Rayssa Leal’s first medal at the X-Games was gold. This Sunday (24), the 14-year-old skater from Maranhão climbed to the top of the women’s street (street obstacles) podium at the Chiba (Japan) stage of the traditional extreme sports event. Fadinha’s best result had been a fourth place three years ago in Minneapolis (United States).
Olympic runner-up in Tokyo (Japan), last year, Rayssa left host Funa Nakayama (who won bronze at the Games) in second place and Australian Chloe Covell in third. Pâmela Rosa and Gabriela Mazetto also reached the final of the street, finishing, respectively, in sixth and seventh.
Among the men, Lucas Rabelo from Ceará was in fourth place and Kelvin Hoefler from São Paulo (silver in Tokyo) finished seventh in the final. The men’s street podium was 100% Japanese, with Olympic champion Yuto Horigome at the top, followed by Daiki Ikeda and Sora Shirai.
Before Rayssa, the one who stood out in the Chiba stage of the X-Games was Gui Khury. The 13-year-old and four-month-old from Paraná, from the Brazilian junior team, won two medals. On Friday (22) he won bronze in the vertical final (dispute held on a “U” shaped track), becoming the youngest athlete to reach the podium in this event. He was second only to American Jimmy Wilkins (gold) and Japan’s Moto Shibata (silver).
On Saturday (23), Gui returned to the podium in the vertical, this time in the specific race of best maneuver. The kid took the silver, hitting a 1080º (which consists of three complete turns in the air). In 2021, at the age of 12, he won gold with the same movement in the Vista (USA) stage, being the first to do so. In Chiba, Americans Mitchie Brusco and Clay Kreiner came in first and third, respectively.
