Antipodean Career Trajectories

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Be still, my heart, be still....holy mother of Christ with Kwan on top! Yuzuru Hanyu--is he even human? After writing him off last season as a mere Johnny Weir wannabe with some potential and crap stamina, he then assaults my heart with just fragments of a long program:





Seriously, this is my face whenever I watch this video:

So damn good....

Then of course Mr. Hanyu then proceeds to go out and does something like this:


Yuzuru Hanyu　羽生結弦　THE ICE 2011　4T-3A by zyem1

Incredible. Just incredible. Suffice to say, that display of jumping prowess just caused Evgeni Plushenko's knees to give out in sheer envy. Goddamn...yeah, it's official. Yuzuru Hanyu is now my second-favourite Japanese male skater and seems to be aiming for a spot on the Japanese world team with the precision of a particularly well-calibrated cruise missile. Nobunari Oda better be quaking in his skating boots.

And on the opposite side of the wonder spectrum, we have Brian Joubert's supposedly new short program:

To start off optimistically, points for choosing some, er, unusual music, and for ending with a step sequence instead of the usual spin. But for everything else...excuse me while I re-calibrate my definition of "hot mess."