Akito Watabe Explained

Akito Watabe
Nationality:Japan
Birth Date:26 May 1988
Birth Place:Hakuba, Japan
Height:1.73 m
Club:Kitano Construction Corp.Ski Club
Seasons:2005
Wins:19
Totalpodiums:74
Wcoveralls:1 (2018)

is a Japanese nordic combined skier who has been competing since 2005. He won a gold medal in the 4 × 5 km team event at the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships 2009 in Liberec.

Career

Competing in two Winter Olympics, Watabe earned his best finish of sixth in the 4 x 5 team event at Vancouver in 2010 and had his best individual finish of ninth in the 10 km individual large hill event at those same games.

His best World Cup finish was third at a 10 km individual large hill event in Finland in March 2010, until the 2011/2012 season when he started to win World Cup competitions.

During the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, Akito Watabe took home the silver medal in the Nordic Combined Individual Gundersen NH / 10 km, Cross-Country event.[1]

In the 2018 Olympics, Watabe won the silver medal in the normal hill/10 km Nordic combined competition.

In the 2022 Olympics, Akito Watabe won two bronze medals in the large hill/10 km and Team large hill Nordic combined competition.

Personal life

His wife, Yurie Watabe, is a Japanese freestyle skier, who specialises in halfpipe.[2] Akito's younger brother, Yoshito also competes in Nordic Combined World Cup.

World Cup wins

SeasonDateLocationHill
2011–125 February 2012 Val di FiemmeHS134/10 km
18 February 2012 KlingenthalHS140/10 km
26 February 2012 LiberecHS134/10 km
9 March 2012 OsloHS106/10 km
2013–1415 March 2014 FalunHS134/10 km
2014–156 March 2015 LahtiHS130/10 km
14 March 2015 OsloHS104/15 km
2016–1711 February 2017 SapporoHS134/10 km
11 March 2017 OsloHS104/10 km
2017–1825 November 2017 RukaHS142/10 km
26 January 2018 SeefeldHS109/5 km
27 January 2018 SeefeldHS109/10 km
28 January 2018 SeefeldHS109/15 km
3 February 2018 HakubaHS134/10 km
10 March 2018 OsloHS104/10 km
24 March 2018 SchonachHS106/10 km
25 March 2018 SchonachHS106/15 km
2019–201 March 2020 LahtiHS130/10 km
2020–2124 January 2021 LahtiHS130/10 km

Notes and References

  1. Suskin, Jeremy Akito Watabe Brings Home First Olympic Medal in 20 Years for Nordic Skiing Event 2 December 2014
  2. Web site: Who is Akito Watabe? . nbcolympics.org . 20 February 2018 . https://web.archive.org/web/20180221035710/http://www.nbcolympics.com/news/who-akito-watabe . 21 February 2018 . dead . dmy-all .