After yesterdays big whittling-down of hundreds of skateboarders down to a mere 64 (32 each of men and women), today’s quarterfinals take on a sort of crossroads quality. We are not yet at the stage when best tricks come into play- that is for the weekend. What we have instead is the attrition stage where the obvious professionals and what we might consider the ‘bubbling unders’- the Brazilian ams who rise to the occasion and the Japanese who have the potential to cause an upset if their verve does not desert them. Alongside them you have a small grip of new faces riding their luck through from qualifying who are skating right on the edge of their ability.
Ph: Davide Biondani
From a meteorological point of view, the women drew the short straw by skating first today on what was a mercury-busting afternoon. The South Americans as always brought the collective energy to one another’s runs and it will surprise no-one to learn that current dominator Rayssa Leal qualified in first place with the only 70+ run of the women’s division. She is joined in progressing to the next round by her Brazilian compatriot Gabi Mazetto, who had a super-solid first run and is the most powerful skateboarder in her division by some distance. Pamela Rosa rounds out the Brazilian women’s representation tomorrow. A total of 6 Japanese women make up the 16 going through into the semi-final tomorrow, which although part of a wider trend is worth reflecting upon- almost 40% of the field tomorrow come form one nation.By contrast, there is only a sole American in Poe Pinson going forward; the European representation consists of two Spanish rippers (Natalia Munoz and Afrika Criado Oliva) and Dutch veteran Candy Jacobs. The Australians are represented by the sharp-looking Chloe Covell and Haylie Powell who recovered from a middling first run to qualify in 14th.
The Men’s Quarterfinals went down under some unseasonal cloud cover which turned up at dinner time and about which nobody complained. On top of our guests from last year we were also graced with the presence of Jamie Foy who established himself as a crowd favourite straight away. The standard overall is higher this year with Carlos Ribeiro, Shane O’Neill and Yuto Horigome all having better runs than 12 months ago and newcomers to our Rome event like Cordano Russell, Ginwoo Onodera and Rio Batan all turning up the tempo on the established names.
Ph: Mark Dillon
Jamie Foy and Alex Midler were crowd favourites but unfortunately didn’t make the cut. Keyaki Ike, Kairi Netsuke and Yukito Aoki also impressed with unexpected tricks and alarming consistency- but it has to be said that Gustavo Ribeiro is looking hungry, Nyjah Huston is back in a big way and Aurelien Giraud is in full bloom.
Join us LIVE on Saturday 24th June at 4PM CET (Google for time differences where you are) on World Skate TV for World Street Skateboarding Rome 2023 Semi-Finals which are guaranteed to rock your world!