In the figure skating world, there is a term that fans often use, called “changing teams,” which means that an athlete decides to switch to a different coach’s team for training.

For example, in Russia, their Crystal Club (a government-funded club) is considered a more official organization, but it’s not the only place where athletes can train. There are also other places like Boris’s group in Saint Petersburg and other clubs that can produce talented skaters.

Russia has a large pool of figure skating talent, and sometimes, if athletes can’t make a name for themselves under one coach or feel they aren’t getting enough resources in that team, they switch to another coach. Some athletes with high potential are the types that coaches would fight over. The old coach is reluctant to let such a strong athlete go to a rival, and the new coach, excited, might even get into arguments with the old coach over this. Since athletes are generally young and full of energy, there’s often a lot of drama for skating fans to watch.

In Japan, figure skating is also divided into factions, such as the Nagoya faction, Kyushu faction, etc. However, interestingly, the coach who trained the Shiratsuka sisters, Mori Kumimi, and the coach who trained Teraoka Hayato and Chiba Takeshi, the 65-year-old coach, don’t belong to the Japan Skating Federation’s factions. Instead, they are coaches who have been with their athletes since the very beginning, working with them in smaller local ice rinks.

They were all good athletes in their time, and although they have no connections with federation officials, their coaching abilities are strong.

After the 65-year-old coach’s body could no longer continue to coach, Teraoka Hayato didn’t want to burden his mentor anymore, so finding a new coach became inevitable. This time, even the Japan Skating Federation, which in the past wouldn’t even send a team doctor with athletes to competitions, showed an impressive level of support.

Half a month after the Four Continents Championships, Zhang Jue followed the news online, watching as the coaches from all factions of the Japan Skating Federation fought to recruit Teraoka Hayato.

Mutual attacks were their most common tactics.

Today, Coach X from the Nagoya faction accused Coach Y from the Kanto faction of visiting a host club.

Note: Coach Y is male.

Spectators: Oh wow!

Tomorrow, Coach O from the Kyushu faction accused Coach X from Nagoya of kissing an athlete at a party.

Note: Coach X is a 53-year-old woman, and the athlete she kissed is only 25.

Spectators: Whoa!

The day after tomorrow, Teraoka Hayato announced that he would join Coach Mori Kumimi’s team with his junior.

Spectators: Hayato did well.

As an athlete, at this time, it was best not to get involved in the messy faction struggles. The most important thing was to train with a coach who could focus on teaching. Although Coach Mori’s rink was a bit small, the coach was kind, there was choreography support, and Keiko was a reliable teammate.

At this time, everyone was trying to get this medal contender or even gold medal prospect on their team, stealing the 65-year-old coach’s star athlete. For Coach Mori, taking in Hayato and Chiba Takeshi meant more work with no real benefit, but if Hayato or Keiko didn’t perform well, everyone would criticize her. In reality, both Hayato and Keiko were injury-prone, so no one knew how long they would last.

So, the fact that Coach Mori was willing to take them in was truly a gesture of goodwill. Those who knew the inside story gave her a thumbs-up, feeling she was more reliable than the other factions in the Japan Skating Federation.

Figure skating fans around the world were satisfied and went about their business.

However, in the “Three Musketeers” internal chat room, Zhang Jue still took time to check in with his friends.

【Crocodile: Are you getting used to training in Fukuoka?】

Hayato replied with a thumbs-up emoji, indicating that everything was going smoothly.

【Bird: I’m fine, but Takeshi is struggling with Coach Mori’s coaching style. He’s used to a coach who arranges everything for him, including music choices and performance analyses, but Coach Mori prefers athletes to make those decisions on their own.】

【Bear: He’s still young and in a growth period where he needs guidance. You and Keiko are already close to your peak forms

【Crocodile: Ilya, do you watch Digimon?】

【Bear: How do you know?】

Because “growth period,” “perfect form,” and “ultimate form” are clearly terms from Digimon!

Zhang Jue: I think I figured something out.

Usually, athletes change coaches in the off-season, and even then, it can lead to a lot of news and even affect their performance in the new season. So, changing coaches halfway through a season is a much bigger deal and can have a more significant impact on the athlete.

Later, Commander Sun quietly whispered to Coach Lu: “Luckily, when Zhang Jue was in the provincial team, I stopped the other national team coaches from poaching Zhang Junbao. Look at how well Junbao has taken care of Little Jue now. Randomly poaching athletes only causes the sport to develop worse.”

Coach Lu snorted: “Now Junbao, when he goes out to scout talent, people say he’s poaching others’ athletes.”

Commander Sun stomped his foot: “Bull! Who said that? Junbao is the best singles coach in the country, and young athletes who train with him have a better future!”

Not to mention Zhang Jue, but Xu Chao, Jiang Yihong, Min Shan, Cha Hanbuhua, and the others all took off after training with Coach Zhang. Meng Xiaolei, Qin Meng, and Lu Qiu, the three young girls, only got their 33-jump combos stable and eliminated all their skating and spinning issues after joining Zhang’s team.

No, Commander Sun had to get to the bottom of this. He was older now and didn’t have the energy to personally train athletes, but at least he could handle the logistical work and ensure that his coaches didn’t have to suffer from rumors after working hard enough to need liver supplements.

What Commander Sun did no one knew, but after chatting with Bai Xiaozhen for a while, when Zhang Jue checked his Weibo again, he noticed there were fewer strange comments under his uncle’s account.

The 2017 World Figure Skating Championships were held in Helsinki, Finland.

On March 27, at the Hartwall Arena’s secondary rink, the male singles were doing their warm-up practice, and they were playing “Spanish Dance” on the speakers.

Due to their similar skill levels, Zhang Jue and Ilya often found themselves practicing together. Zhang Jue stood at the rink’s edge, sipping a bottle of avocado milk that his uncle had made.

“Ilya’s clean performances during warm-up this season are quite high.”

Vasily chuckled: “What’s the point of a clean warm-up? It’s about cleaning up during the competition.”

Zhang Jue had zero clean performances in warm-up this season, but he could still win gold. Isn’t that better?

However, Zhang Jue had also been one of those athletes with a high clean performance rate during warm-ups at the age of 17, but due to accumulated injuries, his consistency had decreased.

At that moment, Teraoka Hayato fell. Falling on the ice was a common occurrence, and athletes of their level had learned how to fall in ways that reduced the risk of injury. He didn’t hurt himself too badly, just scraped his arm a little. His arm was bleeding when he got off the ice, and there was no team doctor to treat him.

The Japanese, being a people who don’t like to trouble others, Keiko had to reluctantly ask Yang Zhiyuan for help to treat the wound.

Zhang Jue sighed: “Even though Hayato is Japan’s number one, with an annual income of over 5 million dollars, it’s not easy for him either.”

When Zhang Jue rose to prominence, the leaders treated him like a treasure, even before he entered the senior category. They had already started sending Yang Zhiyuan to follow him around. In comparison, the Japanese Skating Association’s attitude towards their top male and female skaters was quite hard to understand.

On March 29th, the World Championships officially began, starting with the opening ceremony, followed by the short programs for women’s singles and pairs skating.

The next day, the men’s singles short program took place, followed by the free skate for pairs.

On the third day, the ice dance rhythm dance and women’s singles free skate were held.

The fourth day had the men’s singles free skate and ice dance free dance.

The number of spots each country could secure for the Winter Olympics next year depended entirely on how these athletes performed in the final rankings.

Before the competition, Zhang Junbao received a phone call from Director Sun. After turning off his phone, Zhang Jue and Shen Liu asked him: “How was it?”

Zhang Junbao shook his head: “Still the same. For men’s singles, women’s singles, and pairs, there are three spots. For ice dance, as long as they can secure one spot, it’s fine. But if possible, we hope they can make it into the top 12 to earn two spots.”

Ice dance had very little attention, and sometimes the leadership would even forget about them when setting quotas, which was sometimes quite enviable.

As for men’s singles, Zhang Jue was confident in securing the three spots for his juniors. Cha Hanbuhua also said he would aim for a top-eight finish. That way, even if his senior ended up off the podium and only secured fourth place, their combined rankings wouldn’t exceed 13, and they would still earn three spots.

Upon hearing this, Zhang Jue playfully slapped his junior on the back of the head, laughing and scolding: “You little brat, it’s good that you’re trying to relieve my pressure, but my knee isn’t bad enough for you to worry about it yet.”

Guan Lin and Huang Ying skipped the Four Continents Championship this year to focus on recovery, and their mental state was quite good. Meanwhile, Jiang Xiuling and Luo Mi, the young pair skaters, made it onto the podium at Four Continents, which was promising. They didn’t feel much pressure.

The only issue was with the women’s singles—Min Shan injured herself while practicing the 4S jump.

Actually, both the coaching staff and Zhang Jue thought Min Shan didn’t need to rush to land the quadruple jump right away, because during the PyeongChang cycle, a stable program with two triple Axels was more valuable than an unstable quadruple.

But recently, some male skating fans stirred up a controversy on the internet, spreading the idea that “women’s innate qualities are too poor to land a fully rotated quadruple jump.”

How should one put it? While it was true that Katerina’s quadruple jump wasn’t fully rotated, her coach never allowed her to use it for points, and industry insiders respected Vasily’s decision. They were all looking forward to the first fully rotated female quadruple jump. But after these men stirred the pot, the topic oddly shifted to a gender confrontation.

This issue even escalated on Twitter, with some crazy fans attacking Katerina and Vasily on their social media accounts.

Honestly, the current female skaters, all working hard to break new technical barriers, were all training diligently and never causing trouble. Yet one day, they opened their phones and found a bunch of comments attacking their skills, which was utterly confusing and upsetting.

Min Shan, who was 16 years old and balancing both skating and high school studies, could only use her phone for two hours a week. Yet, she had a good relationship with Katerina, and Zhang Jue and Vasily were also friends. None of them wanted their friendships to be damaged by online opinions.

At this time, Min Shan believed the only way to resolve the public opinion issue was for a female skater to land a fully rotated quadruple jump. Then, those critics would shut up.

She proactively requested more training on the quadruple jump and successfully landed a fully rotated 4S two weeks after the Four Continents Championships, posting it on social media with a message:

“Min Shan—Zhang’s pupil: Women’s singles can land a fully rotated quadruple jump.”

With this action, she proved that women could also master the quadruple jump. It was never a men’s exclusive.

After the video was posted, Zhang Jue was the first to share it, followed by other top-tier skaters, and the controversy eventually died down. Katerina’s Twitter page no longer had any troublemakers commenting.

After landing the quadruple jump, Min Shan gained a lot of confidence. However, at that time, her success rate for landing the jump was still only 30%. In order to bring it to the World Championships, she trained even harder, eventually injuring the ligaments in her right ankle.

Min Shan was someone who couldn’t ignore public opinion. Even if she didn’t engage in online fights, she didn’t like seeing statements like “women are inferior to men” and wanted to prove through actions that women could perform perfect quadruple jumps on the competition floor.

Moreover, as the top female skater, she felt responsible for achieving a good result at the 2017 World Championships and bringing more female skaters from her country to the Olympic stage.

Driven by this sense of responsibility, the young girl requested an injection to go out and compete, her expression resembling Zhang Jue’s from the years he struggled for a Sochi Olympic spot. After some discussion, the coaching staff contacted Min Shan’s parents and finally agreed to let her proceed.

Yang Zhiyuan’s injection technique remained the same. After he gave her the injection, the pain was gone, but the area felt numb.

Before the women’s singles short program, Min Shan was working hard in the warm-up area, preparing. Xu Chuo, who competed earlier, tied her laces and became more determined.

Her coach, Ming Jia, teased: “So, planning to give it your all here?”

Xu Chuo smiled brightly and confidently: “Yes, coach. I must get into the top eight this time and aim for an even higher ranking to relieve Min Shan’s pressure.”

“After all, she is the one with the chance to stand on the PyeongChang Olympic podium. I can’t let her waste too much energy here. As her senior, I have to do something for her.”

Xu Chuo clenched her fists: “So, when the free skate comes, I’ll also need an injection.”

Min Shan wasn’t particularly good at short programs. She often trailed in the short program but made up for it in the free skate. The reason she usually lost to Qing Zi was due to her unstable short program.

At the end of the first day of competition, Min Shan was in fourth place in the short program with a score of 735, while Xu Chuo was seventh.

After the competition, Xu Chuo quietly sat on the chair that Coach Ming Jia had brought over, massaging her knee. A slender white hand holding a medicated patch appeared in her line of sight.

The young girl looked up and saw Zhang Jue smiling: “You did well today. The quality of that 3F+3T combo really surprised me.”

Xu Chuo froze for a moment, proudly nodding while holding the patch: “Of course. I’m the ice-jump master.”

Zhang Jue looked down at the 1.7-meter-tall girl, gently encouraging: “Keep it up in the free skate. Hopefully, we can continue to fight side by side at PyeongChang.”

 

The author’s note: Xu Chuo: As the second sister, I will do my best to relieve the first sister’s pressure, so she can perform at her best and fight for the Olympics!

The career of women’s singles skaters is much shorter than that of men’s, almost the shortest among the four figure skating disciplines. That’s why they all work hard, wanting to bloom their brightest flowers in the shortest time.

 

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