The Winter Olympics have officially ended and the big story for Koreans around the world was Kim Yu Na’s gold medal winning performance in ladies’ figure skating. She broke the scoring record by holding nothing back in the free skate and in the end, she won the hearts of millions as she finally let tears flow. She was one of the great stories of the winter Olympics, having arrived in Vancouver with the highest of expectations and the weight of South Korea to win its first medal in figure skating. She performed to perfection and walks away from Vancouver knowing that she executed perfectly and lifted a nation. There have been thousands of articles written about her performance and you all witnessed her breathtaking performance, so we leave you with not just one thought but many thoughts and visuals of Kim Yu Na. Enjoy!
Admit it. You cried while watching Kim Yu Na skate and we all cried when we saw Kim Yu Na let her emotions go soon as she finished. It was the first time we saw the raw emotions of a 19 year old girl and it was just as beautiful as her performance. Queen Yu Na became a king at the Winter Olympics as she shrugged off the pressure and threw down an incredible performance to win the gold medal in ladies’ figure skating. One of the TV commentators said it best when she said that was one of the greatest performances in Olympic history.
Kim Yu Na destroyed the old record with a world record score of 228.56 and won the gold medal. Her final overall score, 228.56, was about 10 points better than what Jeremy Abbott, the two-time U.S. national champion, managed here — and would have put her ninth in the men’s Olympic competition. The men are allowed to do one more jump in their free skates than the ladies — which makes what Kim Yu Na did all the more impressive.
“I still can’t believe the score that I received,” Kim said. “I’m really surprised. It’s almost as close as the men’s score.” “I have accomplished the biggest, most important goal in my life,” she said. “I am going to enjoy this moment for a while.”
Ladies’ figure skating is the crown event and all eyes were on the reigning world champion but pressure and history were against her as the previous three ladies’ figure skating favorites had failed to win a gold medal at the Winter Olympics. Kim Yu Na is special for shrugging that all off of her and just competing like the athlete she really is. Kim Yu Na was the perfect person to win a gold medal for South Korea. It’s a country that could be considered chauvinistic with a workforce dominated by men, but it was a female teenager on Thursday night that took South Korea on her shoulders and brought pride to a proud nation. Of course Korea took pride in their gold medals in speed skating and other sports, but this gold medal lifted a nation. The last glorious sporting win that captivated South Korea was the World Cup in 2002, and they didn’t even win the world cup. They reached the semi-finals and took pride in their greatest World Cup performance. Since then, South Korea has come up short in sports like the World Baseball Classic. Even this week, there was the disheartening disqualification of the short track speed skating team in the 3,000 meter relay race. They lost the gold medal after having dominated the event for the last four Olympics. But this is special…. really special. A young lady put South Korea on her shoulders and she made them proud. She is now King Kim Yu Na! Bravo Yu Na! Bravo!
Check out her gold medal winning performance (video) at NBCOlympics.com. Also, check out the analysis of Kim Yu Na’s score by the New York Times.
Kim Yu Na kicked ass during the first night of ladies’ figure skating competition at the Winter Olympics. She skated a near perfect performance and outdazzled her competition by setting the all time record for short program scores with a 78.50. This bested her closest competitor and biggest rival, Mao Asado, by nearly 5 points. She came prepared and was a competitor because she had to perform right after a magnificent performance by Mao Asado. It was appropriate that she came out swinging with a performance to the James Bond theme song. She skated with grace, power and beauty. Kim Yu Na is skating her heart out and competing with the grit of Michael Jordan. She has the weight of South Korea on her shoulders and also the knowledge that the previous 3 favorites entering the Winter Olympics failed to win the gold medal in ladies’ figure skating. A lot of guys could learn from her competitiveness and focus. She simply kicked major ice skating ass!
So it has finally come. South Korea’s Kim Yu Na will finally hit the ice in competition for the crown jewel event of the Winter Olympics: woman’s figure skating. There’s a reason why it’s the last of the figure skating events because it carries the beauty and pageantry of the Winter games and Kim Yu Na possesses all of that in her skating. She enters the games ranked #1 in the world and having won many events. However, she carries the weight of the world on her shoulders because South Korea has put their hopes into this teenager to become South Korea’s first gold medalist in figure skating at the Winter Olympics.
Sport Illustrated’s E.M. Swift says Kim Yu Na is the best female skater he’s ever seen when she is at her best. ” I don’t say that lightly, but Kim is the complete package: elegant, athletic, fast, beautiful, charismatic,” says Swift. “Her programs are wonderfully choreographed. She has all the jumps, except the rare (for women) triple axel. Her spins are weightless. But the 2009 World Champion will have to win here before I put her above the likes of past Olympic champions Kristi Yamaguchi and Katarina Witt. She’ll have to prove she can withstand the suffocating Olympic pressure.”
So here’s a quick breakdown between Kim Yu Na and her biggest rival from Japan – which adds to the tension – Mao Asada.
Yu-Na Kim versus Mao Asada
There are several Annie Oakleys in this shooting match, but the gold medal could come down to the same two skaters who have been dueling for supremacy ever since the last Olympics: South Korea’s Yu-Na Kim and Japan’s Mao Asada, who were born 20 days apart in September 1990. Reigning world and Grand Prix series champion Kim seldom stumbles and is peerless from an artistic standpoint. But former world and Grand Prix titlist Asada, who lives and dies by her spectacular jumps, could rack up huge point totals if she lands two triple Axels in her long program as she did recently at the Four Continents event. Their contrasting talents could put the much-maligned revamped scoring system to the test.
Read more at New York Times about how South Korea weighs heavily on Kim Yu Na’s shoulders.
Everywhere I look, there’s a lot of articles about woman’s figure skating champion Kim Yu Na from her chances to winning the gold medal to being the top-earning athlete entering Vancouver. With the Winter Olympics about to start this week, she’s headlining so many articles because she’s intriguing on many fronts. Woman’s ice skating is traditionally the crown event at the winter Olympics and also because she comes into this event with so much pressure. She enters the Olympics with the weight of South Korea on her shoulders to win the country’s first ever gold medal in Olympic figure skating. Further heightening the pressure from South Korea is the fact that her #1 competitor is from Japan, Mao Asada, and we know about the very heated rivalry between these two countries. Unfortunately, Olympic figure skating has not been to kind to reigning world champions who enter the Olympic games. Brian Orser and Michelle Kwan are the faces of failed Olympic bids for the gold medal as both were very heralded reigning world champs. Coincidentally, Brian Orser is the coach for Kim Yu Na and it’s his first time coaching anybody. The New York Times released their second video about Kim Yu Na this week and it describes her relationship with Brian Orser and how she’s been transformed by him from a tactician to an elegant skating beauty. Kim Yu Na was this very raw talent when Brian Orser decided to coach her 4 years ago. She was typical of Korean athletes back then: win by practice and repetition. However, Brian released her creative side and let her express herself. What Brian wants is the judges and the crowds to cry for Kim Yu Na’s performance. So it begs the question, will we cry because she fails to win the gold medal or cry because her performance was so breathtaking?
For the full video on Kim Yu Na and her coach Brian Orser, go to the New York Times.
Hold the presses but the New York Times did a feature on Kim Yu Na, the top ranked women’s figure skater entering the Winter Olympics, and they didn’t write anything dumb like how Koreans like tall people with eyelid surgery and thin calves. Nice! With the Winter Olympics fast approaching, the New York Times is doing short video pieces on athletes and they’re trying to understand the nuances of their respective sport. Kim Yu Na and her coach Brian Orser are featured in the “Inside the Action” video this week as they discuss the execution of the very difficult triple lutz-triple toe loop. The New York Times doesn’t allow embeds so you’ll have to go to their website to check out the 2 minute video.
The Winter Olympics starts up this weekend and you know you’ll be glued to your television for the next couple of weeks. Time Magazine came out with it’s top athletes to watch out for during the Winter Olympics and Kim Yu Na is one of the featured athletes. She is South Korea’s biggest hope in winning a gold medal figure skating because she enters the games as the current world champion and therefore the unofficial favorite to win a gold medal. However, we all know about past Olympics and the disheartening falls of figure skating favorites. Will Kim Yu Na be able to handle the weight of South Korea on her shoulders or will she succumb to the pressures of living up to massive expectations?
Taekwondo, archery, short track — these are the niche sports in which South Korea tends to dominate. But a bright-light event such as figure skating? You bet, ever since Kim, 19, began racking up championships and setting records with the highest-scoring performances, quietly making her case to be the Olympic gold-medal favorite. Steady and consistent almost to the point of appearing robotic, Kim rarely slips on the ice — a skill that has served her well in the points-based judging system. She’s the current world champion and trains in Toronto but is hard to miss in Seoul — her image adorns buses, stores and cosmetics counters. When it comes to performing, the unflappable teen always delivers; Kim stood at the top of the podium in every competition she entered this season.
Kim Yu-Na, the delicate woman’s figure skater from South Korea came from behind to win the Grand Prix finals title in Tokyo, besting her rival Miki Ando of Japan. She was second after the short program but did just enough to edge out Ms. Ando. Kim Yu-Na started out 0.56 points behind her Japanese rival. Kim Yu-Na skated to Concerto in F by George Gershwin, earning 123.22 points in the free skating event for an overall score of 188.86 for the Grand Prix Finals title. This should give her confidence heading into next month’s Winter Olympics in Vancouver. However, she has to be careful because she hasn’t been mistake free in her last few competitions. She has the most talent and ability of anyone in the world, but it may come down to a few deductions for the gold medal. Hopefully Kim Yu-Na will win South Korea’s first gold medal in Olympic figure skating.
What an interesting week with our face to face interview with Asian sensation RAIN and a week of Korean women triumphing and being dismissed. The most exciting hour was Friday evening with RAIN and James McTeigue, the director of Ninja Assassin. We were one of the very first people to speak with RAIN on his press tour to promote the upcoming release of Ninja Assassin. He was very nice and genuinely happy to see us when we first entered the room. We didn’t know what to expect because you read so much about how huge he is in Asia and you wonder what he’s like. He was actually very social, talkative and very comfortable in his own skin. He clearly does not lack confidence, even with the difficult task of having to speak English for a long line of interviews. What was most interesting was that he followed us out to the waiting room and essentially chilled with us while we packed up our gear. It seemed like he wanted to chat more and it wouldn’t be a surprise because he was probably exhausted from speaking English during the interviews. He just wanted to hang with his Korean-American homeys.
What a week of Korean women!
So which Koreans were on TV this week? There were four Korean women to one Korean man. Anthony Kim was seen on NBC this weekend, winning the Kiwi Challenge down in New Zealand. It was actually a tape delay from the previous week. But this was the week of Korean women with two Korean athletes winning their respective competitions. Kim Yu Na won the Skate America championship in Lake Placid, which may presage a gold medal at the upcoming Olympics in Vancouver. Michelle Wie won her very first LPGA tournament down in Mexico against stiff competition at the Lorena Ochoa Invitational in Guadalajara, Mexico. However, for Korean beauties, it wasn’t such a great week with two ladies competing in separate model competitions losing out before the end. Catharina Lee was a finalist for the Victoria Secret runway model competition before going home when they whittled it down to the final five. And Jennifer An almost made it to the very end on America’s Next Top Model but was sent home as well. It’s pretty cool that we’ve Korean women are beautiful, athletic and ambitious. You go girl!
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