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 The FIS Nordic World Ski Championships 2009 ( cs, Mistrovství světa v klasickém lyžování Liberec 2009) took place 18 February – 1 March 2009 in Liberec, Czech Republic. This was the fourth time these championships were hosted either in ...

Liberec Liberec (; german: Reichenberg ) is a city in the Czech Republic. It has about 103,000 inhabitants and it is the fifth-largest city in the country. It lies on the Lusatian Neisse, in a basin surrounded by mountains. The city centre is well preser ...

Career

Competing in two Winter Olympics, Watabe earned his best finish of sixth in the 4 x 5 team event at

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

2010 File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...

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 Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

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. 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. She competed in the 2018 Winter Olympics in the women's halfpipe. Her husband is multiple Olympic medalist Japanese Nordic combined Nordic combined is a winter sport in which athletes compete in cross-country ...

, is a Japanese

freestyle skier Freestyle skiing is a skiing discipline comprising aerials, moguls, cross, half-pipe, slopestyle and big air as part of the Winter Olympics. It can consist of a skier performing aerial flips and spins and can include skiers sliding rails and ...

, who specialises in

halfpipe A half-pipe is a structure used in gravity extreme sports such as snowboarding, skateboarding, skiing, freestyle BMX, skating, and scooter riding. Overview The structure resembles a cross-section of a swimming pool, essentially two concave ra ...

. Akito's younger brother, Yoshito also competes in

Nordic Combined World Cup The FIS Nordic Combined World Cup is a Nordic combined competition organized yearly by International Ski Federation, representing the highest level in international competition for this sport. It was first arranged for the 1983–84 season. Team e ...

World Cup wins

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Watabe, Akito 1988 births Japanese male Nordic combined skiers Living people Nordic combined skiers at the 2006 Winter Olympics Nordic combined skiers at the 2010 Winter Olympics Nordic combined skiers at the 2014 Winter Olympics Nordic combined skiers at the 2018 Winter Olympics Nordic combined skiers at the 2022 Winter Olympics Olympic Nordic combined skiers of Japan FIS Nordic World Ski Championships medalists in Nordic combined Olympic silver medalists for Japan Olympic bronze medalists for Japan Medalists at the 2014 Winter Olympics Medalists at the 2018 Winter Olympics Medalists at the 2022 Winter Olympics Olympic medalists in Nordic combined 21st-century Japanese people