Matthew Stockman/Getty Images
Mirai Nagasu won the short program at the United States figure skating championships.
Published: January 23, 2010
By JERÉ LONGMAN
Inside the Rings
SPOKANE, Wash. — Before finishing second at the United States Figure Skating Championships, Mirai Nagasu said with a teenager’s irrepressibility, “I’m here to show myself and others I’m the future of the U.S.A.”
Many skaters of Asian descent have had success in recent years, including Michelle Kwan of the United States, far left; Shizuka Arakawa of Japan, center; and Kim Yu-na of South Korea.
Far left, Doug Pensinger/Getty Images; center, Doug Mills, via The New York Times; Gonzalo Fuentes, via Reuters
It was self-referential, but Nagasu, 16, also had a broader point to make: Skaters of Asian descent, primarily women but also men, have risen to prominence in large numbers both nationally and internationally.
The reasons are varied, skaters and coaches say. They have to do with rules changes, body type, hard work and discipline, diet and the emergence over the past two decades of role models like Kristi Yamaguchi and Michelle Kwan of the United States and Midori Ito of Japan.
Eight of the 23 women who competed Saturday in the long program at the United States championships were Asian-Americans, who also excelled here among younger skaters. Nathan Chen won the men’s novice competition, completing triple jumps as a 10-year-old. The siblings Maia and Alex Shibutani won the junior ice dancing competition. Another sister-brother team, Danvi and Vu Pham, finished second in the novice ice dance.
The reigning women’s Olympic champion, Shizuka Arakawa, is Japanese. Asian women have won seven of the nine medals at the last three world championships. Kim Yu-na of South Korea is heavily favored to win the women’s gold medal next month at the Vancouver Games, where Asian skaters are also among the favorites in the men’s and pairs competitions.
“Maybe Asians are switching from studying to sports,” said Nagasu, a Japanese-American from Arcadia, Calif., and the 2008 national champion.
The influx of Asian skaters can be traced in part to the elimination of compulsory school figures, coaches said. For decades, the etching of figure-eights on the ice counted for 50 percent or more of a skater’s score at competitions. Mastering these tracings took years and miles skating in circles, delaying the development of jumping technique.
Compulsory figures had a major drawback, though. They could be numbing to watch. They grew increasingly less important and were eliminated in 1990.
“TV and the media thought it was the dumbest thing they’d ever seen,” said Kathy Casey, a longtime American coach.
Without compulsory figures, skating became more like gymnastics. Jumping assumed a new urgency. Younger skaters could excel. The key to jumping is to leap high and spin quickly and tightly through two, three or four revolutions before returning to the ice. Asian skaters are often small and willowy, which can be an asset when jumping.
“They have bodies that are quick and light; they’re able to do things very fast,” said Frank Carroll, who coached Kwan and now coaches Nagasu. “It’s like Chinese divers. If you look at those bodies, there’s nothing there. They’re just like nymphs.”
Asian skaters also often adhere to a diet of rice and vegetables and fish, avoiding large quantities of beef and fat, Carroll said. This can make them less vulnerable to weight gain in a sport where five pounds can make a difference between a winning jumper and a struggling one.
Other cultural factors are also at play, coaches said. Discipline at home often transfers to discipline at the rink, Carroll said. Audrey Weisiger, a prominent Chinese-American coach, said: “A lot of Asian families really drive their kids, and I don’t mean in the car. They’re not allowed to be marginal.”
Nagasu’s mother sits at practice and gives hand signals to her daughter, The Chicago Tribune reported. On Friday, Nagasu said her mother had sometimes used corporal punishment, slapping her when she was younger.
“I think my own thinking is harsher than my mom’s discipline,” Nagasu said. “I think it’s because I’m so hard on myself that I can push myself this far.”
She took up skating even though her parents favored golf. Yamaguchi, the 1992 Olympic champion, was also self-motivated. She often woke her mother at 4 in the morning so she could train, said Yuki Saegusa, the agent for both Yamaguchi and Nagasu.
“I think hard work among Asians is the premise of why they succeed,” Saegusa said. “I don’t think that aspect is given enough credit.”
On the other hand, cultural differences may leave some Asian-American skaters feeling uncomfortable in standing out individually or feeling they measure up, coaches and parents said.
“It may not be second nature that they always feel comfortable,” said Chang Gao, the father of the 15-year-old skater Christina Gao of Cincinnati and a former junior national badminton champion in China.
Curiously, China is one place where women’s singles skating has not fully developed, despite two Olympic medals won by Chen Lu in the 1990s. There are not enough coaches and rinks, said Li Ming Zhu, Chen’s former coach.
“It’s better than it was 10 years ago, but in China they don’t have very many young skaters,” Li said.
That is not the case in Japan, which experienced a skating boom after Ito won a world title in 1989 and an Olympic silver medal in 1992. Rinks are being built, too, in South Korea now that Kim has become a world champion and an Olympic favorite.
“You watch these skaters and you think you can do it too,” said Christina Gao, who trains with Kim in Toronto and idolizes Kwan, who won five world championships and two Olympic medals. “It really motivates me.”
A version of this article appeared in print on January 24, 2010, on page SP7 of the New York edition.
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