“I don’t want to hold back – I want to skate with everything I’ve got.” Wakaba Higuchi prepares for her Grand Prix debut at NHK Trophy while recovering from a foot injury
Wakaba Higuchi Sets Her Sights on NHK Trophy Despite Recent Injury
original source: Hochi News dd. 6th November, 2025
Wakaba Higuchi prepares for her Grand Prix debut at NHK Trophy while recovering from a foot injury. She aims to perform her best, taking a cautious approach to assess her condition ahead of December’s Japan Championships. Here’s a translation of her comments posted on Hochi News.
During official practice for the women’s event at the NHK Trophy, Wakaba Higuchi focused on fine-tuning her performance for her first Grand Prix event of the season. She outlined her goal: “I want to do my absolute best.”
Having last competed two months ago at September’s Challenger Series Kinoshita Trophy, Higuchi revealed that she underwent a challenging recovery period after injuring her foot, which kept her off the ice for two weeks. “There wasn’t an exact diagnosis. It wasn’t a stress fracture, but the doctor was quite vague about it,” Higuchi explained.
For this competition, she has adjusted her jump layout, opting for two salchows to slightly reduce the difficulty. “I’ll aim to achieve top levels in spins and step sequences as I’ve been focusing on them in practice, and I hope to show the results of my training,” she said optimistically.
Higuchi is competing alongside good friend Kaori Sakamoto, who took second place at the French Grand Prix earlier in the season. Speaking about Sakamoto, Higuchi said, “It’s nice that Kao-chan has already finished her first Grand Prix event. Meanwhile, my season starts with back-to-back competitions!” She expressed her admiration for Sakamoto’s early start and acknowledged the challenges of skating consecutive events while not yet in top condition.
Despite this, Higuchi is determined to give her all: “I don’t want to hold back – I want to skate with everything I’ve got.” While her ultimate goal is the Japanese Nationals in Tokyo next month, she sees the NHK Trophy as an opportunity to assess her current condition and fine-tune her skating for future competitions.
Related topics: NHK Trophy, Wakaba Higuchi
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