Photo/Illutration Yuto Horigome after making a successful trick in the men’s skateboard street final at the Paris Olympics on July 29. (Hikaru Uchida)

Three years ago, Yuto Horigome stood atop the podium for the men's skateboard street competition at the Tokyo Games, where the sport was welcomed into the Olympic fold.

Only a few weeks later, Horigome would tell the coach of the national team, “I won’t be competing in the Paris Olympics.”

He had endured a long and winding five years, since it was decided in 2016 that skateboarding would become an Olympic sport.

Since then, Horigome had led the way as Japan’s leading skater and carried high expectations amid the unrelenting pressure. He felt burned out.

“My dream had come true, and I didn’t know what to do,” Horigome, now 25, recalled.

Based in Los Angeles, the birthplace of skateboarding, Horigome had a new goal in mind.

He felt that the Japanese still had not fully understood and embraced the essence of skateboarding.

“I want to spread skateboarding culture and improve the competitive environment in Japan,” he said.

Skateboarding originally spread as part of street culture and many skaters have filmed their tricks utilizing stairs and benches, leaving behind a collection of “video parts.”

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Yuto Horigome competes in the men's skateboard street final at the Paris Olympics at La Concorde Stadium on July 29. (Hikaru Uchida)

Horigome took hints from many skaters’ video parts filmed in the 1990s, improved his techniques and established his own style, he said.

So, after the Tokyo Games, Horigome started focusing on production of his own video parts to develop and popularize skateboarding and leave a legacy for future generations.

In 2023, he was involved in organizing a competition in Tokyo that invited the world's top international skaters.

Until then, Japanese skateboarders had mostly traveled to overseas competitions and it had been rare for the world’s elite to gather in Japan.

It was the pure desire that, “I want more people to know the appeal of skateboarding” that motivated him, Horigome recalled.

At first, he was reluctant to throw himself in the mix for the Paris Olympics.

But to further spread the skateboarding world, he began to mull the significance of winning back-to-back Olympic gold medals.

But the qualifying round was “really hellish,” Horigome said.

A revision in the scoring rules increased the weight of points for runs, in which competitors perform a series of tricks within 45 seconds.

That forced Horigome, who had excelled at difficult standalone tricks, to rethink his strategy.

“No matter what I did, nothing went right,” he said.

In May, toward the end of the Olympic qualifying rounds, he was even eliminated in a preliminary round.

Still, he persisted with the quest for gold if there was even the slightest chance of success.

Then came the final round of the qualifying rounds in June.

In the final run, he scored high, succeeded in nailing a new trick and earned the right to compete in the Paris Olympics in a come-from-behind effort.

“Finally, a glimmer of hope,” Horigome said in relief.

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Yuto Horigome celebrates after winning a gold medal in the men's skateboard street at the Paris Olympics at La Concorde Stadium on July 29. (Hikaru Uchida)

The drama continued in the men’s skateboard street final at the Paris Olympics on July 29.

Horigome failed in his best trick in the final on the second through fourth runs. But he succeeded on his fifth and final run.

He quickly rose from outside the medal standings to the top of the podium again.

“It has been a long and hellish three years to get this far,” Horigome said after his triumph, making him a two-time Olympic champion. “I feel this weighs more than the gold medal from the Tokyo Olympics.”

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