Haru Hayate

Haru Hayate is Sakura's second V-Skill in Street Fighter V.

Description
Executed by pressing Medium Punch and Medium Kick simultaneously, Sakura somersaults toward her opponent before dropping back to her stance. If Medium Punch and Medium Kick are held, Sakura performs a jumping knee strike that launches them into the air.

Tactics
The forward roll itself takes about 26 frames. This gives Sakura a way to approach the opponent in the neutral game. While it can be treated as Ken's or Laura's V-Skill, it is still a fairly slow way to close the distance. Haru Hayate can be linked from most of Sakura's normals, as well as her Hadoken. Her best approach is by cancelling a fully charged fireball into her second V-Skill. Depending how well she spaces this move, she can put her opponent in a mix-up situation. As they are blocking the projectile, Sakura can maintain pressure with normals or break through their defenses with throws.

The somersault can be used to switch sides with her opponent. If her opponent attempts to jump-in on her, Sakura can use her Crouching Heavy Punch to put them in a standing reset. Next, she can use her second V-Skill to roll underneath them to put them back into the corner or in a reset scenario. Other way to switch sides with the opponent is by juggling them with Tengyo Hadoken or from Shunpukyaku while her first V-Trigger is active.

The knee strikefollow-up inflicts decent damage and puts the opponent in a juggle state, allowing her to end the combo with Light or EX Shouoken. The move is -7 on block, putting her very close to the opponent for them to punish. The only way for Sakura to combo the follow-up is from Standing Heavy Punch or from Chin Buster Kick. It has good corner carry potential. Sakura can use this V-Skill during her combos to push her opponent closer to the corner and reapply pressure on them.

With her second V-Skill, cancelling into her first V-Trigger from EX Hadoken becomes more potent. She can link into the knee strike follow-up for a decent combo extender. It is also similar when canceling from her fireballs from her Haru Arashi. It inflicts more damage and has excellent corner carry at the cost of less okizeme.

While her first V-Skill gives her a variety of follow-ups and a way to leap over fireballs, Haru Hayate has better conversions from her normals and projectiles. Her second V-Skill is better paired with her first V-Trigger since Sakura can score extra damage from juggling her opponent with regular, EX, or the V-Trigger Hadoken.