Shizuka Arakawa

Shizuka Arakawa
Shizuka Arakawa
	Arakawa at the 2009 Festa On Ice.
Born	December 29, 1981 (age 42)
Height	165 cm (5.41 ft)
Figure skating career
Country	Japan
Skating club	Prince Hotel
Retired	May 7, 2006
Medal record
Representing Japan
Ladies’ Figure Skating
Olympic Games
World Championships
Four Continents Championships
Grand Prix Final

Shizuka Arakawa (荒川静香, Arakawa Shizuka, born December 29, 1981) is a Japanese figure skater.

She is the 2006 Olympic Champion in Ladies Singles and the 2004 World Champion. Arakawa is the first person in Japan to win a gold Olympic medal for figure skating. She is the second Japanese skater to win any Olympic medal in figure skating, after Midori Ito, who won silver. She is also the second Japanese woman to win any gold medal at the Winter Olympics, after skier Tae Satoya. Her gold medal was the only medal for Japan at the 2006 Winter Olympics.

Arakawa retired from competitive skating following her Olympic win. Following her retirement, she began skating professionally in ice shows and exhibitions. She also works as a skating sportscaster for Japanese television.

Personal life

Arakawa was born in Shinagawa, Tokyo, Japan, and grew up in Sendai, Miyagi, the largest city in the Tohoku region. She is the only child of Koichi and Sachi Arakawa. She was named Shizuka after Shizuka Gozen.

She enrolled at Waseda University in March 2000, and graduated with a Bachelor's degree in social sciences in 2004, while still competing as a skater. She won the 2004 World Figure Skating Championships days after completing her graduation examinations at Waseda University.

She lived and trained for a time at the International Skating Center of Connecticut in Simsbury, Connecticut in the United States after the closure of the Konami Sports Ice Rink in Sendai, where she began her career.

Her figure skating idols are Kristi Yamaguchi and Yuka Sato. She listens to music by Christina Aguilera, Beyoncé and EXILE, and likes shopping, driving, swimming, golf and practising marine sports.

Arakawa cites gourmet cooking as one of her hobbies. She collects beanie babies, has a pet shih tzu (named Charo) and hamster (named Juntoki). She also has four dogs, named Choco, Tiramisu, Aroma and Rosa.

Career

Early career

When Arakawa was 5 years old,^[1] she became interested in skating and entered the Chibikko Skate School.

She started ballet lessons at 7. While still 7, Arakawa had begun training with former Olympian Hiroshi Nagakubo, a pair skater who competed in the 1972 Winter Olympics in Sapporo, Japan. She was landing triple-jump salchows at age 8.

In 1994, she began participating in Japanese national skating competitions. She was named the 1994, 1995, 1996 All Japan Junior Figure athlete. Arakawa progressed through the Japanese ranks quickly and was the first skater in Japan to win three consecutive junior national titles.

Senior career

Arakawa was the senior national Japanese champion in both 1998 and 1999.

Arakawa made her Olympic debut when she represented Japan in the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano at age 16. The Emperor and Empress of Japan attended the ladies' free skate event. She placed 13th at the Nagano Olympics. At that time, she was ranked number 2 in Japan.

In 2002, Arakawa finished second at Japan's national championships and, as a result, was not named to the Japanese 2002 Winter Olympics team.

During the 2002–2003 skating season, Arakawa won the Asian Winter Games and the Winter Universiade. She earned her second consecutive silver medal at the Four Continents Championships. She took the bronze at the NHK Trophy, and placed fifth at the Cup of Russia. She qualified for the ISU Grand Prix Final, where she finished fourth. She later placed third at the Japanese Nationals, marking her fifth medal from this meet, with two golds and two silvers from previous seasons.

In 2004, she won the 2004 World Championships in Dortmund, Germany, after landing seven clean triple jumps. She is the third Japanese woman to win this title after Midori Ito who won in 1989 and Yuka Sato in 1994.

Arakawa had planned to retire after the 2004 World Championships, but her victory there convinced her to change her plans.

Her 9th place finish at the 2005 World Championships was the motivation she said she needed to stay in the sport and regain top form. She felt she could not quit on such a down note. In November 2005, Arakawa called Belarus figure skater Nikolai Morozov and asked if he would consider coaching her. He agreed.

2006 Winter Olympics

At the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Arakawa skated in the short program to Fantaisie-Impromptu by Chopin. After the short program, Arakawa was in third place behind Sasha Cohen and Irina Slutskaya. Less than a point separated the top three skaters.

Although Cohen and Slutskaya were the heavy favorites for the gold medal, both fell during the long program. Arakawa skated to Vanessa Mae's Violin Fantasy on Puccini's Turandot by Giacomo Puccini. One of the highlights of the program was when she performed an Ina Bauer and then did a three jump combination. "Ina Bauer" became a household word in Japan as a result. Arakawa skated a clean free-skate program, with no falls. Although she had planned two triple-triple combinations for the free skate, she did not perform them. She changed them to a triple Lutz-double loop and a triple salchow-double toe loop combinations.

She earned a total combined score of 191.34 points, almost eight points ahead of the second-place Cohen (183.36), earning her the gold medal. Slutskaya was third at 181.44.

Arakawa's Olympic win was the first in the event for a Japanese skater. Her gold medal gave Japan its first and only medal of the 2006 Winter Olympics, and she became just the second Japanese woman to win a Winter Olympic gold. At age 24, Arakawa is the oldest women's Olympic skating champion in more than 80 years. Florence "Madge" Cave Syers from the United Kingdom was the oldest when she won the Olympic title at age 27 at the 1908 Summer Olympics in London, United Kingdom which featured the first Olympic figure skating events.^[2] Arakawa also was the second Japanese woman to win a figure skating Olympic medal of any kind, after Midori Ito. Arakawa is the second Japanese woman to win a Winter Olympic gold, after Tae Satoya.

After winning her Olympic title, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi called Arakawa in Turin, Italy to congratulate her. Koizumi said, "I cheered for you with excitement while I watched television. All the Japanese people are rejoicing. I give a perfect score to every bit of your performance."^[3]

Professional career

Arakawa continues to skate in exhibition programs and is a regular skating commentator for Japanese TV. She competed in the 2006 Ice Wars on the World team.

She also produces her own show Friends on Ice.^[4]

In 2006, Arakawa appeared in a Japanese TV drama, Shichinin no onna bengoshi (7 female lawyers), presented by Asahi TV. She played the role of a cool public prosecutor, Yayoi Shimasaki, in the 8th episode.

She competed in a new ABC skating series "Thin Ice," aired on March 19, 2010, paired with 2006 Olympic men's silver medallist Stéphane Lambiel. They came first in the viewer's votes, and ended the series in third place, winning a total of $45,000. They skated to the songs "Get Me Bodied" by Beyoncé and "Magic" by Robin Thicke.

Signature moves

Arakawa is known for her jumping ability, particularly her difficult triple-triple combinations, like the triple salchow-triple toe and the triple lutz-triple toe, sometimes combined with a double loop. She has executed triple-triple-triple combinations in practice, the most of which have been the triple salchow-triple toe-triple loop combination. She has also executed the triple lutz-triple loop combination in practice.

Arakawa is a great spinner. She has an excellent donut spin, a difficult variation of the Camel spin, that requires great flexibility. In 2004, she added a Biellmann spin to her repertoire.

Arakawa is also known for her spirals. Her signature spiral is a Y-spiral where she releases her free leg and completes the spiral with her leg still close to her head, without the hand assist.

Her trademark move is the Ina Bauer. Arakawa's interpretation of this move putting her in a full backbend. Due to Arakawa's use of this move during her free skate at the 2006 Olympics, the term "Ina Bauer" became very popular in Japan, and Arakawa's performance of it became iconic. The term Ina Bauer is often referred to in Japan by Arakawa's name.

Programs

Season	Short Program	Long Program	Exhibition
2005/2006	Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini by Sergey Rachmaninov Fantaisie-Impromptu by Fréderic Chopin	Fantaisie-Impromptu by Fréderic Chopin Violin Fantasy on Puccini's Turandot by Vanessa-Mae	You Raise Me Up by Celtic Woman
2004/2005	Madame Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini	Romeo and Juliet Overture by Tchaikovsky	"Memory" from Cats musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber Vocals by Grizabella
2003/2004	The Umbrellas of Cherbourg by Michel Legrand Swan Lake modern version by Tchaikovsky	Violin Fantasy on Puccini's Turandot by Vanessa-Mae	If I Had My Way from Camille Claudel by Linda Eder
2002/2003	Swan Lake modern version by Tchaikovsky	Titanic Soundtrack by James Horner	Sing, Sing, Sing by Louis Prima Wind Song by Tim Janis

Competitive highlights

Event	1993–94	1994–95	1995–96	1996–97	1997–98	1998–99	1999–00	2000–01	2001–02	2002–03	2003–04	2004–05	2005–06
Winter Olympics					13th								1st
World Championships					22nd					8th	1st	9th
Four Continents Championships						6th		6th	2nd	2nd
World Junior Championships		8th	7th	8th
Japanese Championships				2nd	1st	1st	5th	2nd	2nd	3rd	3rd	WD	3rd
Japanese Junior Championships		1st	1st	1st
Asian Winter Games						2nd				1st
Grand Prix Final										4th	3rd	2nd
Cup of China													3rd
Trophée Eric Bompard								9th	6th		2nd		3rd
Cup of Russia								7th		5th		2nd
NHK Trophy				7th	6th	8th	5th			3rd		1st
Skate America						9th			4th		3rd
Skate Canada International											2nd
Sparkassen Cup					7th		5th
Winter Universiade										1st
Nebelhorn Trophy		2nd	1st
Triglav Trophy	1st N.

N = Novice level; WD = Withdrew

Media appearances

DVD

荒川静香 Moment Beautiful skating (2006) – ASIN B000BRBPFG
TORINO2006 日本女子 (2006) – ASIN B000EXDYHO

Book

Tira mi su―だから私はがんばれる! (2006)- ISBN 9784048839631
金メダルへの道（2006）- ISBN 9784140811269
LEGEND OF THE ATHLETE荒川静香物語 (2007) – ISBN 9784088743691

References

The Advertiser. (2006). Arakawa stuns stars on ice. Retrieved February 25, 2006, from http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,18257422%5E23218,00.html

International Skating Union. (2006). Shizuka Arakawa's statistics. Retrieved February 24, 2006, from http://www.isufs.org/bios/isufs00000324.htm

Knapp, G. (2006). A golden princess: Quiet deserving winner. San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved February 25, 2006, from http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/02/25/KNAPP.TMP