Ladies and gentlemen, meet your 2012/2013 World Snowboard Tour Halfpipe Champion, Ayumu Hirano. He now is 15.

Ayumu was introduced to extreme sports through his father, Hidenori, who owns a surf shop and a skate park in their hometown Murakami, a small city on the coast of Japan. It all started with surfing, but when Ayumu was 4, he discovered snowboarding. He started competing in 2004, and is first big international success came in March 2011 as he won the Burton US Junior Open, quickly followed by first top 5 result in a men’s comp at the 5Star Burton NZ Open.

His big breakthrough, however, came in the 2012/2013 season. First, the Japanese shooting star— under the wings of his compatriot, mentor and US Open winner Kazu Kokubo—won the 5Star Burton High Fives and then, some months later, he landed a second place in the X Games Aspen Halfpipe Final, bringing him the attention of pretty much every snowboard outlet on this planet. He carried on with a first place at the Burton European Open, a second place at the Burton US Open and a third place at the Oakley Arctic Challenge—earning him, as mentioned before, the 2012/2013 Halfpipe World Tour Champion title. Needless to say he’s the youngest rider who has achieved this.

So what’s next for Ayumu Hirano? We guess only time will tell. But one thing’s for sure: with a mentor like Kazuhiro Kokubo as well as an amount of that much talent, this Japanese whiz kid will go huge in the future. As Ayumu’s dad says, “The higher he goes, the better he feels. And he wants to go bigger than anyone. Even Shaun White.”

Just recently, Ayumu again proved his talent by earning halfpipe silver at the 2014 Sochi Olympics – Congrats Ayumu!

Photo: Ayuma Hirano takes 2nd place at the Burton US Open 2013 Halfpipe Finals