Hanyu: 'I want to give a dream performance'

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Hanyu: 'I want to give a dream performance'

GANGNEUNG, South Korea - This was a moment the Japanese press had waited three months for.

It had been agonizing for them to go that long starved of any real contact with Yuzuru Hanyu, the 23-year-old skater their country adores, the skater who also has won fans worldwide with his boyish charm and unsurpassed excellence in the sport since winning the Olympic title four years ago.

So, along with a few foreign colleagues, Japanese media filled the 150 seats in the Gangneung Ice Arena press conference room Tuesday morning. A few dozen others stood. Camera shutters hummed like cicadas on a hot summer afternoon.

The press conference lasted 23 minutes, with nearly half that time taken for translating questions and answers from Japanese to English. But the chance to hear Hanyu say anything more than hello was enough after a virtual radio silence that had lasted since he injured a ligament in his right ankle on a fall at an NHK Trophy practice session Nov. 9.

His hair still flopped into his eyes. He smiled easily.

"He's in great spirits," his coach, Brian Orser, said.

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Nathan Chen's much-anticipated Olympic debut becomes a flop

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Nathan Chen's much-anticipated Olympic debut becomes a flop

GANGNEUNG, South Korea -- When he stopped skating, Nathan Chen lowered his head and quickly ran a hand through his hair. His face was blank. If something was churning inside him, Chen kept it bottled up.

"It wasn't shock," Chen said of his reaction. "It was more disappointment, the fact I didn't do what I want to do. I'm not going to show that I'm happy and kind of fake it if I'm genuinely not."

Chen truly had nothing to be happy about when it came to his performance. His highly anticipated Olympic debut Friday morning in the short program of the team event was a flop.

It was Chen's lowest-scored short program, by some five points, in two years as an international senior skater. None of his three jumping passes went either clean or as planned. He fell on a triple axel. He also turned a planned second quadruple jump into a double, giving him no points on that element because at least a solo triple jump is required.

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For Nathan Chen, some confidence-building leaps, times five

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For Nathan Chen, some confidence-building leaps, times five

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- It sounds a bit crazy to say this about a guy who had won all four of his events this season prior to the 2018 U.S. Figure Skating Championships, but Nathan Chen has been struggling.

Struggling, that is, by the ice-breaking standards he set while becoming figure skating's newest star last season.

So his strong performance in Saturday night's free skate inside San Jose's SAP Center meant more than just making him a runaway national champion for the second straight year and earning the 2018 Olympic team spot that has been a foregone conclusion.

Chen matched his historic five-clean-quad free skate of a year ago at nationals, and it was his first such performance this season. In each of his previous two competitions, the Grand Prix Final and Skate America, only two of his five planned quads were clean.

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Adam Rippon backs up his confident swagger with his skating in nationals short program

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Adam Rippon backs up his confident swagger with his skating in nationals short program

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Adam Rippon has no doubt he is going to make the U.S. Olympic team, and he isn't afraid to share that impression with anyone who brings up the subject.

"The only argument is if other mothers' competitors are on the selection committee," Rippon said on a media teleconference last week. "I've proven time and time again that I'm one of the most consistent skaters in the world. I'm a leader. I'm ready for this. There is absolutely no reason I shouldn't be on the Olympic team."

Rippon decided before the teleconference that he was going to be blunt. When it was over, he admitted to having some second thoughts about the way it came across.

"I thought maybe I sounded a little too confident," he said.

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Men's figure skating has mess on its hands (and knees, and butts)

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Men's figure skating has mess on its hands (and knees, and butts)

The Grand Prix and Challenger Series events ended last weekend, moving this Olympic figure skating season into the national championship phase (the first two of note are Russia, Dec. 19-24 in Saint Petersburg and Japan, Dec. 20-24 in Tokyo.)

There are big questions related to each.  Will injured reigning world champion Evgenia Medvedeva compete in the Russian Championships? Will injured reigning world and Olympic champion Yuzuru Hanyu be ready for Japanese nationals?

A 2018 Olympic spot for each should be a foregone conclusion, notwithstanding the unanswered questions about eligibility for all Russian athletes.  Given that Medvedeva did not compete at the Sochi Olympics, the epicenter of current Russian doping issues, and given that she has had no doping positives, nothing but injury should keep her from competing in Pyeongchang.

The Grand Prix Series also has left other unanswered questions.  Here are a few involving men’s singles (I’ll get to women, pairs and dance later in the week):

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