Home Country Olympic Heroes Yuto Horigome, Funa Nakayama & Momiji Nishiya Among Elite Field to Battle for Tokyo Podium.
Following a resurgent 2022 season, Street League Skateboarding (SLS) has begun to reveal the first details of its 2023 calendar. Following the news earlier this month that its upcoming run will kick off in Chicago, USA in April, SLS has now announced that, for round two, it will bring the 2023 Championship Tour to Tokyo, Japan’s Ariake Arena on Saturday, August 12.
This marks the first time in SLS’ twelve-year history that Japan will host the sport’s flagship series. Japanese fans will now be able to watch firsthand as the top male and female skaters in the world – including Tokyo Olympians – compete in premier SLS competition.
Among the elite skaters who will have their eyes on the prize in August is Japan’s own Yuto Horigome (Tokyo, Japan). An established SLS Pro and the Tokyo Olympic champion, Horigome looks to reassert his early 2022 dominance where he took trophies home from the opening rounds in Jacksonville and Seattle.
Horigome said, “I am honored that Tokyo(Japan) will host the SLS Championship Tour next summer. Everyone will be able to see top skaters skating at SLS and I am happy that the world’s greatest contest is finally coming to my hometown.”
Established in 2010, SLS is the street skateboarding’s first professional organization and is recognized as the sport’s preeminent annual competition. Its events take place on custom-built, one-of-a-kind, SLS-certified plazas with the best in the sport competing for the highest stakes. Los Angeles, London and Barcelona are some of the renowned cities that have previously hosted SLS stops. Now Tokyo is bringing SLS to Japan for the first time.
This year’s tour will dial up the fan experience with an exciting reimagined one-day format featuring the very best of the best in street skateboarding. The next step in the evolution of SLS, the reimagined format will create a more immediate, immersive and action-packed experience for fans.
In 2023, the SLS competition will be fiercer than ever. A new winner-takes-all structure is sure to raise the stakes, since the first-place skater at each event will now not only earn direct qualification to the next SLS Tour stop final, but will also secure their spot in the 2023 SLS Super Crown as well.
Following his 2022 SLS Super Crown win, Gustavo Ribeiro (Lisbon, Portugal) will be directly entered into the final for the opening stop in Chicago, putting him in prime position to qualify for future 2023 events.
Although Horigome is eager to hoist the SLS trophy in his home country, and Ribeiro carries the momentum from his Super Crown 2022 win, Nyjah Huston (Huntington Beach, USA), the winningest skater in SLS history, looms large, as he is poised to return from injury and aims to reclaim the Super Crown.
Fast-rising Sora Shirai (Kanagawa, Japan) is another strong contender. Last summer, less than five years after releasing his first video part, Shirai, shook up Street League. First, he won the tour qualifier event then, at the trek’s first stop, Shirai gave Horigome all that he could handle before finishing just three-tenths of a point behind the Olympic gold medalist and earning second place on the Street League podium.
On the female side, Olympic silver medalist Rayssa Leal (Imperatriz, Brazil) skated a perfect 2022 – winning every SLS tour stop capped off by her Super Crown victory. But in Tokyo, Leal will face a stiff challenge as she goes up against the rest of the podium from both the 2022 SLS Super Crown and the Tokyo Olympics: Momiji Nishiya (Osaka, Japan) and Funa Nakayama (Toyama, Japan).
In addition, SLS will create multiple opportunities throughout the year for skaters to join the SLS Tour with a lineup of new SLS Select events. With a chance to earn a coveted spot in the SLS Tour Knockout Round for the upcoming event up for grabs, skaters will be invited to compete at several events throughout the year. This expanded qualification pathway creates even more opportunity for aspiring skaters to step up to the next level. Additional info on SLS Select events will be forthcoming.
In 2022, Street League returned to indoor arenas for the first time in two years, which brought back the enhanced excitement and stature SLS introduced to the sport over a decade ago. After stops in Jacksonville, Seattle and Las Vegas, the competition built to the 2022 SLS Super Crown World Championship in Rio de Janeiro, which drew over 11,000 fans across two sold-out days. In addition, more than 14 million viewers worldwide tuned in live for the 2022 Super Crown, and the Men’s Final aired live on ESPN in the U.S. All in all, last year’s Super Crown was the most-watched street skateboarding event in history outside of the Tokyo Olympics.
For more Street League Skateboarding news, including the Championship Tour updates, broadcast information, and more, go to www.streetleague.com and follow Street League Skateboarding on Instagram and Facebook.