Student teaches master: How Olympic skateboarding champ Yosozumi Sakura keeps evolving
The inaugural women's park Games gold medallist is set to take centre stage at the skateboarding park world championships in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. Find out where the Japanese gets her daily source of inspiration from.
Skateboarding
Yosozumi Sakura has won just about every title there is in skateboarding.
From the Olympic Games to the X Games, to the world championships to the Asian Games. One month shy of turning 21, she has it all.
But Yosozumi is still learning. Learning from what she used to be - a kid wanting two things: to be good at skateboarding, and to have fun doing it.
At base, the Japanese practises at a private park in her native Wakayama Prefecture, an old warehouse-turned facility provided to her by a local sake brewery.
There the inaugural Olympic women’s park champion skates with friends but also lessons three to four children, one of them since the child was four years old. “I hope we can go to LA together”, she says, referring to the 2028 Summer Games.
While Yosozumi does the coaching, the education goes both ways. She loves kids; before taking up skateboarding in the sixth grade, she wanted to become a nursery school teacher.
Yosozumi knows what it’s to be like in their shoes. Supporting children who have the same dreams on wheels is a lifelong mission she harbours.
But her natural adoration for children isn’t the only reason she continues to work with them. For Yosozumi, skating with kids is part of her training.
“Kids are fearless and they never rest”, she said to Olympics.com. “If I try to keep up with them, that is a workout in itself. If I skate as much as they do without taking a break, it really pays off.
“When you teach someone how to skate, you take it one technique at a time. When to turn it up, where your line of sight should be - everything.
“But because you lead someone by holding their hand, there are things I learn as well. Teaching helps me, too”.
The skateboarding qualifying race for Paris 2024 has been heating up in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, since last week when the street world championships were held.
The focus turns to park this week at Aljada Skate Park where Yosozumi will be top-ranked in the women’s event, per the Olympic World Skate Ranking, and where she will be joined by her partner in crime, Sky Brown.
Yosozumi is a hallmark of consistency who’s been competitive virtually every time she’s jumped in a bowl post-Tokyo 2020.
And if there’s one lesson the world has learned, it’s to never doubt Yosozumi who will take her first big steps toward an Olympic title defense in Paris on Friday (10 February).
“I am (confident). Of course I’d love to win the title but most importantly, I want to have fun. And if I can pull off all the tricks I’m hoping to, it’s perfect”.