Ginwoo Onodera — Seven tricks. Seven 9+. SLS history rewritten at 16.

He stepped onto the Ken Rosewall Arena spot in Sydney on February 15, 2026. His 16th birthday. What happened next wasn’t in any record books — because no one ever thought it was possible.

⏱ 4 min read

SLS Sydney 2026 — the first stop of the season

Ken Rosewall Arena. Sydney. First stop of the 2026 SLS circuit. The lineup is stacked: Nyjah Huston, Chris Joslin, Ginwoo Onodera. The planet’s best street riders on the same spot. In the men’s final, a kid from Yokohama, fresh off his sixteenth birthday, was about to do something no skater had achieved in the circuit’s fifteen-year history.

To put it in perspective: since its creation in 2010, Street League Skateboarding has seen legends. Nyjah Huston has bagged thirteen titles. Reynolds, Joslin, Gustavo Ribeiro have all left their mark on the circuit. Yet, no one had ever accomplished what Ginwoo was about to do that day.

Before you see the numbers, check out how he skates. His pro part with Jart Skateboards, dropped in December 2025:

Seven tricks. Seven times above 9

In the SLS format, each rider gets seven attempts in the final. The two lowest scores are dropped. The remaining five make up the total. A 9.0 is already an elite performance — the kind of run you show your non-skater friends to explain why this sport is serious.

Ginwoo scored: 9.1 — 9.4 — 9.1 — 9.2 — 9.5 — 9.0 — 9.2.

Seven tricks. Seven times above 9. Final total: 37.3. Absolute circuit record. Never seen. Never even close. Since 2010, no one had hit 9+ on all their attempts in an SLS final. Ginwoo did it on his 16th birthday.

Tony Hawk said of him at 13: « He skates like he’s in a video game. » In Sydney, he *was* the video game. The other riders didn’t lose — they witnessed something unlike anything they’d seen before.

Who is Ginwoo Onodera?

Ginwoo Onodera (小野寺 吟雲) was born on February 15, 2010, in Yokohama, Kanagawa — the city just south of Tokyo. He was five when he first saw a skateboard, on the concrete of Venice Beach, Los Angeles. Back in Japan, he started skating at Shin-Yokohama Skatepark. Three years later, he joined the AM team for Jart Skateboards.

His progression is vertical. Japan Champion at 12 — the youngest in the history of the national title. X Games gold in 2023 at 13. Paris 2024 Olympics on the Japanese street team. SLS Super Crown World Champion in December 2025, at 15, just days after Jart gave him his first pro model.

His style is recognizable: kickflips to front board on rails as long as highways, fakie tre flips off manny pads, hard flips impossible at angles no one tries. He’s lean, calm on the spot, and wears understated skate shoes. No visual hype. Just skateboarding.

This comeback to the forefront by a new Japanese generation brings to mind other meteoric rises. You think of Antwuan Dixon in a different vein — two riders who define their era each in their own way, without ever overdoing it.

What Sydney 2026 really changes

Competition skateboarding has long had a bad rap in street circles. « Too clean. Too formatted. Too safe. » Ginwoo dismantles that narrative. His skating is technical and risky — he’s not checking boxes on a score sheet, he skates like the camera isn’t even there.

What Sydney 2026 proves is that a rider can be a world champion AND have a style that holds up. Jart Skateboards, a Spanish brand that’s no marketing empire, finds itself sponsoring the kid who just rewrote the record books of the planet’s most publicized circuit. It’s a victory for smaller entities as much as for Ginwoo.

One question remains: will Ginwoo last? Skateboarding history is full of brilliant prodigies who burned out fast. But at 16, with two Super Crowns and an absolute record already under his belt, Ginwoo Onodera doesn’t look like someone building for the short term.

Next up: the SLS DTLA Takeover in Los Angeles, where he’ll face Nyjah Huston on his home turf. Seven tricks. Seven judges. And maybe another line in the record books.