Ranking Female Japanese Figure Skaters By Interest Level

Fuji TV does a lot of interesting things with their Nationals broadcast, but they also have a YouTube channel, upon which every one of the skaters post match interviews were posted.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCayz9_-aTstZRoeeZxiPf6g/videos

YouTube posts the view count of the interviews which, for entertainment purposes, can be used as a gauge as to the interest level that each skater commands. I thought it would be interesting to list all of the skaters by viewcount of the interview following their free skate, and indeed there were some surprising names in the top 10.

I used the estimated number of the index page, unless I needed to get the actual viewcount number to break a tie.

1. Marin Honda 26000
2. Kaori Sakamoto 22000
3. Rika Kihira 20000
4. Ayaka Hosoda 9200
5. Satoko Miyahara 8100
6. Mai Mihara 7500
7. Rika Hongo 3900
8. Wakaba Higuchi 3100
9. Hiyori Tokura 2000
10. Yuna Shiraiwa 1865
11. Mako Yamashita 1834
12. Yuka Nagai 1655
13. Yuhana Yokoi 1651
14. Miyu Nakashio 1300
15. Miyabi Oba 1200
16. Tomoe Kawabata 892
17. Saki Miyake 787
18. Akari Matsubara 655
19. Wakana Naganawa 641
20. Rinka Watanabe 629
21. Yuna Aoki 623
22. Ayumi Kagotani 609
23. Nana Araki 411
24. Hina Takeno 332

Were they all uploaded at around the same time. Just having an extra 12 hours in original post by can skew the results. It's better to gather this data in a month or less to see if interest continues.

I'm not surprised Marin's view count is so high. She has a famous sister, her family I think is famous, and her first senior year post Junior win, Japan media relentlessly promoted her as the next Mao. Not sure how much longer that's going to last if she doesn't start producing.

asiacheetah said:

Were they all uploaded at around the same time. Just having an extra 12 hours in original post by can skew the results. It's better to gather this data in a month or less to see if interest continues.

Click to expand...

They were uploaded soon after they were broadcast (the stream was broadcast live throughout the broadcast) I posted it today because it hadn't changed much from yesterday. Like I said, it's just entertainment, not a super scientific poll.

I am sure Marin's gorgeous looks and family connections help, but its not like she hasnt got anything to offer as a skater. Her SS are to die for, the way she moves on the ice is just so natural and she got 2 best programs in ladies field this season. Jumps wise i think we wont see any improvement till next season, she is pretty much in the samd boat as Evgenia. But even with jump mistakes i can watch her skate all day

This is indeed an interesting way of ranking them. It's nice to see Rika H. pretty high up the list - I still root for her relentlessly!

Rankings generally haven't changed since I posted this. The only item of note is that Mako Yamashita has slightly edged ahead of Yuna Shiraiwa for 10th place, meaning that nobody going to the World Junior Championships cracked into the top 10.