Seiji Gori

Seiji Gori五里 誠二
Seiji Gori五里 誠二
Romanized	Gori Seiji
Relatives	Yasuko Gori (Wife)
Profile
Gender	Male
Occupation	FSC Head Coach
Skating Information
FS Club	Aisei Ride FSC
Student	Manaka Roba Iruka Okazaki
General Information
Manga Debut	18 — My Cards

Seiji Gori (Japanese: 五里 誠二 Gori Seiji) is the head coach of Aisei Ride FSC. He is first introduced during the Chubu Block Tournament.

Profile

Made it to the nationals at age 22. He then retired and became a middle-school teacher; once he heard his old club was de-facto defunct, he rebuilt it as a new club, Aisei Ride. Good at helping students develop their talents, no matter what they are. He's taken on many more students since Iruka got picked for development, making his club one of the top three in Nagoya.

---

Volume 6 Character Cards

Media Appearances

Manga

Volume 1	1 2 3 SP1 SP2
Volume 2	4 5 6 SP3 7 SP4
Volume 3	8 9 10 11
Volume 4	12 13 14 15
Volume 5	16 17 18 19 EX1
Volume 6	20 21 22 23
Volume 7	24 25 26 27 28
Volume 8	29 30 31 32
Volume 9	33 34 35 36
Volume 10	37 38 39 40 SP5
Volume 11	41 42 43 44 45 SP6
Volume 12	46 47 48 EX2
Volume 13	49 50 51 52 53 SP8
Fanbook	FBSP1 FBSP2 FBSP3 FBSP4
Uncollected	UCSP1

Story

While planning to launch Aisei Ride FSC and discussing the matter with Shinichiro Sonidori at Howa Sportsland, his attention was caught by a girl named Iruka Okazaki, who goes on to become Aisei Ride's first student. Upon learning that she was struggling with abusive parents, Seiji and his wife Yasuko began providing Iruka care and support in daily life, and helped maintain distance between Iruka and her parents so she can pursue figure skating without fear of harm.

At one point, Seiji discovers Iruka in the midst of self-harm. He removes a pair of scissors from her hand as she clutches them by the blade. Acknowledging her suffering, he expresses understanding that what must've hurt more than anything else was the fact that no one noticed her pain. He voices his commitment to being more attentive going forward — even if Iruka appears fine on the surface, he promises to keep watching closely so her inner wounds aren't overlooked.

Seiji first appears during the Chubu Block Tournament, accompanying his student Manaka Roba, who scores 72.62 and finishes in third place. In the evening, he joins Shinichiro Sonidori, Atsushi Wani, Rintaro Chiwa, Shoya Kijita, and Tsukasa Akeuraji for dinner.

The next year, Seiji appears again at a training camp in Osaka, where he joins another evening gathering with his fellow coaches. There, he shares an observation that in recent years, injuries have become a more prevalent cause of skaters losing their jumps. He describes the loss of jumps due to growth as both a truth and a curse: Skaters, fearing the loss of everything they have worked for since childhood, often resort to strict dieting and meticulous self-monitoring to maintain their ability to land jumps. This causes energy deficiency, leading to stress fractures, disrupted hormone function, and weak bone mass development, with extreme cases resulting in eating disorders and body dysmorphia.

With these concerns, Seiji expresses a desire to set a new precedent where skaters can maintain their jumps without severe injuries, a sentiment that deeply resonates with the rest of the coaches present.

Later the same year, Seiji and Yasuko travel to Thailand to accompany Iruka on Event 1 of the Junior Grand Prix. She later competes in the All-Japan Junior, but suffers an unexpected injury during practice time. The diagnosis is a compound fracture requiring surgery, forcing her to withdraw from the JGP Final due to a 3-month recovery. The shock also triggers a relapse of aphonia, impairing her speech. A psychiatrist suggests medication, but it raises anti-doping concerns. Furthermore, the situation with their sponsors has become a mess.

Despite everything, Seiji, aware of how attuned children are to adult emotions, does his best to stay cheerful, hoping not to burden Iruka further. At one point, he meets with Tsukasa Akeuraji and shares their current situation. Tsukasa struggles to comprehend how Seiji can still smile in such a situation, prompting Seiji to explain his reasoning and advise Tsukasa to also be mindful of his expression around students. He believes that while it is hard to fight misfortune, despair can be avoided, and encourages Tsukasa to think on the word "resilience."

During a hospital visit, Iruka shares with Seiji and Yasuko that she was once again confronted with the choice between living as a strong and talented figure skater, or as a pitiable person ruined by idiot parents. While parts of her wants to reveal the hurt side of herself to the world, she's realized that her talent as a skater was nurtured by those who knew that side of her, which is why she will continue to skate. She vows to hold on to this life and its pains, even if her scars are ugly and she's not loved, to live through this miserable life as the coolest skater out there.

Moved, Seiji and Yasuko immediately embrace her from both sides. Seiji tells Iruka that her courage to move forward makes her truly cool, and that someone like her is sure to be loved by the world. Iruka, too, begins to cry as the three of them remain entwined.

Trivia

• During his time as a teacher, Seiji was so overworked that he learned to eat lunch in one minute.

Etymology

• The surname "Gori" consists of the kanji 五 ("five") and 里 ("village"/unit of distance).
  • The reading gori is likely short for gorira (ゴリラ, "gorilla"), an animal reference.
• The given name "Seiji" consists of the kanji 誠 ("sincerity"/"truth") and 二 ("two").