Brian Orser: "We have to understand the system"
Q: Now, two out of the three best male skaters are your students: Yuzuru Hanyu and Javier Fernandez. It seems like that they are very different characters.
BO: Yes, they are. They are very different, and because of this, I think it is easier to them. They are good teammates, they are friendly with each other on the ice and they respect each other. They don’t go together to cinema or to a party, because Yuzu is not that type, he rather stays at home to study, becase he goes to university.
Their style, their temperament are different, and I have to know both of them very well. I have to understand how they feel in certain moments. I emphasise to my students that communication is the key. If they don’t like something, then they have to tell me, and if I don’t like something, then obviously I tell them too. They have to tell me what is going on in their lives, then I don’t have to guess. I don’t have time to guess. We have to find out the problems and then try to solve them. Anyway their schedules are different, sometimes they skate together, sometimes they not.
Q: It is said that Yuzuru Hanyu barely understood English when he went to Toronto, but it only turned out later…
BO: Yes, because he was constantly nodding and saying: „Yeah yeah yeah. Yeah yeah yeah.” Since then I know that „Yeah, yeah, yeah” means: NO.
Q: Was it difficult to communicate with him?
BO: Very much. Now I can comfortably ask him: „Yuzu, are you sure that you understand what I’m saying?” Because it happens that I tell him to jump a flip, and then he jumps a loop. But he keeps nodding the whole time. Now he speaks English better, so the communication is easier, and it is also natural that I ask him that he understands everything.
Q: Did you use an interpreter?
BO: No, but the language of figure skating is universal. The technical things can be discussed easily. The situation is more difficult if it’s about strategies and plans. I want to explain to them everything, so that they will understand why we train in some way or in another on a certain day.
Q: How important is to you that your students score 100+ in the short and 200+ in the free program?
BO:: It seems like it is the biggest motive in this season. It all began with Yuzu at the NHK Trophy, and it continued in the Grand Prix Final, but there also Javi skated very well and got more than 200 points.
Q: Do Javi and Yuzu inspire each other?
BO: Extremely, and they respect each other very much. If they train together, Javi fells and Yuzu is near to him, he always stops and helps him to get up. In the beginning of the season, Javi had struggled with his free program, especially with the last 45 seconds of it, which is really killing (?). Yuzu stood there with the other skaters and coach and kept clapping and shouting: „Go Javi, go Javi!”. But it’s the same vice versa. If Yuzu fells, Javi helps him to get up. Before the start of the season, when Yuzu was practicing the three quads, he couldn’t succeed with the third one, the second quad toe. He couldn’t find the rhythm at all. Then at the end he asked Javi: „Javi, how can you jump the third quad?” Javi replied the following: „Yuzu, just shut it off your brain. Don’t think about it. Just breathe, and do it, but don’t think.” And after this Yuzu started to jump those quad toes successfully. So they work together very well. I think, it also gives them some kind of comfort: if you train together with someone with whom you go the the big event, to the Olympics, to the world championships, then it is a good feeling that there is someone with you who went through the same just like you did.
Q: Javi said in Bratislava that it’s possible that the triples will soon disappear from figure skating, or that the ISU will have a rule that only three quads will be allowed in the free skating. In your opinion, in which direction is this sport going?
BO: One day triples may be gone. In my time, people had swooned from triple axels, the media went crazy too. I jumped a 3A during training and everyone went crazy. Now it is a completely natural thing. It is incredible, how many things happenned in 25 years. So, who knows what will happen in the next 25 years
e fan on Weibo:
(but then apparently Patrick has worse SS than Nathan so there you go).
