SEOUL (AFP) - South Korean figure skating sensation Kim Yu-Na will make her much-anticipated return to the ice at the world championships in Moscow this week. The Olympic champion has not skated competitively since losing her world title in Turin last year to Japan's Mao Asada, the 2008 and 2010 titleholder and Olympic silver medallist. Kim arrived in Moscow on Friday ahead of the season's final competition which takes place a month after being relocated from Tokyo because of the devastating quake in Japan. She had been training in California with choreographer David Wilson and coach Peter Oppegard, with whom she teamed up in October after a split with her former Canadian coach Brian Orser for reasons that have not been fully explained. The South Korean insisted she was determined not to let the scheduling change from Japan get in the way of her bid for a second world title. "There have been changes to the timetable, but I will just keep training the way I have all along," said Kim, according to Yonhap news agency. "In the US, I put myself in perfect shape for March in Tokyo. I will work hard to regain that form," added the skater dubbed "Queen Yu-Na" in her home country. Oppegard said most of the technical preparations had been done in the US and the key would be to improve Kim's conditioning. The coach also said that Kim, listed by Forbes magazine this year as one of the world's highest-paid female athletes with annual earnings of $9.7 million, was a great athlete who should be able to make necessary adjustments to the scheduling change. Kim will perform her short programme on Friday to the ballet "Giselle" and her free skating the following day to a compilation of traditional Korean music, and if she lands her jumps and skates cleanly is the favourite to claim a second gold. Bang Sang-Ah, a figure skating analyst with broadcasters SBS, told Yonhap that the month-long delay helped Kim earn an extra month to regroup herself. "Others have been competing all season long, and this is the time of the year when their conditioning level drops. But Yu-Na has had her sights on the worlds all year long (without other events)." Bang said Kim has developed "an aura of a champion" after winning the Olympic gold with a world record performance and she can intimidate others just by taking the ice for practice. "She has become more mature since becoming the Olympic champion," Bang said. "We can't ask for perfection, but she has experienced enough to overcome one or two minor miscues." A recent trend in figure skating judging could help Kim threaten her own records. Koh Sung-Hee, a director of figure skating competition at the Korea Skating Union, said judges this season have been more generous with their additional points, known as "grade of execution," or GOE. "This could work in favour of Yu-Na because she's a very strong jumper. The ISU wants to separate the good from the average and encourage skaters to have better performances," she said.