He walked away from competition after probably the greatest disappointment of his life.
Thanks for your insight, SkateFiguring. Yes, that's why I thought sometimes he said too much to the press about his struggles. But one of the impressions I got from him was that perhaps he was trying to moderate the expectations of others, to save them from disappointment and to lessen his own pressure.
After reading your comment:
The thought occurred to me that perhaps he struggled emotionally with his reason / purpose for coming back to competition in part because of a big what if - "What if I, who lost the Olympic gold medal and let everyone down, go back into competing and lose big again? Could I bear the disappointment? Should I even risk it? And am I good enough to do this?"
That is why I think we hear a lot from him now that he is more concerned about his performance than his scores, which is certainly the right way for him to go, as long as he means it.
And the speed of his mental turnaround! I'm glad he found another way to let go of the pressure through his tears! I'm very glad that Kathy was able to remind him to go out and skate for the love of it, and he did exactly that.
I think sometimes he says the right thing that he knows he needs to do, often before he knows how to put it into practice. E.g., at 3:25 in this video, where he admitted that he said all the time that he wanted to skate for himself, but he could never figure out how to until last night.
Thank you vivley for bringing the articles. They got me in real mixed emotions for and about Patrick.
I am often of two minds about Patrick's openness. I'm glad to know his state of mind better yet I'm concerned how his honesty can easily work against him. He gives away much of his "secrets" of success and at the same time his vulnerability revealed can make him more vulnerable.
Even as I realized the extraordinary pressure he was under that was hard to fanthom and yet completely disregarded by most people, I still hurt for him to "hear" him tell it and the pain he went through.
He walked away from competition after probably the greatest disappointment of his life. Coming back after a year and a half, he needed to pick up his most difficult skills again and relearn how to compete, meeting the most formidable rival at the first competition at home under intense watch and speculations. The pressure he put on himself was similar to the one he did when he debut his quad and fell many times - he feared he would disappoint many people and fail their expectation. Then he consulted someone who understood, Brian Boitano, and overcame the mental obstacle to go on to dominate the figure skating world for 4 years. This time he found a trusted trash can for his mind dump, and peace and focus in performance.
I didn't want to have unfair and unrealistic expectation for the super intense first competition but he showed how a true champion can be almost super human to triumph when most succumb. He blew just about everybody away with the glorious performance and victory last night. Shock and awe indeed.
Now that that is over, I'm so very happy for him for having acquired another exhilarating experience he can bank and a new mental skill he can use again to bring him more success and ever closer to his goals. I hope he will always remember 'Alright, I'm just going to go out and do what feels good."
My admiration and joy for him go up another level. And I now dare to dream really big for him, as big as he dares to dream.
^^ I am glad to read that Kathy helped him reach the zone... with all the crap we hear about 'he needs a jump coach" etc... maybe what he really needs is someone who helps him focus. Considering the quality of his jumps yesterday, I'd say he is fine with Kathy
MM mentioned it but I don't know where his source is. It seemed he had known about it from our discussion. There was a hilarious video by Patrick and Kurt, in which Patrick demonstrated how he couldn't move his right eye upward. I know he used to be turned round and round in a chair before going on ice to overcome the effect of his eye condition. As to the cause, I've no idea.
Patrick has been ridiculed about his eyes for a long time, called rape eyes even, but bless MM for speaking up against such mocking ever since he knew of Patrick's physiological condition.
Great articles. Does anyone else feel that he's better now than ever before? Those jumps were just so perfect, so textbook.
I've always maintained that Patrick has the perfect techniques for all his jumps. It's all mental during competition. His occasional 3A imperfections were blown out of proportion and created a belief that it was his nemesis and he didn't have the technique. So much so that even Patrick bought into it to create and amplify the apprehension during competition. When he is able to bypass the mental issue and focus on the skating at hand, he lands his jumps securely in a beautiful flow with the program, as part of the magnificent performance.
Blaming his lack of a "proper" or technical coach is an easy lazy thinking IMO and I have always defended his choice. At Patrick's level, any skater would love some technical coaching from him! A coach has to be the right person who can bring out the best from him and be supportive during the progress, including any necessary detour. Mao went through an even longer and more painful detour but there was no clamour about her need to change to a jump coach. And every top skater has jump problems most of the time without their coaches being blamed. It is easy to deride Johnson as just a dance coach and because of Patrick's relationship with her daughter.
As I stated before, I believe Patrick knows what works for him and he would get himself a new or additional coach if he needs to. As it is, Patrick seems to be very close to Johnson and relies much on her technical advice and emotional support. Why argue with results?
Congrats, Violet Bliss, for turning violet. At first I thought I had replied to the wrong person! Lol! Your comments are very zen-like.
Ah, you noticed my new enlightened hue! I originally picked a skate related username in a hurry, fueled by the shock I saw how Patrick was slandered, ridiculed and derided online. I never liked it and welcomed an opportunity to change it except for the loss of recognition by the forum pals after having been bsing for so long and so much here! (I noticed most who changed their usernames didn't have yet so many posts.) Then I decided to leave a clue of my former identity in the title and went ahead and transmuted.
Why violet? I decided neither the red pill of harsh reality nor the blue pill of blissful illusion was desirable. Their hybrid yields the purple harsh illusion and the violet blissful reality. Voila, I took the violet pill! Violet is the colour of our crown chakra, of the Budha lotus, the ultra of the rainbow, and that of the divine violet flame. It is generally a colour of connection to the divine. Thus, I'm now living and basking in the divine violet bliss.
And violet bliss is what I wish for Patrick as well whenever he skates in competition, if not everyday.
May the bliss be with you all.
Watching Patrick Chan skate is like a dream. Seriously, he does everything my coach used to tell us to do and, everything I tell my students to do. He's one of those skaters you have your students watch on the big screen when he performs.