includes a video dedicated to the conception of Notte stellata 2023 together with Kohei Uchimura:

Hanyu is very active in all natural disasters, not just Sendai or Tohoku. He went to Wajima, bringing attention to Ishikawa Prefecture, months after the earthquake, after he had donated money immediately (as he had donated money after the earthquake in Turkey), and made posters and billboards to help tourism in the region. With Re_Pray he went to Saga, revitalizing the region. And he did not forget Hokkaido, which was hit by an earthquake in 2018.

Returning to Sendai, we can see the importance that his city has for him in the video, this one subtitled in English, that he made as an ambassador for tourism of the city.

The Chinese version of this video is here, the Korean version of this video is here, and an English short version of the video, without audio, is here (I went in all these places, although it was not during Tanabata so I didn’t see the streamers).

He has also worked to improve skating opportunities in Sendai, donating very large sums to the Ice Rink and supporting the renovation project of the Xebio Arena, which is scheduled to reopen next July.

Hanyu has appeared on countless television programs, but unfortunately in most cases those programs in which Hanyu has participated are not visible outside of Japan, even if sometimes on YouTube you can find videos uploaded by fans, clips of shows, some programs, and even parts of appearances on television programs, sometimes with English subtitles. I am certainly forgetting some, for those that I remember I am inserting the link to an official video or to one of the numerous articles dedicated to that program. Hanyu has met Shuzo Matsuoka on several occasions, the first time right after his farewell to competitions. In the immediate aftermath, he also gave an interview to Tokyo TV, available online in Japanese divided into part 1, part 2 and part 3.

In September 2022, Hanyu was a guest on the local show Saturday Watchin! The television later uploaded the video to its YouTube channel divided into part 1, part 2 and part 3. The same happened with Oh! Bandess. In this case we have part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4 and part 5. Hanyu was a guest on the same show also in March 2023 and in the following two years, always on a date close to that of the Tohoku Earthquake. Another show in which he appeared is Teremasa.

These are regular broadcasts, not specials created especially for him, and which he went to as a guest, Yuming’s radio show All Night Nippon Gold, Kohaku Uta Gassen where he served as a judge on December 31, 2022, Shinya Kiyozuka’s Classic TV, Tetsuko Kuroyanagi’s Tetsuko’s Room, Gen Hoshino’s Ogensan to Issho, the Switch Interview with Kochi Domoto in October 2023, and Mansai Nomura’s Lucky Bags. This video is from when Hanyu was a guest of Tetsuko Kuroyanagi in Tetsuko’s Room:

While all of these broadcasts were aimed at a Japanese audience, we do have an official English translation of the conversation that took place in 2024 between Hanyu and Shigesato Itoi, the creator of the video game Mother.

There is no official translation into any Western language of the two autobiographical books published by Hanyu in 2023, following those he published in 2012 and 2016.

As far as I know, there are only two Japanese publications with English text, a photo book and a perpetual calendar. In both cases, the photos are accompanied by short captions in Japanese and English. I have chosen not to list most of the numerous photo books or magazines focused on Hanyu, not even the ones I have bought, because they are so many publications and this post is far too long. In this case, however, I will make an exception because it is a sign of the openness of a Japanese publisher to an international audience. The book, and the calendar, are called G.O.A.T.

As I mentioned earlier, Hanyu briefly visited Canada in the spring of 2023. There are several photos of skaters training in Toronto and a short video posted by Tracy Wilson to testify to this trip.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Tracy Wilson-Kinsella (@tracywilsonk)

Hanyu was also the protagonist of two events in the Metaverse, events that could be accessed from all over the world. In 2023, for his birthday, there were 35,000 of us. Last March, in three days, there were 130,000 of us who entered the Metaverse. He was there incognito but, on both occasions, those who were present were able to watch two programs from his last tour, Ashura-chan and Megalovania the first time and Mass Destruction and Hymn of the Soul (if I remember correctly) the second time.

At least one article by Hanyu and a conversation are noteworthy. The article was published in Bungeishunju, an extremely prestigious journal to which important figures in Japanese culture contribute, and for an athlete to be asked to contribute is decidedly rare. The conversation, published in installments by Deep Edge Plus, took place between Hanyu and philosopher Rei Nagai, author of Underwater Philosophy, and it’s another thing that doesn’t happen very often for an athlete to converse with a philosopher.

One last thing, even if Hanyu did nothing special for this project and, simply, the director focused (also) on him. Hanyu is one of the protagonists of the film Beijing 2022, dedicated to the 2022 Olympic Games. The film won the Guirlande d’Honneur at the Milano International Sport Movies & TV Festival in 2023.

It has been three years since Hanyu turned pro. I haven’t listed everything he has done, all the photoshoots, TV appearances, interviews, sponsorships. What Hanyu is doing is amazing, and I’m sure he will continue to amaze us in the future.

The Italian version is here.

Second part of my very long post dedicated to what Yuzuru Hanyu has been up to since turning pro. When I wrote the post, only two years and nine months had passed, not three, but the exact title would have been a bit ugly. And since the title I chose refers to three years, I edited the post to add a show that, at the time I wrote most of the text, we still didn’t know anything about. The first part of the post, dedicated to the programs we can watch on the internet, is here.

Solo shows

The solo shows. Something that was unimaginable before Hanyu, because who would have thought that a single skater could have the energy to skate an entire show? Enough charisma to captivate the audience for the duration of a show instead of just a few minutes? And what would the audience watch during the time it took the skater to change? Just to name a few of the problems…

The first show was Prologue. Two shows in Yokohama, November 4th and 5th 2022, three shows in Hachinohe, December 2nd, 3rd and 5th. This is the official website:

https://prologue-official.jp

Prologue was broadcast only in Japan. Now we can buy the DVD or Blu ray of the last show in Hachinohe on Amazon.co.jp (and on several other Japanese sites, the links are on the official website of the show). I commented it (in Italian) here. Here you can watch a short trailer related to the DVD:

#羽生結弦 単独アイスショー第1弾『#プロローグ』

待望の映像作品集💿DVD&Blu-ray💿ついに明日(7月19日)発売です✨ pic.twitter.com/lR0g3b38BY

— 『プロローグ』 (@jp_prologue) July 18, 2024

The show’s set list is similar for all days, with only two programs that vary from show to show based on audience input:

• warm up
• Seimei
• Change
• Let’s Go Crazy / Hana ni nare / Otoñal / Étude in D-sharp minor
• Spartacus / Hello, I Love You / Mission: Impossible II / Somebody to Love / Sing, Sing, Sing
• Romeo + Juliet
• A Fleeting Dream (new program choreographed by Hanyu)
• Haru yo, koi
• (encore) Parisienne Walkways
• (second encore, only on the last day) From Russia with Love

Members to Hanyu’s YouTube channel paid section can watch Seimei as he skated it in the first of the two shows in Yokohama.

On the last day of Prologue Hanyu announced his second solo show, Gift.

This is the official website (in the English version):

https://gift-official.jp/index_en.html

Gift took place on February 26th, 2023 at the Tokyo Dome, the first time in the prestigious arena was built an ice rink. There were 35,000 people watching the show live, another 30,000 watching from numerous movie theaters in Japan, and it was live, on television in Japan, and on the internet via Globe Coding in the rest of the world, with subtitles in various languages, including English. Hanyu noticed that he had a large international fan base, and since then he has provided live coverage of one day of his solo shows in each city he has performed in. He doesn’t leave Japan – as far as we know after Beijing he has only left Japan once, on a private trip that saw him return for a few days to the Toronto Cricket Club – but we can still see at least part of what he does (although it would be nice to see everything).

Since July 2023 and until not too long ago Gift has been available worldwide on Disney+ with subtitles in a lot of languages. Now it is not available in Europe anymore. I hope that in the future they will decide to propose it again because here we are talking about art. At the moment the only possibility to watch Gift is to order the DVD or Blu ray from Japan, but unfortunately there are no subtitles inside.

I previously wrote in Italian about Gift in two parts, which can be found here and here. Here instead is a review of Gift made by a person who knows nothing about skating and that, for this very reason, helps us understand what impact the show has on someone who is not a fan of Hanyu.

Disney Singapore has made a trailer with English subtitles to promote the show:

Gift is longer than Prologue, has a more complex story, more elaborate videos, live music, and a compaly of dancers who sometimes accompany Hanyu’s videos or performances, and is divided into two parts. This is the set list:

• The Firebird
• Hope and Legacy
• One Summer’s Day (new program choreographed by David Wilson)
• Ballade No. 1 by Chopin
• warm up
• Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso
• ——–
• Let Me Entertain You
• Ashura-chan (new program choreographed by Hanyu)
• Phantom of the Opera
• A Fleeting Dream
• Notte stellata
• (encore) Haru yo, koi
• (encore) Seimei

I published a review of Gift (in Italian) on FantasyMagazine. You can listen to part of the song Gift, composed by Satoshi Takebe for this show, here.

In the 2023-24 season Hanyu did a tour, Re_Pray.

This is the official website:

https://repray-icestory.jp

There should have been six shows in three cities, given the huge success they became eight shows in four cities:

Saitama, November 4th and 5th, 2023
Saga, January 12th and 14th, 2024
Yokohama, February 17th and 19th, 2024
Miyagi, April 7th and 9th, 2024

In Japan, all the shows were broadcast, partly live and partly delayed. The first show in Saitama, and the second in the other cities, were broadcast live internationally on internet on Beyond Live. At the moment there is no news regarding DVD, we can only hope that Hanyu manages to obtain the rights to publish his show in a format that we can purchase and keep. This is a huge problem, probably I will write about it in the future. But even if he does not succeed, it is important to remember that the live broadcast took place, that if we follow his accounts we are able to watch what he does. And we can try to ask the various streaming platforms to include Re_Pray, and also all of Hanyu’s other shows, in their catalog. Maybe if they receive enough requests they will move to acquire the rights.

I found two different trailers for Re_Pray:

⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️
きょうから
一般抽選発売のうけつけが
すたーと💻🪽#羽生結弦 #RE_PRAY宮城公演 ✨https://t.co/YVFT23MKzY#ゆづづ の想い💭が
たっぷりつまった宮城公演…
みんなも わくわくしてるぐり？🥹❤️‍🔥
⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️⛸️❄️ https://t.co/u8KKLIumwv pic.twitter.com/EAJQMujx0D

— ぐりり【公式】 🎊khb50周年🎊 (@khb_guriri) March 25, 2024

#羽生結弦 の最新アイスショー⛸️
／
ICE STORY 2nd “#RE_PRAY” 横浜公演 最終日
マルチアングルカメラ４台分の追加配信がスタート🎉
＼

横浜公演の最終日映像を
すべて別アングルでお届け‼️

表情がしっかりと見える映像から
全身をとらえた映像まで…☺️
全7種の映像が楽しめる❣️

視聴はタップで👇

— TELASA（テラサ） (@telasa_jp) February 27, 2024

Re_Pray is linked to the world of video games, and at a certain point the show offers a choice, just as someone playing a game might have a choice. Depending on the choice made, Hanyu skates one or the other of two different programs. This is the set list:

• A Fleeting Dream
• Gate of Living (new program choreographed by Mikiko)
• Hope and Legacy / Ashura-chan
• Megalovania (new program choreographed by Hanyu)
• warm up
• The Darkness of Eternity (new program choreographed by Hanyu)
• ——–
• A Fleeting Dream_RE
• Requiem of Heaven and Earth
• One Summer’s Day
• Haru yo, koi
• (encore) Let Me Entertain You
• (encore) Seimei
• (encore) Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso

I published an analysis of Re_Pray (in Italian) on FantasyMagazine.

The last solo show in chronological order is the Echoes of Life tour.

This is the official website:

https://echoesoflife.jp

In this case, Hanyu performed in three cities, for a total of seven shows:

Saitama, December 7th, 9th, and 11th, 2024
Hiroshima, January 3rd and 5th, 2025
Chiba, February 7th and 9th, 2025

Echoes of Life had the usual Japanese live broadcasts of some of the shows and delayed broadcasts of the others, and also international live broadcasts on Beyond Live of the first show in Saitama and the second in Hiroshima and Chiba. Along with the subtitles on Beyond Live, this time Hanyu also created an audio guide in English for those who don’t know Japanese and would be watching the show live in the arenas. And since Hanyu always opens ticket sales to international fans, this time I also participated in the lotteries and won the chance to buy tickets for the two shows in Chiba. I shared my impressions of the shows I saw live here (in English).

There are two trailers for the show on X. Some images appear in both trailers, others only in one of the two.

【ch2】22(土)よる7時～Yuzuru Hanyu ICE STORY 3rd “Echoes of Life” TOUR「広島公演 DAY1」TV初放送でお届け⛸3月～5月は“広島公演DAY1・千葉公演DAY1・舞台裏SP”と3カ月連続放送💽🔐 出演・制作総指揮 #羽生結弦 演出 #MIKIKO https://t.co/IU2nGm5KqN pic.twitter.com/pvxlcOhyn0

— ＣＳテレ朝チャンネル (@tvasahi_cs) March 16, 2025

Yuzuru Hanyu ICE STORY 3rd
“Echoes of Life” TOUR⛸️❄️

⋰
埼玉公演マルチアングルカメラ映像
TELASAで独占配信中🎉
⋱

ショーの頭から終わりまでを
6つのカメラのお好きなアングルで‼️順次配信‼️
多種多様なカットをお楽しみください❣️#羽生結弦 #Echoes

視聴は👇https://t.co/2HS9xpahqa pic.twitter.com/P50j9CnanZ

— TELASA（テラサ） (@telasa_jp) December 23, 2024

On Hanyu’s social pages we can see some other short videos with training and some images of the preparatory phase or behind the scenes: https://x.com/echoesoflife_jp.

Prologue was autobiographical, and Gift was still tied to Hanyu’s personal story, although he transformed them in a way to make them universal. On a narrative level, Hanyu grew show after show. Re_Pray was extraordinary, with the narration that was detached from Hanyu’s personal story. Echoes of Life is pure narration, and is superior to Re_Pray. I wrote an article (in Italian) for FantasyMagazine. Again, there are no DVDs or other media to watch the show. I hope Hanyu manages to buy the rights and will be able to publish Echoes of life, but that’s something we’ll only find out in the future.

If we exclude the encores, the show is almost entirely made up of new programs. Chopin’s Ballade had to be placed at a very specific moment for narrative reasons, because it is the short program of Hanyu’s second Olympic gold, the one that laid the foundation for success, and then there are three programs from the professional period, two of which previously he had only skated for YouTube. The others are all new programs. We are not sure, but probably all but two were choreographed by Hanyu, who studied dance for months and who in some phases improvised the movements to best express the emotions of the moment. The program:

• First Pulse (new program)
• “First Echo” and “Circulation” (new programma)
• Utai IV: Reawakening (new program choreographed by Mikiko)
• Mass Destruction: Reload (new program)
• Piano Collection (1: No. 3 Ballade in G minor by Brahms – 2: Prelude and Fugue in C minor, BWV 847 by Bach – 3: Keyboard sonata in D minor, K. 141 by Scarlatti – 4: Étude Op. 25, No. 12 in C minor – Ocean by Chopin – 5: Étude Op. 10, No. 4 in C-sharp minor – Torrent by Chopin), new program coreographed by Jeffrey Buttle
• Ballade No. 1 in G minor by Chopin
• Goliath
• ——–
• Aqua’s Journey
• Eclipse/Blue (new programma)
• Gate of Steiner – Aesthetics on Ice (new program)
• Danny Boy
• Hymn of the Soul (programma inedito)
• (bis) Let Me Entertain You
• (bis) Ashura-chan / Megalovania
• (bis) Seimei

Hanyu has posted a video featuring some moments from the show on the music of First Pulse:

プロ転向から3年を迎えました！
たくさんの応援が心強く背中を押してくださっています。
いつも、今までも、ありがとうございます！
これからも進み続けます🪽⛸️🧊 pic.twitter.com/WtMZTbn3hg

— 羽生結弦official_Staff 公式 (@YUZURUofficial_) July 18, 2025

Notte stellata, Challenge and The First Skate

Notte stellata, the exhibition program, was choreographed by David Wilson for the 2016-17 season. Hanyu performed it several times. One of them was at the PyeongChang Olympic Games gala:

The name of this program has also become the name of a show. This is the official website:

https://nottestellata.com

The show takes place in the Sekisui Heim Super Arena in Rifu, near Sendai, on a weekend in March, on days as close as possible to that of the earthquake that devastated Tohoku on March 11, 2011. There are three shows, one per day. In 2023 it was March 10, 11, and 12, in 2024 March 8, 9, and 10, this year March 7, 8, and 9. It is an event commemorating the earthquake, but there is also concrete help, with part of the proceeds going to charity and the presence on site of people who were affected by that earthquake or, this year, also by people affected by the earthquake that devastated the Noto Peninsula on January 1, 2024.

In this case Hanyu is not the producer of the show, even if the show is centered on him. This is a more traditional show, with a cast of skaters alongside Hanyu. They are, in alphabetical order, Violetta Afanasieva, Shae-Lynn Bourne, Jason Brown, Javier Fernandez (only from the second edition), Rika Hongo, Satoko Miyahara, Tahakito Mura, Akiko Suzuki and Keiji Tanaka. More traditional, however, does not mean that it is a show like all the others. Each skater performs one or more programs, there are the opening and closing group numbers (Hanyu participated in the closing number on Song of Hope, choreographed by David Wilson), a collaboration between two skaters, Afanasieva who does programs other than the traditional ones because she is a hula hoop specialist, and then there is the special guest and Hanyu.

Each of the three editions was opened by Hanyu, who performed Notte stellata. The last program of the first half is a collaboration program between Hanyu and the special guest. In 2023 the guest was gymnast Kohei Uchimura. Together, Hanyu on the ice and Uchimura on the floor, performed Conquest of Paradise, a new program that, in Hanyu’s part, was choreographed by David Wilson and Hanyu himself. Towards the end of the show, Uchimura performed a gymnastics program, and immediately afterwards Hanyu performed Haru yo, koi. The first half of the show opened with a group number with Bourne, Hongo, Mura and Suzuki performing Dynamite, and Hanyu performing the song with them in a video shown on the big screen. A snippet of Hanyu on the big screen, without music and with the skaters who have stepped aside for the moment, can be seen in this tweet, although it is too little to really understand what the program is like.

#座長は映像出演 pic.twitter.com/olXNMQWgjt

— 東和薬品 presents 羽生結弦 notte stellata 2025【公式】 (@notte_2025) March 16, 2023

In 2024 the structure of the show was similar, with Notte stellata at the beginning, Permission to Dance in the middle, with Hanyu still on the big screen and the same group of skaters plus Tanaka on the ice, and Danny Boy at the end. This was the first time that Hanyu performed Danny Boy, a new program choreographed for him by David Wilson. In this case the special guest was the actress Mao Daichi, who near the end of the show performed one of her historic numbers. The first half of the show ended with the extraordinary collaboration between Daichi and Hanyu on Carmina Burana. The choreography was created by Shae-Lynn Bourne and Rino Masaki, Daichi’s usual choreographer.

Some footage from Danny Boy (as well as Notte stellata, Haru yo, koi and the show Challenge) can be seen in this video, unfortunately without the music for copyright reasons.

This year’s show was a little different. Notte stellata again at the beginning and Haru yo, koi again at the end, but this time Hanyu always performed on the ice, not on the big screen. The guest was Mansai Nomura, and there were two collaborations. In the first, Nomura and Hanyu, plus Bourne, Miyahara, Mura and Tanaka, proposed a new version of Mansai Bolero, to the music of Ravel’s Bolero and with choreography by Shae-Lynn Bourne for the parts on the ice. At the beginning of the second half, Hanyu returned to the ice, did his warm up, and then went out. At that point, the onmyoji Abe no Seimei, played for the occasion by Nomura, arrived near the ice rink. The onmyoji summoned his shikigami to fight against the forces of evil, and Hanyu returned to the ice. This Seimei is pure theater.

Small problem: Notte stellata does not have an international livestream. Many international fans, including me, are asking for it, for the moment we have not received an answer. What we can see on the internet are some videos in English that talk about the behind the scenes, the preparation, and that show some images of the three editions of Notte stellata.

For now we can only purchase the DVD or Blu-ray version of the 2023 and 2024 editions (the latter has just been released, I hope that in a year they will release the DVD of the 2025 edition).

In the title of this section I indicated two other shows, Challenge and The First Skate. Challenge was organized by Hanyu’s request because he wanted to give concrete help to the areas devastated by the earthquake of the Noto Peninsula. This article in English is dedicated to Challenge:

https://olympics.com/en/news/hanyu-yuzuru-back-kanazawa-figure-skating-earthquake

On January 1st, 2024, Ishikawa Prefecture was devastated by an earthquake. A few months later, Hanyu went to Wajima, one of the hardest-hit cities, and met with locals:

On September 15th, together with Satoko Miyahara, Takahito Mura and Akiko Suzuki (and some local artists, a group of drummers and a group from a calligraphy school) he performed in the show Challenge, whose proceeds went to the areas devastated by the earthquake. Challenge was broadcast only in Japan by an on-demand service. Hanyu skated in two group numbers, an opening one to taiko music and a closing one to Que sera sera, with choreography by Akiko Suzuki and his own, and he performed again Haru yo, koi.

The other show is The First Skate. This one isn’t a charity show, but the inaugural show of the renovated Xebio Arena in Sendai. The show, which took place on July 5th, featured several Sendai skaters, in addition to Takeshi Honda, Rika Hongo, and Akiko Suzuki. Hanyu performed a group number on Turandot and then performed Haru yo, koi and Let Me Entertain You. The organizers announced they are working to make the show available online, with the purchase of a ticket. We don’t yet know if this option will be available only to Japanese fans or if tickets will be available worldwide.

Stars on Ice and Fantasy on Ice

Hanyu has performed in two regular shows, Stars on Ice and Fantasy on Ice. The first was Stars on Ice, which he participated in 2023.

https://figureskate-soi.com/2023

Ten shows in three different cities: Osaka (March 30 and 31, April 1), Oshu (April 3, 4 and 5) and Yokohama (April 6, 7, 8 and 9). Almost all of the shows had television coverage only in Japan, unfortunately the solo shows are the only ones for which we have an international broadcast because they are the only ones entirely managed by Hanyu and it is important to him that we too can watch them. For the other shows, we can continue to ask the organizers for a paid international live broadcast, maybe sooner or later they will listen to us.

Hanyu choreographed his part in the opening group number, All These Things That I’ve Done, and performed three different programs: The Phantom of the Opera on the first day in each city, Ashura-chan on the second day in each city and the fourth day in Yokohama, and One Summer’s Day on the third day in each city. In Ashura-chan and One Summer’s Day, whose choreography normally does not include jumps, he added a 3Lo.

Fantasy on Ice in 2023 was made up of two parts called Tour A and Tour B, both consisting of six shows. Tour A stopped in Makuhari (May 26, 27, 28) and Miyagi (June 2, 3, 4), Tour B stopped in Niigata (June 16, 17, 18) and Kobe (June 23, 24, 25). In both tours Hanyu participated in group numbers, choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle, and presented a new program, choreographed by himself. In Tour A the group numbers were Ain’t no mountain high enough/Rising Heart and USA, his program If… In Tour B the group numbers were History Maker and Stars, his program Glamorous Sky. Unfortunately not even Fantasy on Ice assists us with images, all I found among the official videos was a 3F in Glamorous Sky.

¸¸✧･ﾟ•.いよいよ本日‼+:｡:✧
⛸18:00～
『ファンタジー・オン・アイス2023 in KOBE』

スケーターとアーティストとの
華麗なコラボレーションで
見る人を夢の世界に誘う
“伝説のアイスショー”を
たっぷりとお届けします✨

🏡HPhttps://t.co/hBAqJcWnpT#FaOI #FantasyonIce pic.twitter.com/yeZFVMQkqH

— BSフジスポーツ【BSフジ公式】 (@bsfuji_sports) July 8, 2023

The last show in which Hanyu participated was Fantasy on Ice in 2024, only in Tour A. Two cities, Makuhari (May 24, 25 and 26) and Aichi (May 31, June 1 and 2), six shows in total. The opening and closing numbers, choreographed by Jeffrey Buttle, were Ray of Light and High Pressure. In addition to leading the group numbers, Hanyu performed two numbers, Danny Boy and Meteor, a new program choreographed by him. We only have an official video of the official rehearsals of the first group number (with Hanyu who had injured himself in a fall the day before and has a large plaster near one eye):

There are also a couple of official photos with the costume for Meteor, one on the ice and one backstage, shared by the singer Takanori Nishikawa.

どれ程の方がお気付きでしょうか？色使い、シルエット、まさかの引用に、コラボレーションとは斯くあるべきであると改めて痛感しました！是非会場で目撃下さい！#FantasyonIce 愛知公演、Aichi Sky Expo で本日より開催です！@Fantasy_on_Ice #FaOI#羽生結弦 #西川貴教https://t.co/pyPro2c2Sq https://t.co/VMp2U69D9z pic.twitter.com/VM6dverqlK

— 西川貴教 (@TMR15) May 31, 2024

終わってしまいました… 氷のように儚く、瞬きのような６公演でした。会場、劇場、中継で今公演に触れて頂いた皆さま、本当にありがとうございました。そして素晴らしい出会いをくれた関係者の皆さまにも心より感謝申し上げます。@Fantasy_on_Ice #FaOI#羽生結弦 #JavierFERNANDEZ#StephaneLAMBIEL https://t.co/sJ7fsfpt0Z pic.twitter.com/u48hhcTB1c

— 西川貴教 (@TMR15) June 2, 2024

Part three is here.

(the Italian text is here)

Not even three years have passed since Yuzuru Hanyu decided to leave competitions and go professional. But what is professionalism in figure skating? There are no associations, rules, or predetermined paths. In fact, it is all in the hands of the skaters.

Many of them perform in a lot of shows. There are countless in Japan: Stars on Ice (born in the United States but which has expanded over the years with tours in Canada and Japan), Prince Ice World, Fantasy on Ice, Dreams on Ice, Friends on Ice… And then there are careers related to figure skating such as that of coach, or choreographer, or within the federation, or even as a sports journalist. Many skaters undertake one or more of these careers.

In this reality, Hanyu chose a path different from that of anyone else. Of course, he participated in traditional shows, in Stars on Ice in the first season, in Fantasy on Ice for two seasons, and he also collaborated to create a show in which he performs alongside other skaters, as several champions of the past had already done. However, he also created solo shows, something that was unimaginable before him, and that will hardly be replicated by anyone else. He created choreographies, even if he created them only for himself, but he also performed choreographies created by others, because the number of programs he performed in these three years is very high. He opened his own YouTube channel, like many other skaters, and yet it is a different channel, not only because his few videos have attracted considerable attention, but also for how he has made these videos. He goes on television, even if not as a journalist. More or less not as a journalist, because he has covered the role of “Special Messenger” several times. In just three years, Hanyu has done an infinite number of things. Let’s see what they are.

YouTube

On August 7, 2022, Hanyu opened his YouTube channel. He made it clear that it would be a channel dedicated to figure skating, not to his private life, which is only his. In October, he also opened a section reserved for paid subscribers. Most of the videos for members of this section are videos in which he talks about what he has done or mentions his future projects. They are in Japanese, but in some cases there are English subtitles, in other cases there are English translations made by fans among the comments. Some of the videos also include a handful of seconds dedicated to a jump. Hanyu said that we can talk about the videos for members, unless he say to us otherwise, so I will mention them from time to time, but I will focus mostly on the public videos. The channel is this one:

https://www.youtube.com/@hanyuyuzuru2624

Later Hanyu also opened his profiles on X (and then he also opened profiles related to his shows, Prologue, Gift, Re_Pray, Echoes of Life and Notte stellata) and on Instagram.

The first video, very short and only in Japanese, is a simple greeting, the information that Hanyu has opened the channel.

In the second video we start to see some skating, a 3A, a 3Lz, a spin and a 4T, the first three elements filmed from a very particular angle, with the camera placed on the ice. Between one element and another Hanyu provides some information about the channel and gives the appointment for the next day, when he will hold a training session live on the internet.

The training session, which he calls SharePractice. For a few months it was not visible outside of Japan due to copyright issues. When Hany found out about it, he took action to solve the problem.

The training, lasting about two hours, took place partly in the corridors of the Ice Rink and partly on the rink. And on the rink Hanyu performed several jumps and skated some parts of his past programs such as Hana ni nare, Ten to chi to and Hope and Legacy (of these two programs he skated only a small piece to perform some quadruples) and, at the end, White Legend (with a different music for copyright reasons). The climax came when he skated Seimei perfectly with the layout he had created for the 2018 Olympic Games: 4S, 4T, 3F, 4S+3T, 4T+1Eu+3S, 3A+2A, 3Lo, 3Lz.

Hanyu showed his subscribers part of another training. In the summer of 2023 he published in the membership a video of a dozen minutes containing numerous jumps.

In October, Hanyu began posting entire programs on his channel. The new video contains one of his historic programs, Change, which he performed in exhibition for the first time when he was still competing in the junior category, and the first new program choreographed by him, Dreamy Aspiration. Some of the cameras are placed on the ice, the shots are particular, and we will find these characteristics in all of Hanyu’s programs. Hanyu often skates very close to the camera, with remarkable effects. As for the special effects inserted during the editing phase, we will see Hanyu’s skills improve video after video.

Between the two videos, Hanyu speaks a little, and for the first time the video contains English subtitles. In the membership it is possible to see both programs without any editing, with the shooting done by a single camera, the demonstration that editing is a choice but that Hanyu really skates the programs from beginning to end, without interruptions.

Sasanqua is a new program choreographed by Hanyu and related to Prologue. I will talk about the shows later. In fact, this music accompanies one of the videos of Prologue, and Hanyu had shown some of the images that we see in the video during Prologue.

Instead, it is a gala program from his competitive period The Final Time Traveler, performed for the occasion at the Ice Rink Sendai.

After Gift, Hanyu uploaded Boku no koto to his channel. This is a new program choreographed by him that he used in Gift for the closing credits. In the membership we can see the program, with its 5 quadruples, filmed by a single camera: Hanyu really skated Boku no koto as we see it.

On March 11, 2023, the 12th anniversary of the Tohoku earthquake, Hanyu uploaded Requiem of Heaven and Earth on his channel, one of the many programs he dedicated to the earthquake and performed at galas during his competitive career.

The next program is an old program by Hanyu, Notre-Dame de Paris. It is the free skate of the 2012-13 season, the first one choreographed for Hanyu by David Wilson and never skated by Hanyu to perfection because at the time he did not have enough energy to be able to complete the technical content to the fullest (without considering that in the last two competitions in which he performed Notre-Dame de Paris, Hanyu was not in the best physical condition). Here the program is perfect, but only members can watch it.

Months later, in December 2023, Hanyu uploaded Goliath, a new program choreographed by him. In the membership it is possible to see the same program performed not on the ice but in the Ice Rink dance studio.

Along with Goliath Hanyu uploaded another new program, Aqua’s Journey, and again the choreography is his. There is another version of this program in the membership.

For the closing credits of the Re_Pray tour, Hanyu performed Estpolis II, another new program choreographed by him. Actually, Estpolis II is the Japanese title of the video game whose music Hanyu used, the English title is Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals. If you click on the title, it will take you to the English Wikipedia page dedicated to the video game. Music is important to Hanyu, so where possible I have included links to an explanation.

The costumes worn by Hanyu in this video are those of the new Re_Pray programs: A Fleeting Dream and A Fleeting_RE (the first is actually a program created for Prologue, but here, with the second version of the program, the music for solo piano and a costume of a different color, it takes on a new value), Gate of Living, Megalovania and The Darkness of Eternity. In this case, for the special effects he collaborated with GEEKPICTURES.

The latest program uploaded by Hanyu on his channel is Last Ambient. Once again the choreography is his, the music by Taisei Miyakawa. For this program in the section dedicated to members it is possible to watch part of the work on the choreography done in the dance studio.

Edit: After I wrote this post Hanyu uploaded to his channel two versions of Danny Boy that he recorded in April at the Sendai Ice Rink. Full version:

Short version:

Edit 2: On July 19, 2025, Hanyu posted another video on his channel. It’s Mass Destruction: Reload, a program from the show Echoes of Life, which he performed between December 2024 and February 2025.

Other events

In 2022 Hanyu participated for the last time in 24-hour. The program he performed on that occasion was Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso. After this program, even we can’t see it in this video, he added an encore, the choreographic sequence of Seimei.

In December, Hanyu made a surprise appearance at the Sendai Major’s Cup, a competition for young skaters that was founded with money he donated after his second Olympic gold medal. Before the competition began, Hanyu performed Parisienne Walkways, then encouraged local skaters to have fun, do their best, and keep chasing their dreams.

In 2025 Kenshi Yonesu wanted Hanyu for the music video for Bow and Arrow, the opening theme for the anime Medalist. When he came up with the choreography, Hanyu tried to be as faithful to the anime as possible, just performing figure skating elements a little more difficult than the ones we see in the anime.

This is the “short program” version, with Hanyu skating, while we only hear Yonezu’s voice:

Yonezu also uploaded on his channel an interesting conversation between him and Hanyu about the birth of this program. You can turn on the subtitles and set them to automatically translate into English, but in the comments someone published a real translation:

In March 2025, Hanyu performed and filmed two different versions of Danny Boy. The videos were broadcast by NHK as part of the final episode of the program Ogensan to Issho, hosted by Gen Hoshino. In the summer of 2023, Hanyu was invited by Hoshino to one of his programs, and on that occasion Hoshino talked about the song Danny Boy as one of his favorites. A few months later, Hanyu began performing Danny Boy, choreographed by David Wilson, in several shows: Notte stellata 2024, Fantasy on Ice, and Echoes of Life. There are currently no official versions of the program on the internet, mentioned in this article:

https://worldfigureskating-web.jp/news/12191

The second post about Hanyu’s professional career is here.

English translation here.

Terza e ultima parte del mio lunghissimo post dedicato a ciò che ha fatto Yuzuru Hanyu da quando è passato al professionismo. Quando ho scritto il post erano trascorsi solo due anni e nove mesi e non tre, ma il titolo preciso sarebbe stato bruttino. E visto che il titolo che ho scelto parla di tre anni, ho modificato il post aggiungendo alcune cose fatta da Hanyu negli ultimi tre mesi del suo terzo anno da professionista. La prima parte del post, dedicata ai programmi che possiamo vedere su internet, si trova qui. La seconda parte, dedicata ai solo show e agli show incentrati su di lui, Notte stellata e Challenge, si trova qui.

Stars on Ice  and  Fantasy on Ice

Hanyu si è esibito in due show tradizionali,  Stars on Ice  e  Fantasy on Ice. 

https://figureskate-soi.com/2023

Dieci date in tre città diverse: Osaka (30 e 31 marzo, 1 aprile), Oshu (3, 4 e 5 aprile) e Yokohama (6, 7, 8 e 9 aprile). Quasi tutte le date hanno avuto una copertura televisiva solo in Giappone, purtroppo i solo show sono gli unici per i quali abbiamo una trasmissione internazionale perché sono gli unici interamente gestiti da Hanyu, e per lui è importante offrire anche a noi la possibilità di guardarli. Per gli altri possiamo continuare a chiedere una diretta internazionale a pagamento agli organizzatori, magari prima o poi ci ascolteranno.

Hanyu ha coreografato la sua parte nel numero di gruppo iniziale, All These Things That I’ve Done, e si è esibito su tre programmi diversi: Il fantasma dell’Opera il primo giorno in ogni città, Ashura-chan il secondo giorno in ogni città e il quarto giorno a Yokohama, e One Summer’s Day il terzo giorno in ogni città. In Ashura-chan e One Summer’s Day, la cui coreografia non prevede salti, ha aggiunto un 3Lo.

Fantasy on Ice nel 2023 è stato costituito da due parti chiamate Tour A e Tour B, entrambe composte da sei show. Il Tour A ha fatto tappa a Makuhari (26, 27 e 28 maggio) e Miyagi (2, 3 e 4 giugno), il Tour B ha fatto tappa a Niigata (16, 17 e 18 giugno) e Kobe (23, 24 e 25 giugno). In entrambi i tour Hanyu ha partecipato ai numeri di gruppo, coreografati da Jeffrey Buttle, e presentato un programma nuovo, coreografato da lui stesso. Nel Tour A i numeri di gruppo sono stati Ain’t no mountain high enough/Rising Heart e USA, il suo programma If… Nel tour B i numeri di gruppo sono stati History Maker e Stars, il suo programma Glamorous Sky. Purtroppo nemmeno Fantasy on Ice ci assiste con le immagini, tutto quello che ho trovato fra i video ufficiali è stato un 3F in Glamorous Sky.

¸¸✧･ﾟ•.いよいよ本日‼+:｡:✧
⛸18:00～
『ファンタジー・オン・アイス2023 in KOBE』

スケーターとアーティストとの
華麗なコラボレーションで
見る人を夢の世界に誘う
“伝説のアイスショー”を
たっぷりとお届けします✨

🏡HPhttps://t.co/hBAqJcWnpT#FaOI #FantasyonIce pic.twitter.com/yeZFVMQkqH

— BSフジスポーツ【BSフジ公式】 (@bsfuji_sports) July 8, 2023

L’ultimo show tradizionale a cui Hanyu ha partecipato è stato Fantasy on Ice nel 2024, solo nel Tour A. Due città, Makuhari (24, 25 e 26 maggio) e Aichi (31 maggio, 1 e 2 giugno), sei show in tutto. I numeri iniziale e finale, coreografati da Jeffrey Buttle, sono stati Ray of Light e High Pressure. Oltre ad aver guidato i numeri di gruppo, Hanyu ha interpretato due programmi, Danny Boy e Meteor, un programma nuovo coreografato da lui. Di ufficiale abbiamo un video relativo alle prove ufficiali del primo numero di gruppo (con Hanyu che si era ferito in una caduta il giorno prima e ha un vistoso cerotto vicino a un occhio):

In più ci sono un paio di foto, una in pista e una nel backstage, condivise da Takanori Nishikawa, l’interprete del brano musicale.

どれ程の方がお気付きでしょうか？色使い、シルエット、まさかの引用に、コラボレーションとは斯くあるべきであると改めて痛感しました！是非会場で目撃下さい！#FantasyonIce 愛知公演、Aichi Sky Expo で本日より開催です！@Fantasy_on_Ice #FaOI#羽生結弦 #西川貴教https://t.co/pyPro2c2Sq https://t.co/VMp2U69D9z pic.twitter.com/VM6dverqlK

— 西川貴教 (@TMR15) May 31, 2024

終わってしまいました… 氷のように儚く、瞬きのような６公演でした。会場、劇場、中継で今公演に触れて頂いた皆さま、本当にありがとうございました。そして素晴らしい出会いをくれた関係者の皆さまにも心より感謝申し上げます。@Fantasy_on_Ice #FaOI#羽生結弦 #JavierFERNANDEZ#StephaneLAMBIEL https://t.co/sJ7fsfpt0Z pic.twitter.com/u48hhcTB1c

— 西川貴教 (@TMR15) June 2, 2024

Alcuni numeri

Ho deciso di scrivere questa sezione per riassumere in qualche numero e in qualche dato cosa ha fatto Hanyu in questi tre anni.

Show:

• Prologue – 5 date fra novembre e dicembre 2022
• Major’s Cup – 1 data, dicembre 2022 (il pubblico c’era, perciò questa è un’esibizione)
• Gift – 1 data, febbraio 2023
• Notte stellata – 3 date, marzo 2023
• Stars on Ice – 10 date, marzo-aprile 2023
• Fantasy on Ice – 12 date, maggio-giugno 2023
• Re_Pray – 8 date, novembre 2023-aprile 2024
• Notte stellata – 3 date, marzo 2024 (bonus: il pubblico ha potuto assistere a due prove)
• Fantasy on ice – 6 date, maggio-giugno 2024
• Challenge – 1 data, settembre 2024
• Echoes of Life – 7 date, dicembre 2024-febbraio 2025
• Notte stellata – 3 date, marzo 2025 (bonus: il pubblico ha potuto assistere a due prove)
• The First Skate – 1 data, luglio 2025 (in questo caso ho aggiunto la segnalazione dello show dopo aver pubblicato il post)

Il totale dice 13 show, 61 date. Hanyu non si è certo rilassato dopo aver lasciato le gare, anzi, lavora più di prima, e crea show, o anche programmi autonomi, straordinari. Di questi show, otto sono stati trasmessi in diretta internazionale, di quattro esistono DVD o Blu ray. Meglio che niente, anche se per i miei gusti è un po’ poco. Non per nulla sto chiedendo alle piattaforme di streaming di inserire gli show di Hanyu nel loro catalogo, i solo show e anche Notte stellata. O, se non le piattaforme di streaming, sarebbe bello se le televisioni giapponesi ci fornissero la possibilità di acquistare un biglietto per il livestream, per Notte stellata o anche per eventuali altri show a cui Hanyu dovesse partecipare, perché anche nei programmi di gruppo lui dà sempre il massimo, e If…, Glamorous Sky e Meteor, programmi che difficilmente Hanyu proporrà in altre occasioni, sono meravigliosi.

Questi sono i programmi pattinati interamente o in parte da Hanyu in questi tre anni (non considero quelli su cui si è limitato a eseguire un salto, come Ten to chi to durante la SharePractice). Nell’elenco specifico se si tratta di un programma creato in queste tre stagioni e, se è noto un coreografo diverso da Hanyu, il nome del coreografo. Conto anche i programmi di gruppo non solo perché Hanyu ha dovuto imparare la coreografia, ma anche perché lui è sempre in una posizione di rilievo, con gli occhi di tutto il pubblico su di lui. Se esiste un video ufficiale online, inserisco il link. Nel caso video di gara che comprendono numerosi pattinatori, il link rimanda direttamente a quando sul ghiaccio c’è Hanyu.

• Hana ni nare
• Seimei [Giochi olimpici 2018]
• White Legend [Giochi olimpici 2014]
• Introduzione e rondò capriccioso
• Change
• Dreamy Aspiration (programma nuovo)
• Let’s Go Crazy
• Otoñal [Campionato nazionale 2019]
• Étude in D-sharp minor
• Spartacus [Asian Novice Championship 2005]
• Hello, I Love You
• Mission: Impossible II
• Somebody to Love
• Sing, Sing, Sing
• Romeo + Juliet
• A Fleeting Dream (programma nuovo. Non considero A Fleeting Dream_RE come un programma diverso, anche se il modo in cui interpreta il programma è diverso)
• Haru yo, koi [Giochi olimpici 2022]
• Parisienne Walkways [Giochi olimpici 2014]
• From Russia with Love
• Sasanqua (programma nuovo)
• The Final Time Traveler
• L’uccello di fuoco
• Hope and Legacy [Campionato del mondo 2017]
• One Summer’s Day (programma nuovo, coreografia di David Wilson)
• Ballade No. 1 in G minor by Chopin [Giochi olimpici 2018]
• Let Me Entertain You [Campionato del mondo 2021]
• Ashura-chan (programma nuovo)
• Il fantasma dell’Opera
• Notte stellata [Giochi olimpici 2018]
• Boku no koto
• Conquest of Paradise (programma nuovo in collaborazione con Kohei Uchimura, in parte coreografato da David Wilson – qui è possibile vedere quasi 20 secondi del programma senza musica)
• Dynamite (programma nuovo interpretato in studio)
• Song of Hope (programma di gruppo nuovo coreografato da David Wilson)
• Requiem of Heaven and Earth
• All These Things That I’ve Done (tecnicamente è un programma di gruppo, ma per la sua parte, circa un minuto coreografato da Hanyu, Hanyu è in pista da solo)
• Notre-Dame de Paris
• Ain’t no mountain high enough/Rising Heart (numero di gruppo nuovo coreografato da Jeffrey Buttle)
• If… (programma nuovo coreografato da Hanyu, con suggerimenti di Mikiko)
• USA (numero di gruppo nuovo coreografato da Jeffrey Buttle)
• History Maker (numero di gruppo nuovo coreografato da Jeffrey Buttle)
• Glamorous Sky (programma nuovo)
• Stars (numero di gruppo nuovo coreografato da Jeffrey Buttle)
• Gate of Living (programma nuovo coreografato da Mikiko)
• Megalovania (programma nuovo)
• The Darkness of Eternity (programma nuovo)
• Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals (programma nuovo)
• Goliath (programma nuovo)
• Aqua’s Journey (programma nuovo)
• Carmina Burana (programma nuovo in collaborazione con Mao Daichi, coreografato da Shae-Lynn Bourne e Rino Masaki – qui è possibile vedere 4 minuti del programma)
• Permission to Dance (programma nuovo interpretato in studio – un frammento del programma di una decina di secondi)
• Danny Boy (programma nuovo coreografato da David Wilson – pochi secondi del programma senza musica + Dopo che ho scritto questo post Hanyu ha caricato sul suo canale due versioni di Danny Boy che aveva registrato in aprile all’Ice Rink di Sendai: full version e short version).
• Ray of Light (numero di gruppo nuovo coreografato da Jeffrey Buttle)
• Meteor (programma nuovo)
• High Pressure (numero di gruppo nuovo coreografato da Jeffrey Buttle)
• Taiko drum (in mancanza di un nome ufficiale definisco così il numero di gruppo coreografato da Akiko Suzuki e rifinito da Hanyu sul suono dei taiko per lo show Challenge – qui vediamo quasi 30 secondi del programma, ma su una musica diversa da quella originale)
• Que sera sera (nuovo numero di gruppo coreografato da Akiko Suzuki e rifinito da Hanyu)
• Last Ambient (programma nuovo)
• First Pulse (programma nuovo – in questo video possiamo sentire la musica e vedere alcune immagini dell’intero show)
• “First Echo” and “Circulation” (programma nuovo)
• Utai IV: Reawakening (programma nuovo coreografato da Mikiko)
• Mass Destruction: Reload (nuovo programma coreografato da emmy, Mikiko e Hanyu)
• Piano Collection (programma nuovo coreografato da Jeffrey Buttle)
• Eclipse/Blue (programma nuovo)
• Gate of Steiner – Aesthetics on Ice (programma nuovo)
• Hymn of the Soul (programma nuovo)
• Bow and Arrow (programma nuovo)
• Bolero (programma nuovo in collaborazione con Mansai Nomura e altri cinque pattinatori, coreografato da Shae-Lynn Bourne – questo video comprende un minuto e mezzo del programma)
• Seimei (nuova versione rivista interpretata con Mansai Nomura – circa 2:40 del programma si trovano qui – aggiungo anche la versione del video con commento in inglese)

Se non ho perso il conto, sono 68 programmi, più della metà sono programmi nuovi e molti sono stati coreografati da lui. Se a questo aggiungiamo l’ideazione di quattro solo show, il montaggio dei video del suo canale, il ruolo da lui ricoperto in Notte stellata, vediamo che lo sforzo creativo è enorme. Uno sforzo creativo che ha portato anche alla nascita di un libro per bambini illustrato dalle Clamp per Gift.

Questo il sito ufficiale del libro Gift: https://sp.clamp-fans.com/ja/gift/

Per questa collaborazione è stato girato anche un video:

Per Echoes of Life invece Hanyu ha scritto racconto:

Il numero e la varietà dei programmi può solo dare un’idea delle sue doti interpretative, affinate nel continuo studio e nel continuo lavoro di perfezionamento. Nel caso dei tour, chi guarda tutti gli show è in grado di apprezzare i cambiamenti apportati da Hanyu per cercare di migliorare ciò che propone al pubblico, così come quando gareggiava continuava a perfezionare i programmi durante tutta la stagione agonistica. A livello tecnico/atletico vediamo qualche cifra.

Una gara è costituita da programma corto e programma libero, che vengono pattinati in due giorni diversi e complessivamente durano meno di 7 minuti. In Prologue il tempo di pattinata si aggira sui 30 minuti, in Gift sfiora i 43, più o meno come in Re_Pray, in Echoes of Life sfiora i 50 minuti. Le trottole in Prologue erano state 11, in Gift erano diventate 16, in Re_Pray 20, il solo Megalovania ne contiene 6, in Echoes of Life ce ne sono 15, una della lunghezza di un minuto. Sommando i due programmi, in gara i pattinatori fanno 6 trottole. Il numero degli elementi di salto in una gara è 10, 3 nel programma corto (per i migliori si tratta di una combinazione quadruplo+triplo, un altro quadruplo e un 3A), e 7 nel libero (tre combinazioni, solo una può essere di tre salti, almeno un 3A, con un’unica eccezione i migliori pattinatori fanno 4 o 5 quadrupli, gli altri sono salti tripli). In ogni solo show ci sono almeno 4 quadrupli, diversi 3A e diversi altri tripli, e il numero di salti con almeno tre rotazioni è superiore rispetto al numero di salti tripli o quadrupli che un pattinatore può eseguire sommando i due programmi di gara. E poi c’è tutto il resto.

Questi i diversi tipi di salti eseguiti da Hanyu dopo il suo passaggio al professionismo (non considero quante volte li ha fatti, solo la varietà di salti e combinazioni, e non mi soffermo neppure sui passaggi di transizione inseriti spesso immediatamente prima o dopo il salto):

• 1Lo ritardato
• 1A ritardato
• 2T con le braccia allargate per scelta coreografica
• 3T
• 3S
• 3Lo
• 3Lo+1Eu+3S
• 3F
• 3Lz
• 3Lz+2T+2T
• 3A
• 3A+2T versione rippon
• 3A+3T
• 3A+3T+3Lo
• 3A+1Eu+3S
• 3A+1Eu+3S+1Eu+3S
• 4T
• 4T+2T
• 4T+3T
• 4T+1Eu+3S (lo abbiamo visto per l’ultima volta nel febbraio del 2025)
• 4T+1Eu+3S+1Eu+3S
• 4T+3A
• 4S
• 4S+3T (lo abbiamo visto per l’ultima volta nel marzo del 2025)
• 4Lo (non lo esegue negli show, ma lo abbiamo visto per l’ultima volta nel marzo 2025)
• 4Lo+3T
• 4Lo+3A (lo abbiamo visto per l’ultima volta nel luglio del 2024)
• 4Lz (marzo 2025)
• 4A<< (lo abbiamo visto per l’ultima volta nel dicembre del 2022)

I salti per me non sono la cosa più importante, ma Hanyu è ancora in grado di fare quattro tipi diversi di quadrupli, e tre in combinazioni importanti, oltre ad aver completato combinazioni che in gara sono molto rare o proibite dal regolamento. E se è vero che qualche volta è caduto, è vero anche che è riuscito a completare almeno una data in tutti gli show (con l’eccezione di Gift, che ha avuto una data sola) senza commettere errori.

Televisione e altri impegni

Al di là del pattinaggio, che siano show o video, Hanyu ha fatto un’infinità di altre cose. Una non sorprendente è che ha lavorato con i suoi sponsor. Con alcuni di loro la collaborazione è terminata. ANA è fra questi, ed è un peccato, perché avevano realizzato diversi video molto belli. Sono terminate anche le collaborazioni con Nishikawa Down e con Sekkisei, mentre proseguono quelle con Ajinomoto, Citizen, Phiten e Towa Pharmaceutical. Due sponsor nuovi, Haier e Aqua, hanno realizzato degli spot all’Ice Rink di Sendai:

Altro sponsor nuovo è Gucci, per il quale Hanyu ha realizzato prima un breve filmato

e poi il classico “what’s in my bag” in collaborazione con Elle:

Per Gucci Hanyu è stato protagonista di due mostre fotografiche, YUZURU HANYU: A JOURNEY BEYOND DREAMS featured by ELLE e In Focus: Yuzuru Hanyu Lensed by Jiro Konami (qui è visibile un breve video) È stato anche intervistato da giornali che normalmente non si occupano di pattinaggio quali Elle Japan, GQ, Newsweek, Brutus, Ginza, Goethe, Kateigaho, Toyo Keizai e SO-EN.

発売中の『GQ JAPAN』6月号 特別版の表紙には、羽生結弦が登場。

撮影の様子をおさめたショートムービーをお届け！https://t.co/Hr2sgbhAbg#GQJAPAN #羽生結弦 #YuzuruHanyu #GUCCI #グッチ pic.twitter.com/IusVYDtv1W

— GQ JAPAN (@GQJAPAN) May 2, 2024

Un altro bellissimo video realizzato da Hanyu per Gucci si trova sul sito ufficiale.

A volte le riviste che realizzano un servizio fotografico su Hanyu pubblicano i dietro le quinte. Questo è quello di Figure Skating Life Extra.

🎥【メイキング動画公開！】 8/29発売 フィギュアスケートLife Extra『羽生結弦 PROFESSIONAL Season2』#羽生結弦 さんが魅せる変幻自在の動きや表情。カメラマンが切り取った瞬間がどんな形になるのか、誌面をお楽しみに✨
Photo: 矢口亨
Styling: 柳翔吾
Hair&Make: 柿崎友美#YuzuruHanyuPRO2 pic.twitter.com/wAArNJKRJe

— フィギュアスケートLife (@fskating_Life) August 27, 2024

Questo è quello di Aera. La fotografa è Mika Ninagawa.

Un altro video pubblicato da Aera si trova qui.

Il 29 settembre del 2022 Hanyu ha partecipato alla cerimonia dedicata ai 50 anni dell’instaurazione delle relazioni diplomatiche fra Cina e Giappone.

Nel dicembre dello stesso anno gli è stato conferito il Kikuchi Kan Award per aver contribuito a diffondere la cultura giapponese, anche se, essendo impegnato con Prologue, Hanyu non ha potuto partecipare alla cerimonia e ha mandato un breve video per ringraziare del premio. I premi da lui ricevuto sono numerosi, fra l’altro nel 2023 è stato nominato “Persona dell’anno” dalla Public Relations Society of Japan e ha ricevuto lo Special Achievement Awards dalla Japan Skating Federation.

Hanyu è stato incluso in diverse liste prestigiose, è stato fra gli atleti più ricercati su Google nel 2022, fra gli atleti olimpici più rappresentativi del XXI secolo stilata da ESPN, fra i 10 atleti più importanti secondo l’Associazione dei giornalisti professionisti e fra i 30 straordinari leader under 30 dell’Asia Pacific Young Leaders nella categoria “Cultura/sport/arte”.

Numerose sono anche le partecipazioni televisive. La più importante per la continuità e il suo significato è quella di News Every, dove ricopre il ruolo di Special Messanger. In diverse occasioni Hanyu ha parlato di calamità naturali, di prevenzione dei disastri, e si è recato in aree che avevano subito una calamità. Parte di queste trasmissioni sono state caricate come video su YouTube con sottotitoli in inglese.

Altri video relativi a sue partecipazioni alla trasmissione, solo in giapponese, sono stati caricati da News Every sul loro canale YouTube nel dicembre 2022, nel gennaio 2023, nel marzo 2023, nel luglio (1 e 2) 2023 e nel dicembre 2023. L’elenco completo dei video si trova qui.

Il canale di News Every comprende anche un video dedicato all’ideazione di Notte stellata 2023 insieme a Kohei Uchimura:

Hanyu è comunque molto attivo per tutte le calamità naturali, non solo per Sendai o per il Tohoku. Si è recato a Wajima, riportando l’attenzione sulla Prefettura di Ishikawa, mesi dopo il terremoto, dopo che nell’immediato aveva donato soldi (come aveva donato soldi dopo il terremoto in Turchia), e ha realizzato poster e manifesti per aiutare il turismo della regione. Con Re_Pray si è recato a Saga, rivitalizzando la regione. E non ha dimenticato l’Hokkaido, colpito da un terremoto nel 2018.

Tornando a Sendai, l’importanza che la sua città riveste per lui si vede anche nel video, questo sottotitolato in inglese, che ha realizzato come ambasciatore del turismo della città.

Si è anche adoperato per migliorare le possibilità di pattinare a Sendai, donando cifre molto alte all’Ice Rink e sostenendo il progetto di rinnovamento della Xebio Arena, la cui riapertura è prevista per il prossimo luglio.

Hanyu ha partecipato a un’infinità di trasmissioni televisive, ma purtroppo nella maggior parte dei casi quelle trasmissioni a cui ha partecipato Hanyu non sono visibili fuori dal Giappone, anche se a volte su YouTube si trovano video caricati dai fan, spezzoni di show, alcuni programmi, e anche parti di apparizioni in programmi televisivi, a volte con sottotitoli in inglese. Sicuramente ne sto dimenticando qualcuna, per quelle che ricordo inserisco il link a un video ufficiale o a uno dei numerosi articoli dedicati a quella trasmissione. Hanyu ha incontrato in diverse occasioni Shuzo Matsuoka, la prima volta subito dopo il suo addio alle gare. Nell’immediato ha anche rilasciato un’intervista a Tokyo TV, disponibile online in giapponese suddivisa in parte 1, parte 2 e parte 3.

Nel settembre del 2022 Hanyu è stato ospite della trasmissione locale Saturday Watchin! In seguito la televisione ha caricato il video sul suo canale YouTube suddiviso in parte 1, parte 2 e parte 3. Lo stesso è avvenuto con Oh! Bandess. In questo caso abbiamo la parte 1, parte 2, parte 3, parte 4 e parte 5. Hanyu è stato ospite della stessa trasmissione anche nel marzo del 2023 e nei due anni successivi, sempre in una data vicina a quella del Terremoto del Tohoku. Un’altra trasmissione in cui è apparso è Teremasa.

Sono trasmissioni normali, non speciali creati appositamente per lui, e in cui lui si è recato come ospite, All Night Nippon Gold di Yuming il, Kohaku Uta Gassen in cui ha ricoperto la funzione di giudice il 31 dicembre 2022, Classic TV di Shinya Kiyozuka, la Tetsuko’s Room di Tetsuko Kuroyanagi, Ogensan to Issho di Gen Hoshino, la Switch Interview con Kochi Domoto nell’ottobre del 2023 e Lucky Bags di Mansai Nomura. Questo video risale a quando Hanyu è stato ospite di Tetsuko Kuroyanagi nella Tetsuko’s Room:

Se tutte queste trasmissioni sono state rivolte a un pubblico giapponese, della conversazione che si è svolta nel 2024 fra Hanyu e Shigesato Itoi, il creatore del videogioco Mother, abbiamo una traduzione ufficiale in inglese.

Non esiste una traduzione ufficiale in nessuna lingua occidentale dei due libri autobiografici pubblicati da Hanyu nel 2023, dopo quelli che aveva pubblicato nel 2012 e nel 2016.

Che io sappia di pubblicazioni giapponesi con anche il testo in inglese ne esistono solo due, un libro fotografico e un calendario perpetuo. In entrambi i casi le foto sono accompagnate da brevi didascalie in giapponese e in inglese. Ho scelto di non elencare la maggior parte dei numerosi libri fotografici o riviste incentrati su Hanyu, neppure quelli che ho comprato, perché si tratta di tante pubblicazioni e questo post è fin troppo lungo. In questo caso però faccio un’eccezione perché è un segnale di apertura degli editori giapponesi a un pubblico internazionale. Il libro, e il calendario, si chiamano G.O.A.T.

Come ho ricordato prima, nella primavera del 2023 Hanyu si è recato brevemente in Canada. A testimonianza di questo viaggio ci sono diverse foto dei pattinatori che si allenano a Toronto e un breve video pubblicato da Tracy Wilson.

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Hanyu è stato protagonista anche di due eventi nel Metaverso, eventi a cui era possibile accedere da tutto il mondo. Nel 2023, per il suo compleanno, eravamo in 35.000. Lo scorso marzo in tre giorni siamo stati in 130.000 a entrare nel Metaverso. Lui era lì in incognito ma, in entrambe le occasioni, chi era presente ha potuto guardare due programmi dell’ultimo tour.

Da ricordare almeno un articolo di Hanyu e una conversazione. L’articolo è stato pubblicato su Bungeishunju, un giornale estremamente prestigioso a cui contribuiscono personalità importanti della cultura giapponese, e che a un atleta sia richiesto un contributo è decisamente raro. La conversazione, pubblicata a puntate da Deep Edge Plus, si è svolta fra Hanyu e la filosofa Rei Nagai, autrice di Underwater Phylosophy, e che un atleta conversi con un filosofo è un’altra cosa che non avviene tanto spesso.

Un’ultima cosa, anche se Hanyu non ha fatto nulla di particolare per questo progetto e, semplicemente, il regista si è focalizzato (anche) su di lui. Hanyu è uno dei protagonisti del docufilm Beijing 2022, dedicato ai Giochi olimpici del 2022. Peccato che in Italia questo film non sia stato quasi trasmesso nonostante abbia vinto la Guirlande d’Honneur al Milano International Sport Movies & TV Festival nel 2023.

Sono trascorsi tre anni da quando Hanyu è passato al professionismo. Non ho elencato tutto quello che ha fatto, tutti i servizi fotografici, le apparizioni televisive, le interviste, le collaborazioni con gli sponsor. Quello che Hanyu sta facendo è straordinario, e sono sicura che continuerà a stupirci anche in futuro.