Cocona Hiraki Wins Silver in Women’s Park with Difficult Grind; Skateboarding Star Aimed to ‘Perform in My Own Style’

By Takao Inoue / Yomiuri Shimbun Sportswriter

17:42 JST, August 7, 2024

PARIS — At 15 years old, Cocona Hiraki won her second consecutive Olympic silver in the women’s park skateboarding event on Tuesday, scoring 92.63 points. Australia’s Arisa Trew won the gold with 93.18 points.

Hinano Kusaki, 16, was eighth with 69.76 points. Tokyo Games gold medalist Sakura Yosozumi, 22, finished 10th in the preliminaries and could not advance to the finals.

“I was able to give everything I wanted and was also able to win a medal,” Hiraki said after receiving her second silver medal Tuesday.

She was 12 years and 11 months old when she bagged her first silver medal at the Tokyo Games in 2021, making her the youngest medalist in Japan’s Olympic history. Now 15, Hiraki was back to the podium with more sophistication.

Hiraki’s signature trick is the nosegrind, in which the truck between the front wheels is used to grind on a ledge. At the finals, Hiraki was in the lead after the first run, using the trick at a difficult corner while skateboarding in the course freely for 45 seconds. Although the second run was unsuccessful, dropping her to third, she increased the difficulty of the tricks to score higher points in the third run.

After the run, she hugged other skateboarders in celebration and said, “I was able to complete the run that I’ve never done all the way through even during practice.”

Since the Tokyo Games, airs and rotations have become the mainstream in the women’s park events. In order to “perform in my own style and achieve the result,” she extended the distance of her grind and increased the number of variations. She had repeatedly and thoroughly practiced on uneven edges and now is able to perform her signature trick anywhere.

Her moves became polished as she desired to “be recognizable as Cocona Hiraki from any angle, and to be seen as cool.”

She recalls participating in the Tokyo Games, thinking “How big a deal are the Olympics?” And she said she thought, “Advancing to the finals and winning a medal were both a miracle.”

Three years on at Paris Games, Hiraki had grown into a skateboarder determined to win a medal, who was persistent about her style and could fascinate spectators with her skateboarding.