yuzuru hanyu thesis english

Axel with Wings

[ENG TRANSLATION] A Feasibility Study on Utilization in Figure Skating by A Wireless Inertia Sensor Motion Capture System, Yuzuru Hanyu – 20210318

Original journal article was first published 18 March 2021

Translation: @ shinjistarxx Proofreading: @ yuzueco & @ axelsandwich

This is an unofficial fan translation from Japanese to English by the Axel with Wings team of a part of Yuzuru Hanyu’s thesis that was edited for an article in Waseda University’s Journal of Human Sciences for a special feature. We are not professional translators, though we have taken as much care as possible in ensuring the translation is accurate, and would therefore advise all readers to keep this in mind. Please send us a DM if you spot any errors. 

The Axel with Wings team are very proud of Yuzuru’s research and believe that its significant contribution to figure skating academia should be shared with an international audience, who are currently limited by the language barrier. The translation source material is a free, publicly available excerpt of the thesis ( here ) and the translation has been done in that same spirit of sharing academic research and study. 

We are aware that derivative works are generally subject to copyright law. However, we have made the translation available as an interim measure as we believe that it is unlikely there will be an authorised English translation and we are unable to contact the relevant copyright holders. We hope this translation will be taken in good faith and with the same spirit that allows fans of figure skating from all different countries to share news and information with each other that they would otherwise not have access to because of language barriers. If an official English translation becomes available or we are contacted by the copyright holder, we will remove access to this translation immediately and request all downloaded copies be deleted as well. 

The Axel with Wings translation team seeks no monetary gain from their work. If you have paid any other third party for access to this document, you have been scammed. 

However, if you would like to recognise the time and effort that has gone into this, we would be very happy if you will consider making an optional donation to charities that support the recovery of the Tohoku region, which has always been a cause important to Yuzuru. Some of our recommendations are AAR Japan for the Tohoku area or Japan Platform .

Please do NOT reupload the PDF, re-translate in another language, quote excerpts of this translation in any media article or share screenshots of the translation on any social platform without prior permission. You must contact the Axel With Wings Twitter ( @axelwithwings ) first via DM. We will not be allowing reposts on Instagram or Facebook as a blanket rule but you may share the URL of this blog post. If you spot any unauthorised reposts, please contact us ASAP.  

By agreeing to click through to download the document and all the secondary translations based off ours, you are acknowledging you agree to all of the above points.

Please DM the Axel With Wings on Twitter with any further questions.

Vietnamese translation by @heyitsheunn

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We are the Axel with Wings translation team, made up of fans of Yuzuru Hanyu. We hope to share videos of him and Japanese figure skating content with more people around the world. We aim to do our best to accurately capture the spirit of what's said. Hope you enjoy our videos and other contents. View all posts by axelwithwings

2 thoughts on “[ENG TRANSLATION] A Feasibility Study on Utilization in Figure Skating by A Wireless Inertia Sensor Motion Capture System, Yuzuru Hanyu – 20210318”

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Yuzuru Hanyu

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Yuzuru Hanyu’s thesis on Motion Capture

• Thread starter treblemakerem
• Start date May 15, 2021

treblemakerem

• May 15, 2021

Came across this video today https://youtu.be/3c2dDaIaifw The link to his thesis is posted in the description but my Japanese is not good enough to read it. Wonder what people think about this?  

Blades of Passion

Skating is art, if you let it be.

• May 16, 2021

• May 19, 2021

Blades of Passion said: I love it and want it. Please have the computer tell everyone the exact amount of rotation and amplitude on a jump so I don't have to anymore! The computer will assign GOE's better than most judges. Click to expand...

CanadianSkaterGuy

It's interesting, the use of motion capture to measure rotation, etc. But a couple initial issues: for things like edge and foot pressure/contact points seen in the video it seems that a skater would actually have to be "wearing" the actual motion-capture hardware in order to have the computer capture the data. The costs of this would probably only make such technology accessible for certain skaters/competitions. Another issue I foresee is that this would have to be calibrated for every skater. On things like distance/height, a smaller skater might jump differently relative to their height compared to a taller skater. In terms of average speed, a skater with longer legs might cover more distance - or if they take a choreographic break in their program it might skew their average speed lower. Fair point too about judging fatigue, but that is the nature of any refereed/judged sport (I don't think it takes into consideration that there are floods and warmup groups, where the judges get a bit of a reprise). Obviously this is a fan video that is super biased and even not-so-subtly shades his rivals, which makes me question the objectivity and even the translation of the thesis itself, but it's a cool glimpse into something that may eventually be integrated into the sport.  

• May 21, 2021

gkelly said: Computers will be able to do a better job of measuring the rotation, correct takeoff and landing edges, height and distance, and speed of a jump, and most errors. But others of the positive GOE points are more qualitative, even subjective, and therefore less appropriate for computer determination: Effortless throughout (including rhythm in a combination or sequence) Steps into a jump, unexpected or creative entry Very good body position from take-off to landing Element matches the music Click to expand...

Team Gorgeous Cacti!

• Jun 18, 2021

Some things can't be simply measured, but some can, and I'm all for it. But I predict there still would be problem, just like with VAR in football, because afterall, it's not technology that makes the decisions...  

kolyadafan2002

Fan of kolyada.

• Jun 19, 2021

Blades of Passion said: Actually you could program all of that into a computer. There might be a couple details that are currently too difficult to fully describe to the computer, but competitive skating has already become robotic anyway, so it's not as if these details are being properly assessed anymore. Also, the current guidelines for GOE are far from being the best ruleset. Most importantly, the vast majority of judges suck. So who really cares about their hackneyed personal assessment (if it can even be called a personal assessment, given how they are essentially just puppets). The computer in nearly every case will do a better job than any human panel we've had to date. Click to expand...

I think adding as much metrics as possible to aid technical panel’s decisions is a great idea. I think it will be particularly useful for athletes without reputation, because if metrics show an outstanding jump, it will hopefully push their GoE higher than they would have otherwise gotten. Maybe? I think part of GoE will always still be that wow, that was the most beautiful frigging jump I had seen! but metrics are good, obviously prorated to skater’s height/stride  

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Yuzuru HANYU

It's hard to argue that anyone has had a bigger impact on modern-day figure skating than Hanyu Yuzuru , the two-time Olympic champion.

Hanyu’s technique is outstanding, but he combines his ability with an astonishing creativity and artistry. He makes difficult moves like the Beillmann spin and the doughnut spin look simple.

Battling through multiple injuries, the Japanese star has changed the landscape of the sport since his first Olympic title at Sochi 2014. A huge presence in Japan, he is a star of TV and film as well as one of the country’s most famous athletes.

Aged just 19, Hanyu became the first Asian man to win an Olympic gold medal when he triumphed in Sochi, becoming the youngest men's champion since 1948. He followed up by defending his Olympic title in PyeongChang 2018, becoming the first man to go back-to-back for Olympic gold since 1952 (Richard Button).

During his career, Hanyu has also won two world titles and four Grand Prix Finals – cementing himself as perhaps one of Japan's finest ice athletes, and also his place as one of the greatest figure skaters in history. Hanyu was also the first skater to successfully land a quadruple loop jump in ISU competition, doing so in 2016.

He has broken an extraordinary 18 world scoring records, and was also the first man ever to break the 100-point mark in the short program, the first to gain 200 points in a free skate, and the first to get a combined total of 300.

Quadruple Axel chase

Hanyu has a knack for pushing boundaries – aside from being the first to land the quadruple loop, he made his goal for the Beijing 2022 Olympic Games the quadruple Axel.

Featuring four-and-a-half rotations in the air, no one has successfully landed the jump – the next frontier in figure skating jumping.

As far back as in 2019, Hanyu had spoken of learning the jump; he unveiled a first public attempt at the 2021/22 Japanese nationals, although he landed on two feet and the jump was downgraded. He would go on to attempt the jump once more on Olympic ice, seeking a slice of history.

While he under-rotated the attempt and fell, Hanyu told reporters afterwards: "I rotated the Axel as well as I could. I went for it, and it's something I'll cherish forever."

He added after the Games' exhibition gala: "On the quad Axel, I couldn’t have tried it on a more fitting stage and with more support than I could have asked for.

“I gave it everything I have. People say I’m almost there, I’m close but it’s easier said than done. I think I’ve taken my quad Axel as far as it can."

Beijing 2022

All eyes were on Hanyu at Beijing 2022 to see if he could become the first skater since before the Second World War to win three straight Olympic gold medals.

However, Hanyu's quest for a three-peat took a big hit with his very first jump in the short program. To gasps from the crowd, he singled a planned quadruple Salchow – later explaining he hit a hole or rut in the ice. That left him in a disappointing eighth place.

So it was a measure of Hanyu's pure ability that, despite falling on the quad Axel and also on a quad Salchow in the free skate, the Japanese superstar still hauled himself up by four places to finish fourth overall.

"I fell on the Axel, fell on the Salchow but nailed everything in the second half. It's about falling and getting back up again," he said after the skate.

Hanyu hasn't ruled out going to a fourth Games at Milano Cortina 2026.

With a teasing smile, he said at a press conference to review his Beijing Games: "If you ask me whether these were my last Games, I don't know.

"The Olympics is a special place, one of a kind. It's a competition, a challenge, that you want to take on even if you're hurt.

"There's no other place like that for a figure skater. There is a part of me that does want to skate here again."

I try to find challenges after every competition and overcome them the next time.

Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics Top Moments and Highlights

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Yuzuru Hanyu’s mastery of artistry and technique

The “ice king” is the embodiment and hope of figure skating

By Valerie Yao — Published March 20, 2022

I started watching the Winter Olympics after the 2010 Vancouver games, and from then on, I was deeply captivated by the charms and beauty of those icy sports. The games became my one solace on many barren days.

As the Beijing 2022 games came to an end earlier this month, I couldn’t help but feel nostalgic over the iconic moments we’ve seen in the past month. The figure skating events mesmerized me the most, as the skaters’ every jump and spin teleported me to a wonderland of art and happiness. 

Among them, one skater especially stood out to me as the supreme standard of both artistry and techniques — the embodiment of figure skating. Not only I, but the figure skating and Olympic communities also owe a debt to Yuzuru Hanyu for the impacts and changes he has made to the sport. 

Yuzuru Hanyu, who was born in Sendai, Japan in 1994, is a reigning champion figure skater with dazzling achievements. In 2012, he started training in Toronto with the 1984 and 1988 Canadian silver medallist Brian Orser. Hanyu won back-to-back gold medals in the 2014 Sochi Olympics and 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics, becoming the first man to win two consecutive golds since 1952. He also became the first male singles skater to achieve a Super Slam, since he has won all major international championships at the senior and junior levels. 

I recently revisited his past Olympic performances, and every routine is a masterclass in skating. Aside from his flawless technical elements, one of the most fascinating aspects of Hanyu’s performance is his ability to bring out and infect the audience with the emotions of the characters he portrays. 

In his debut at Sochi, he inked the whole rink with his vivacious spirit. Wearing a blue shirt, Hanyu immediately transports the audience to a Paris street in his short program skate to “Parisienne Walkways” with his confident, frisky steps. Later, in his free skate, he delicately carried out the emotions in “Romeo and Juliet” with excellent skills and expressions. 

If Sochi was the triumph of youth for the 19-year-old, then four years later, Pyeongchang was confirmation that Hanyu is indeed the king of the ice. Hanyu’s Pyeongchang free skate, “Seimei,” vigorously unfolded the story of Seimei’s growth to becoming a powerful man, just like Hanyu himself. 

In Beijing, he further explored the philosophy behind his free skate program, “Heaven and Earth,” with connections to his own life. In a turquoise costume with embroidered sakura blossoms and golden birds, he elegantly portrayed the story of an ancient Japanese warlord, Uesugi Kenshin, which had many parallels to Hanyu’s athletic career. 

Hanyu, like Uesugi, became a leader at a young age. They both experienced tremendous hardships, yet kept fighting and matured. Hanyu illustrated his own coming-of-age story through his Olympic performance. 

It may appear that Hanyu has achieved everything that he deserves, but there have been many instances when his hard work didn’t pay off — sometimes due to International Skating Union’s (ISU) unjust targeting and underscoring. Research and past scoring results demonstrate that, oftentimes, more than half of the judges show statistically significant nationalist biases when scoring. 

Furthermore, in Beijing, Hanyu attempted the quadruple axel (4A) jump — which requires 4.5 revolutions — becoming the first person to attempt one at an international event. Hanyu’s 4A in Beijing 2022 was acknowledged, but not certified, because he fell when landing. 

No one has ever landed a 4A in competitions. Hanyu’s heroic, history-making challenge pushes figure skating’s standard and technical difficulty forward. It’s possible he could still land the 4A in competition — there is a lot to yet expect from Hanyu.

Since it’s considered the most difficult jump, however, 4A’s score in ISU’s judging book doesn’t reflect its true difficulty. Though it’s arguably significantly more difficult than quadruple lutz (4Lz) jumps, the 4A is worth only one point more than the 4Lz. 

Given this, the 4A is a high-risk jump with low rewards that ended up hindering Hanyu from getting the gold. Regardless, Hanyu’s fans will always respect his efforts to dazzle on the ice. The way he pursues even more difficult tricks, even if he risks medals, is the very embodiment of the Olympic spirit. 

Furthermore, in protest against the ISU’s underscoring, Hanyu wrote his graduation thesis on how 3D capture technology, that analyzes athletes’ movements, can help figure skating judges grade fairly. His resistance to the ISU’s biases provides hope for fairer games and a brighter future for the competitive sports field — and, personally, his perseverance is a constant reminder for me to keep going. 

Fortunately, as Hanyu suggested, the ISU is now working on implementing artificial intelligence and augmented reality technologies in judging figure skating, which will help determine skaters’ pre-rotation and rotation numbers and make scoring more accurate.

What inspires me the most about Hanyu is his devotion. He doesn’t regard figure skating as merely a competitive sport, but as an art. He doesn’t add difficult jumps to his routine just to get high scores. Rather, he strives to achieve overall balance and elegance for the programs, alongside difficult and technical manoeuvres, so he carefully plans tough step sequences and jumps in his choreography by adding graceful jump entrances and exits. 

These choices not only increase his programs’ technical difficulties but also blend his choreography into the music, thus adding unity. We need more athletes like him — we watch competitive sports to not only witness awesome skills but also to find inspiration and explore the breadth of humanity. 

As he glided over the rink in his sparkling white and pink costume and gracefully kissed the ice in his performance “Come, Spring” at Beijing 2022’s figure skating gala exhibition, Hanyu planted seeds of hope and great expectation for the future of figure skating — and spring has indeed come.

Tags: Figure Skating , Ice Skating , Olympics

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