Japan's Hanyu fumes at rival for 'intentional' collision

[pocoloco]

I hardly believe that D10 is an insensitive jerk out to deliberately obstruct someone's way, but I also think Hanyu is hardly an entitled drama queen who should just suck up the fact that he didn't feel safe. Apparently they had a chat but seems like it didn't work. What is known is the bare bones of the situation and we don't even have video of the main altercation, but what I see is two extremely dedicated athletes, one who lashed out in anger, and one who maybe misspoke in defensiveness. Both sides are at fault and also not at fault because they're human, wish it wasn't playing out so ugly in the eyes of the media.

Camera perspectives can lie all the time, but I think that those distances were small enough that if they continued at proper speed it wouldn't have been pretty. These are some of the fastest guys in the world.

 

[PeterG]

Theres a video of the whole thing?

Worlds is being filmed?

 

[AnonSkaterGuy]

Denis Ten has basically been so fragile with injuries it sometimes seems like he's bubble gumed or duct taped together. I doubt he would deliberately crash into Hanyu or anyone else. This type of blatant crashing has been addressed several times in the media and skaters have said " it simply does not happen."

Ten was in the wrong but quite frankly, Yuzuru has a sense of entitlement ( hush about his damn music playing) that might be part of the problem. He fully expected Denis to stop in his tracks but nobody does that. Most skaters have a general sense of mindfulness about other skaters but none of them plan on kissing Yuzuru's ass.

Denis as well as other skaters should perhaps make a more deliberate attempt to show to the skater who has right of way a deliberate clearing of passage but Yuzuru is the one who had the bloodied crash during a warmup at another competition, not Denis. I seriously doubt that Denis who's been on the injured list repeatedly would would try and get in Yuzuru's way. He's the size of a female gymnast for shits sake anyway... Sounds like an intense, practice session.


BTW, remember Tracy Wilson going on and on during the TSL interview about YUZURU ALMOST CRASHING INTO A SKATER and being so nice to the skater and compassionate? I believe the other skater was acting like king of all assholes but Yuzuru supposedly was the consummate gentleman... TUH....

This. There was talk about this kind of stuff in Sochi as well, where skaters like Yuna Kim would get pissed cause skaters wouldn't clear the way for them.

Additionally, there was one incident on the practice session where I think Julia Lipnitskaya was running her program and Sotnikova was doing a spin, and did not stop her spin to move. She wasn't the only one. Lots of girls were very aggressive on those practice sessions. If you get into the habit of moving, people start assuming you'd move and stop moving themselves, and you end up getting less accomplished in that time than you should have.

Mutual Respect is a huge part of what makes crowded freestyle sessions work out. Problems arise at competitions like this because you don't have hierarchies of skill on packed practices like this. It's a ton of top skaters with many accomplishments. They all think they're top dog.

This happened to me when I was a lower level skater. I would always stand at the boards to avoid getting in the higher level skaters' way. When I got "better" and needed more room to do things, they'd always assume that I'd move for them, so they'd never yield. It wasn't until a few games of chicken and a lot of B**** Faces that they decided to give me the same respect on the ice that I gave (and give) them.

Until then, I'd skate 2-3 hours and spend 2+ hours circling because I had to move out of their way when they wanted to do a jump, spin, pattern, section, whatever in the spot I was aiming for...

In addition, if you are doing something like spinning, often you're dizzy when you come out of the spin. Trying to dodge someone can often be more dangerous than if they just went around you. What if you're spinning and dodge the other way, but someone was coming that way as well? Would have been safer to just keep spinning and have both of them navigate around you. If someone's mid-spin, and you're just skating; program or not, it's almost always safer for you to go around them because their spatial awareness is not as good as yours in that situation.

You can't expect people to simply know where you are at all times simply because your program is playing. You cannot expect them to stand at the boards and just wait until your program is over, either...

On sessions here, skaters are taught to go around other people who are on the ice and in the way, even if they're running a program.

Having the right of way does not mean that people just magically pop out of spins to bail that patch of the ice, just cause you're coming.

 

[Madhatter]

I hardly believe that D10 is an insensitive jerk out to deliberately obstruct someone's way, but I also think Hanyu is hardly an entitled drama queen who should just suck up the fact that he didn't feel safe. Apparently they had a chat but seems like it didn't work. What is known is the bare bones of the situation and we don't even have video of the main altercation, but what I see is two extremely dedicated athletes, one who lashed out in anger, and one who maybe misspoke in defensiveness. Both sides are at fault and also not at fault because they're human, wish it wasn't playing out so ugly in the eyes of the media.

Camera perspectives can lie all the time, but I think that those distances were small enough that if they continued at proper speed it wouldn't have been pretty. These are some of the fastest guys in the world.

I also don't believe either. Ten was most likely oblivious and a bit preocuppied with himself and Hanyu's freaking out and overreacting because that CoC mind**** is still with him.

Somebody asked whether there was bad blood between them, I think an argument could be made that Denis was robbed at last year's worlds and he could be fed up with Hanyu being everybody's darling when he's got his own shit to deal with, which could have made him be more annoyed.

Ok, that's the end of my armchair psychoanalysis, not gonna get rich this way that's for sure.

 

[AnonSkaterGuy]

Another thing. I practiced on an Olympic-size rink surface. It's not *that* big. I think people who see skating mostly on TV don't judge speed accurately. These people skate fast. If Hanyu was on one side of the rink when Dennis started his spin, he could be on the other side before the spin was over. It's not hard.

Elite Novice-Senior Skaters can clear some serious ice. They are not slow, except when you compare them to much faster elite-level skaters.

Speed in figure skating really is something you have to see to believe.

If you think they look fast on TV, they will look 50-75% FASTER when you're skating on the same session with them.

 

[Doubletoe]

You can't expect people to simply know where you are at all times simply because your program is playing. You cannot expect them to stand at the boards and just wait until your program is over, either...

On sessions here, skaters are taught to go around other people who are on the ice and in the way, even if they're running a program.

Having the right of way does not mean that people just magically pop out of spins to bail that patch of the ice, just cause you're coming.

Actually, it means EXACTLY that. It means you need to be aware at all times where the program skater is and where he is headed (and yes, it takes just 3-4 seconds for a Hanyu or Ten to get from one end of the rink to the other). If you can't figure out where he's headed, stay close to the boards until you're sure. You can't just go around another skater and set up a triple axel or quad toe off pattern without risking serious injury to yourself. You have it set up the way you do precisely because it puts you on the correct edge, with your body in the right position, and set up for the right timing.

Yes, official competition practice sessions are intense. I know because I've been on them, too (not at this level, of course). But each skater on these sessions gets the same opportunity to skate his entire program with music, so any practice he gets in while another skater is skating his program should be considered a bonus.

 

[aliceanne]

I think Hanyu is still in shock from the CoC 2014 collision with the Chinese skater, where I think it was intentional. Denis was in the way at Worlds 2016 practice, but reports from off the ice said it looked unintentional.

He collided with Han Yan at COC - why would Han collide with him intentionally?

 

[kwanfan1818]

Right of way is something that's yielded. You can be right, but that can mean a collision or a trip.

There aren't many skaters who use as much of the ice as Hanyu with that speed and sweep. For a lot of skaters, after their first few jumps, the other skaters have quite a bit of space, comparatively speaking.

 

[GoddessMode]

Worlds is being filmed?

Very funny. I was asking for a link but okay.

 

[Meoima]

I think the incident is being blown up by the media. It wasn't that complicated in the first place. They're in practice and the competition is tense, the pressure is immense, any incident might cause some outburst from any side.
It is stressful to compete and practice under such pressure, anytime you can snap. It would be better if they ignore it and talked to each other behind the stage. I think it was supposed to be like that until someone wrote an article.
The thing is the media caught up too fast and they're making it too big.

 

[Jebrista]

Denis did not have to watch out for every other skater, only Yuzuru Hanyu, since Yuzu was in his program. If a skater is in his program and you aren't sure where he's going to be in 10-15 seconds, don't start a spin! Period! I am regularly on freestyle sessions with close to 30 skaters (including Denis Ten, coincidentally) and I make sure nobody ever has to change trajectory or abort a jump because of me. It's called awareness and courtesy. On the rare occasion I get in someone's way during their program, I apologize. From what I've seen of him, Denis is very much in his own world. Even if it's not intentional, it is inconsiderate.



I actually agree that Ten did not look that close to Hanyu--at least from the camera's perspective--in the practice video from the previous day. I am guessing he was spinning right where Hanyu was headed for his 3A the next day, though. I'm surprised nobody has posted the video yet.

Actually, Ten would have to look out for all the other skaters for the sake of his own safety.
While Hanyu is doing his runthrough everyone else does not simply stop what they are doing.
It is their responsibility to watch out, but everyone continues to skate.
SO, Denis needs to predict and watch out for Hanyu, while simultaneously looking out for other potential collisions, WHILE focusing on his own skating. Yes, it is his responsibility and he is at fault, but the accusations are quite intense.

And concerning Hanyu's reaction, yelling "heads" or something is quite common and fine. But punching the boards or ice is EXTREMELY disrespectful to the rink itself as well as the other skaters and the audience watching. There is a difference between an undisciplined young teen doing such a thing, and World Champion. Yes, in the moment one gets very heated so I don't entirely blame him, but alas he is World and Olympic Champion, and doing such a thing teaches young skaters that it is okay to act this way!

Aside from all this, yes, it is Ten's responsibility to watch out, but alas there is so much more into this, and the accusations are completely disregarding the hundreds of moving parts. I think if it was any other skater than Hanyu who was getting disrupted it would be a much less big issue.

 

[GarrAargHrumph]

Yelling to warn other skaters is completely normal. My old coach used to loudly yell "Watch!" in a very Russian accent. It was all kinds of awesome. But punching the boards is not considered acceptable on-ice behavior, and I also understand that it was out of character for Hanyu, so I'm thinking this was a one time thing, born out of tension and frustration, and that the media is putting more emphasis on it than is needed.

 

[PeterG]

Very funny. I was asking for a link but okay.

Sorry, I wasn't being very clear about what I meant. My comment definitely wasn't a dig at you, but at the discussion which would be cleared up by watching the video footage and seeing whose music was playing. If it wasn't Denis or Hanyu's music, then both had the right to try out whatever moves they could considering they're sharing the ice with five other people. To continue this discussion when we should just be referring to the video is just all of us making this molehill into more and more of a mountain.

 

[mathil]

Sorry, I wasn't being very clear about what I meant. My comment definitely wasn't a dig at you, but at the discussion which would be cleared up by watching the video footage and seeing whose music was playing. If it wasn't Denis or Hanyu's music, then both had the right to try out whatever moves they could considering they're sharing the ice with five other people. To continue this discussion when we should just be referring to the video is just all of us making this molehill into more and more of a mountain.

Hanyu's music was playing for all three instances. He was doing his SP run through.
There is no video of the last incident because filming was not allowed in the practice rink (when Hanyu says he 'watched the video' he's probably referring to the ones his trainer took, as he films all of his run throughs with a tablet).

 

[misskarne]

I was highly unimpressed when I saw the first incident live on Tuesday evening. It didn't look particularly intentional but Denis wasn't exactly making a herculean effort to get out of the way, either. I did not see the second incident because I was watching Brendan, but was told about it after. But for me, three times across two practice sessions crosses the line from accident to deliberate.

Here's the thing. No matter what, Denis is 100% in the wrong here. Yuzuru's music was playing, ergo, Yuzuru had right of way. Absolute right of way, no ifs, buts or maybes. It is not up to him to move. It is up to Denis to move. And as I understand it, Yuzuru had spoken to Denis about it after the Tuesday night session, and Denis had blown it off. Yuzuru is completely within his rights to "bark" at Denis. In fact, watch any practice session, at any level, and I can guarantee you, at some point you will hear the skater in program yell "excuse me" or similar.

Here's the other thing. Denis is not a little kid. He's not a beginner skater. He knows - or should know - the rules and etiquette of practice sessions. He should know that the skater in music has right of way. If he doesn't, he has no business being on a championship practice session. I thought his comment in this icenetwork article was particularly shocking:

"I honestly didn't notice it until someone was screaming at my back every time he was passing by," Ten said. "I don't think there was an issue; we didn't hit each other. I always train with a lot of people on the ice. Maybe he is not used to a lot of people. It's practice: There are six people on the ice, and sometimes we get too close to each other."

No, Denis, no. It has nothing to do with the number of people on the ice.

 

[Cachoo]

Is there any other way to do this so collisions are avoided?

 

[misskarne]

Is there any other way to do this so collisions are avoided?

Uh, yeah, it's called everybody follows the rules and gets out of the skater in-program's way?

 

[Willin]

I don't think the arguments about top skaters moving fast, it being hard to not get in each others' ways, and the skaters having to practice rather than stand at the wall are negated by one small thing: we rarely (maybe once in a blue moon) hear about a tiff of this sort even when you have top skaters on the same practices. There have been 100s of practice sessions featuring top skaters at worlds, Olympics, GPFs, etc. and yet incidents like this are pretty darn rare among those top skaters.

If it was really that hard to utilize a practice ice session without getting in the way of other top skaters who are doing their programs, I'm sure we'd have heard a lot more of these incidents.

 

[thvu]

Just an example, at the ice dance practices, it was very common for skaters practicing the waltz patterns to yell "corner!" When they could see skaters in the way. Those skaters promptly got out of the way, and thought nothing of being "barked" at. I didn't think anything was wrong with what happened Tuesday, but I definitely think there's something wrong with Ten's reaction to the criticism. There's an obvious etiquette out there when music is playing. It's get out of the damn way.

 

[WildRose]

Once could be an accident, perhaps even twice, but 3 times? That's deliberate. Clearly Dennis likes to play head games on the practice ice. If I were Hanyu I'd be furious. That kind of behaviour needs to be called out before someone gets seriously hurt - good for him for saying something.

 

[mathil]

http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20160331-00000161-sph-spo

Japanese press asking Hanyu about the incident. Besides what is already known, he adds that another incident happened at last year's WC in Shanghai, where before the SP (he does not specify if it was in practice or during the 6 min warm-up) Hanyu had fallen and regardless of this, Ten jumped a quad, almost running him over.

 

[VGThuy]

Sounds like this had been building up for a while. Honestly, after reading some of the posts here, I wonder how many would have excused Hubert at 1991 Worlds if she had just avoided Midori at the last second rather than crash right into her while she wasn't looking at where she was going and if Midori had the Yuzuru uber fanbase with social media and the Internet being as pervasive as it is now.

 

[MsZem]

Is there any other way to do this so collisions are avoided?

Outfit them all with specially designed TCAS

I'm definitely in the "Frank Carroll would not allow a skater to get away with deliberately endangering others" camp. Even if Denis did seem like the type to do so, which he does not.

 

[bardtoob]

. . . I wonder how many would have excused Hubert at 1991 Worlds if she had just avoided Midori at the last second rather than crash right into her while she wasn't looking at where she was going . . .

The only thing Hubert had the ability to avoid was the blade on her own landing skate. Hubert was an out of control speeding disaster.

. . . and, yes, 25 years later I am still mad at what happened to Midori at 1991 Worlds.

 

[mrinalini]

Denis may have been in the wrong, but I'm not impressed by Yuzuru's little temper tantrum either. I'm trying to picture a 16-year-old or even 14-year-old Michelle Kwan reacting in that manner and I just can't; if a young girl can display such classiness, I jolly well expect the same of an adult male.

And the insinuation that the collision between Yuzuru and Han was in any way intentional by either party is downright idiotic.

 

[Loves_Shizuka]

Michelle Kwan

 

[handomi]

Let's sums up few things.

1. There is no talk about INTENTIONAL COLLISION from Hanyu camp. It's about intentional move to interrupt run trough.
2. The way media thinks = intentional+move+Hanyu+Ten= Hanyu calling Ten for intentional collision = Big news
3. We just don't know. We all know inside it is not without a possiblity that indeed it may have been intentional to psych Hanyu out. It's FIGURE SKATING. We all know it
4. Let's not go too far. We don't need to war each other.
5. Let's hope both Dennis and Hanyu skates beatifully today.

 

[Meoima]

Denis may have been in the wrong, but I'm not impressed by Yuzuru's little temper tantrum either. I'm trying to picture a 16-year-old or even 14-year-old Michelle Kwan reacting in that manner and I just can't; if a young girl can display such classiness, I jolly well expect the same of an adult male.

Denis and Yuzuru did not have a huge fight or anything. They don't jump into each other and kick and kill. Yuzuru said he got angry after the incident and he was furious that the practice session got ruined. But then after that Yuzuru himself said it was wrong of him to get angry. He felt sorry that he lost his temper that way.

And the insinuation that the collision between Yuzuru and Han was in any way intentional by either party is downright idiotic.

Yuzuru and Han Yan are still good to each other. No issue. They all know the collision was just an accident.

 

[forthewin]

I think Hanyu is still in shock from the CoC 2014 collision with the Chinese skater, where I think it was intentional. Denis was in the way at Worlds 2016 practice, but reports from off the ice said it looked unintentional.

I am saying go **** yourself for trying to draw me into that.

From your nasty politically motivated question. To the ignore list with you!

I have no horse in this interregional rivalry.

Another politically motivated comment.

Seriously, why would this guy be allowed to trash talk and bully posters like this? And the admin doing nothing about it?

 

[rhapsody]

Michelle Kwan

No point in having a thread on FSU if Michelle Kwan isn't mentioned at least once.