"The limits of destiny can be eternal, but the indomitable challenges cannot be ignored or lacking." Stetson wrote in My Dream. It is fitting to place this sentence at the men's singles free skating arena that ends today to witness the birth of Axel's first four-week jump in the top event.
At this Winter Olympics, the figure skating men's singles free skating, the 27-year-old Yusheng Yu string with the leverage to pry the rules into the ice rink. Accompanied by the Japanese composer Tomita's tailor-made repertoire "With the Common Heaven and Earth", Yu yusei uses a series of choreographed steps to enter the first jump of the performance, which is also the unprecedented Axel Surrounding (4A).
For the first time in the international figure skating arena, a player challenged the 4A, which was approaching the limit of humanity
Glide forward during take-off, jump with a rear blade on the back of the right foot, hold your breath, tighten your muscles, explode with full body strength and rotate nearly 1620 degrees in the air, and the feather knot string falls on the ice as it prepares to slide out. Although there were some deviations in the sliding angle that led to the loss of the base score and eventually missed the medal, for the badminton players who have competed in the Olympic Games three times, because of the attempt, this jump is also a regrettable success.
After the end of all the performances, the International Skating Federation announced a small sub-table of Yusheng's string performances, on which "4A <" appeared.
"4A is impossible to accomplish in my lifetime."
In 1882, The Norwegian Axel Paulsen created the Axel Jump in his first international competition, and he probably wouldn't have believed that the jump had reached the point of being all around.
How hard is it to complete this action? Runners spin in the air at the equivalent of running in 9.5 seconds in a 100-meter sprint; when falling on ice, they bear nearly 6-7 times their own weight. The number of jumps around is not enough, the ice is unstable and easy to fall, these are the mountains that are difficult for humans to cross on the way to conquer 4A. The Russian godfather of figure skating also believed in the interview that it was almost impossible for anyone to complete this action in his lifetime.
At the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, Yusei completed the consecutive championships and became the youngest defending Olympic champion in history. But where will I be next? "(I'm currently) all the motivation is only 4A, I've achieved what I can achieve, I've done what I can do, and all that's left is this goal that I described as a child." He was announced to the world at his post-match press conference.
The 11-year-old Yusei Yushin, who has the "mushroom head" of idol Pushchenko, shyly stated his wish in an interview with reporters.
From here, Yu Yushin stepped into a completely unknown territory. How high does a perfect 4A need to take off and jump? How fast do I need to reach when doing a rotational motion in the air? Entering the Beijing Winter Olympic cycle, Yusheng made thousands of attempts, making the audience think that the birth of a new limit was close at hand.
In the training of the 2021 All-Day Championship, Yu Yu jumped out of the 4A and successfully fell on the ice.
"Can history that has fallen into the abyss repeat itself?"
Last month, Yusei won the all-day championship and successfully won the seat at the Winter Olympics. Although he did not successfully jump out of the 4A in the official competition, he also stressed in many interviews before the game that he would definitely try this move again in the Beijing Olympic Games.
On February 8, yusei yushin appeared in the 21st place in the short program, and he reserved his first jump for the Sakhov jump around. Due to the ice knife stuck to the ice hole during the jump, the action directly jumped, and finally scored 95.15 points, only eighth. The day before the free skating competition began, Yusuke Yusuke submitted a new action plan to increase the difficulty of the jump in the schedule, but the first action was still 4A.
Temporary modifications to the action configuration to increase technical difficulty were also seen at the 2017 Figure Skating World Championships. Yusei Yusuke jumped and fell in the short program at that time, ranking fifth. When he was commented by the media as "early exit from the medal competition", he also temporarily increased the difficulty before the final, and finally showed a perfect 4-week jump in the free skating "Hopeand legacy".
Yu Yusei 2017 Figure Skating World Championships free skating.
This was undoubtedly the top difficulty configuration 5 years ago. Five years later, Yusei chose to challenge himself again.
"I wish you the freedom to skate the day after tomorrow."
On the day that the short program ended, Yu Yu also received a distant blessing. Proshenko, also the defending Olympic champion of figure skating, said on his personal social platform: "Yu Yusei, you are a great athlete. Your contribution to figure skating is priceless, and I wish you the freedom to skate the day after tomorrow. ”
In the free skating arena, the much-anticipated 4A ended with a lack of weeks and falling on the ice, but fortunately, the performance behind the Feather String was basically successfully completed, scoring 188.06 points. No one dared to challenge this action on the international stage, but Yu Yusei still opened up this new field and showed the world a new possibility of figure skating. When the last note was dissipated and the feathered string ended with a continuously accelerated upright rotation, he looked over the Capital Gymnasium with open arms, completing his olympic curtain.
The younger generations who appeared a little later completed the competition one by one, more and more wonderful jumps piled up in the arena, and Yu Yu gradually withdrew from the medal competition. At this time, although he did not win the Olympic triple crown, The Feather Knot, who basically fulfilled his childhood wish, inherited the fireworks on mount Olympus and may be planning a free slide in the future.