Medalist - Ch. 52 - All-Japan Junior Women's FS (Part 2)

[MangaDex]

 

[lovemonger]

hi to all medalheads!

it's the second half of hikaru's FS! i would like to thank the anonymous little bug for their redrawing efforts, as this chapter continued to have difficult pages to clean. very appreciated from us. thank you for your patience in waiting for this release, we were all a bit preoccupied to finish it at our usual pace.

please consider buying the official manga! it can be the japanese raws or an official translation of the manga, it doesn't matter, because either way it's to signal support towards the author and all the people involved in the production of medalist. welcome to all newly-made manga readers that came from the anime!

there was a short author's note by Tsurumaikada-sensei this chapter:

Including the one published this time [in the magazine], there are four different interviews I did with Yonezu-san. The contents mainly differ in the second half so they feel like remixes of each other. It's a remix festival! In the spirit of this, the color page for Afternoon will feature an alternate version of Volume 6's cover that was rejected. Please go ahead and compare them.
This is embarassing, but I need to correct one thing I said in the article. The first time I saw "Persona Alice" wasn't on the Weekly Vocaloid Ranking, but the Daily Vocaloid Ranking. Very sorry about that! It first appeared in #480, so if you're doing a net tour of Hachi-san's songs, check it out... The comments at the time were very enthusiastic also.

EDIT: and another note... when we first uploaded this chapter (around 15 hours ago, from this edit), we had missed a page. it was what's now page 4. sorry about that.

enjoy the chapter, and happy skating!

 

[tomatomandarine]

Genuinely how can anyone compete. Short of an injury that takes her out she seems untouchable.

 

[mikhi]

Thank you for all your hard work as always!

 

[SuperOniichan]

Will we be able to get to that point in the next or third season? How many chapters have been adapted into anime at all? I think it has a good potential to get more recognition and anime than just 1-2 seasons.

 

[Mentholatum]

@SuperOniichan the anime covered up to chapter 15, so this will definitely not be in the season 2 and probably also not in season 3 (if there is one).

 

[SuperOniichan]

@SuperOniichan the anime covered up to chapter 15, so this will definitely not be in the season 2 and probably also not in season 3 (if there is one).

Did the anime add any original content? Or are the chapters relatively long in general?

 

[conqjw7]

Thís Hikaru arc has been nothing but amazing, great understudy into the psyche of Hidaka Jun.

 

[Ryuseishun]

Hikaru's character development has become something so special and dear to me now.

 

[luminary]

These last few chapters has done wonder to humanise Hikaru.

 

[tottori]

Genuinely how can anyone compete. Short of an injury that takes her out she seems untouchable.

Just because you're the best (figure skater/soccer/basketball/baseball player/etc) around at age 13 doesn't mean you'll stay the best. For most other sports that's a little more obvious because you aren't fully physically developed yet and you don't have your greatest strength/stamina etc, and in a lot of sports it just means you hit your growth spurt faster than the other 13 year olds did. They'll catch up eventually.

But for skaters it's also not quite so simple; the essential physics involved in skating means the square-cube law starts working against you as you age, and that affects the fundamentals of every jump there is. People lose that "ants can carry their own body weight" factor going from child to adult. Those skaters who can stay on top over a long period of time aren't just talented, they have be able to evolve their approaches and techniques along with their physical bodies, they have to constantly recalibrate their sense of balance, and so on. When the coaches are talking about forbidding quads and the like, that's part of what they mean: there are just structurally/mechanically some moves an 19 year old or even a 16 year old can't do the same way a 13 year old could without practically guaranteeing a major injury. And it's never a given that they'll succeed at reinventing all of that and not end up "peaking too soon".

Hikaru's clearly the best right now, but "the best" is a target that will be moving for her just as fast as it is for anyone else going forward.

 

[Ajira]

How our little shrimp will overcome this obstacle? And thanks for the translation 😊!

 

[exxeld]

I was a bit off base with my assumptions about why Jun would leave her but I figured he would after Hikaru's last presentation.

Them nerfing Hikaru by having her hold off on quads til she stops growing is also a good call both to aid her growth and also story wise as to not leave an impossibly wide gap for Inori to not be able to cross. With Hikaru's message having been delivered to Inori, I am excited to see their mutual growth moving forward.

 

[trixg315]

Hope there will be no time skip. That last page felt like there's gonna be one. I still want to see how Inori fares in the JGP finals.

 

[doomrider7]

Just because you're the best (figure skater/soccer/basketball/baseball player/etc) around at age 13 doesn't mean you'll stay the best. For most other sports that's a little more obvious because you aren't fully physically developed yet and you don't have your greatest strength/stamina etc, and in a lot of sports it just means you hit your growth spurt faster than the other 13 year olds did. They'll catch up eventually.

But for skaters it's also not quite so simple; the essential physics involved in skating means the square-cube law starts working against you as you age, and that affects the fundamentals of every jump there is. People lose that "ants can carry their own body weight" factor going from child to adult. Those skaters who can stay on top over a long period of time aren't just talented, they have be able to evolve their approaches and techniques along with their physical bodies, they have to constantly recalibrate their sense of balance, and so on. When the coaches are talking about forbidding quads and the like, that's part of what they mean: there are just structurally/mechanically some moves an 19 year old or even a 16 year old can't do the same way a 13 year old could without practically guaranteeing a major injury. And it's never a given that they'll succeed at reinventing all of that and not end up "peaking too soon".

Hikaru's clearly the best right now, but "the best" is a target that will be moving for her just as fast as it is for anyone else going forward.

Except with every single advantage that Hikaru has, there's no reason to buy into the idea that she wont continue to uncontestedly dominate. Only ways are all author fiats like fluke injuries and whatnot. I also don't like the "shining light" comment as I feel in neuters every other emotional relationship Inori has far back behind to the one with Hikaru in spite of them not really knowing each other or interacting at all.

Edit: Love the reddit brigading by the way.🤣

 

[GetterRin]

Except with every single advantage that Hikaru has, there's no reason to buy into the idea that she wont continue to uncontestedly dominate. Only ways are all author fiats like fluke injuries and whatnot. I also don't like the "shining light" comment as I feel in neuters every other emotional relationship Inori has far back behind to the one with Hikaru in spite of them not really knowing each other or interacting at all.

You're forgetting that this is a sports manga, what moves these characters is on the field performance. The passion, the rivalry, the awe at each other's skill and that pushing them, that's the appeal to these series and what makes a truly great sports manga. Most of her other friends she meets at tournaments or camps, at the end it's all about the sport even with them. So wanting some deep constant off the field friendship feels kinda silly and misses the point.

 

[Hem]

Can't wait until Archer Hidaka Jun and Inori have to have a dramatic impromptu not-coaching-just-me-skating-by-myself session in the rink.
"Can you keep up?" Was already used in this chapter on Hikaru.

So Next is "A fool pursuing a borrowed dream", "Drown in your ideals", and some line about realizing how much he loved the pursuit of perfection even if the results caused him pain and loss before being saved by her relentless drive despite his chiding of her many failings -
"Keep skating, Inori."

 

[irondark30]

I’m just glad she’s back on her feet. Hopefully we get more character development from Inori or even support generally, like from Tsukasa for example. I just don’t wanna see her that sad again bro 😭

 

[lovemonger]

hey everyone!

we hadn't noticed this, but we missed a page when uploading the chapter for the first time. it's fixed now -- the page we missed was what now is page 4. sorry about that! thank you for your understanding!

 

[Zasshu]

Did the anime add any original content? Or are the chapters relatively long in general?

It added a lot more to Tsukasa's backstory (should be ep6 iirc) but other than shuffling a bit of side content around, its mostly identical