- Joined
- Apr 23, 2018
It worked great for Javi too. Before Yuzuru moved to TCC, Javier was a mind case... the same 2012 where Yuzuru earned bronze in Worlds, Javier bombed both LPs in Euros and Worlds. Having Yuzuru around helped Javier to learn to manage the pressure. Also there is an interview where Tracy talks about how relaxed Javier used to be about training before Yuzuru arrival and how having someone like Yuzuru pushed Javier to improve and taking the training more serious.
Javi definitely and seriously moved up once he got a taste of Yuzu's work ethic - they pretty much shared the top awards for several years there. I would hazard a guess that he is pretty grateful that he said "yes" to Brian all those years ago, his butter came back well and truly buttered with amazing scores (the second to reach 200+ in the free and 300+ overall if I recall correctly?) and 2 worlds on top and over Yuzuru. There's a lovely bit in Yuzu's interviews on Kenji no Heya (can't recall where I got the subbed version, but I did save it because it's quite fascinating, from several years ago when he was twenty) where Yuzu says that when one of them was having a bad day, it was the other rather than the coaches etc who was able to say the right words and bolster them. It wouldn't work for everyone, it quite possibly wouldn't work for anyone else with one of them, it possibly wouldn't work now for Yuzu at his level (it had its bumps in the Olympic runup but Javi obviously knew pretty exactly how bad it was for Yuzu). We don't know, just as we don't know what is actually said and done at TCC.
What ifs are a fairly futile mind game (for all we all play it, you should hear my English rellies on the World Cup and the Ashes!!!) but even as fairly-newbie as I am, I do think they both reached higher and further because they had each other to challenge as well as the individual attention the TCC could give them. When you think about it, maybe but maybe Shoma's the one who should regret that Javi said yes...


