Ryōyū Kobayashi (小林 陵侑, Kobayashi Ryōyū, born 8 November 1996) is a Japanese ski jumper.
As a ski jumper, he has won 31 World Cup individual competitions, the World Cup overall title twice, Four Hills Tournament three times, and individual olympics gold medalist.
He is the third ski jumper in history to win the 'Grand Slam' of all four events in the 4Hills Tournament, the gold medal at the 2022 Olympics in Beijing on the normal hill and the silver on the large hill.[4][5][6]
With 252 metres (827 ft), the third longest jump in history, he is the current Japanese record holder.
In a nonofficial event near Akureyri on Iceland, in April 2024 he achieved a distance of 291 m after being around 10 seconds in the air and landing smoothly.[7] It was an unofficial world record. However, it is not being counted as an ski flying world record by FIS.[8]
Personal life
He was born on 8 November 1996 in Hachimantai, Iwate Prefecture, Japan.[9] He began skiing at the age of five but began ski jumping in the first grade inspired by his older brother and Japanese ski jumper Junshiro Kobayashi.[9] He made his first ski jumping steps usually practiced at Tayama Ski Jumping Hill in Hachimantai and Hanawa Jumping Hill in Kazuno, Akita.[10] In 2015, he joined Japanese ski jumping team Tsuchiya Home Ski Team.[9] Short after end of 2022/2023 season, he announced that he left the team after 8 years and he's planning to create his own club 'Team Roy’.[11]
He has two older siblings, Junshirō Kobayashi and Yūka Kobayashi, and a younger brother, Tatsunao Kobayashi; they all are ski jumpers. He attended Morioka Central High School, graduating in 2015.[9]
On his own YouTube channel he shares vlogs from competitions, private life, free time and training.[12]
Career
At the 2018 Winter Olympics, Kobayashi competed in the men's normal hill, placing 7th, as well as the men's large hill, placing 10th. He has also competed in the team event with teammates Taku Takeuchi, Noriaki Kasai, and Daiki Ito, finishing in 6th place.[2]
Kobayashi won his first Olympic gold medal at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing in the men's normal hill event. He became the third Japanese athlete to win a gold medal in the individual ski jumping events at the Olympics, after Kazuyoshi Funaki in the individual large hill event in 1998, and Yukio Kasaya in the individual normal hill event in 1972. He also succeeded in the other one tournament, in the men's large hill, placing 2nd.
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