Snowboarding, curling gold prospects named Japan Winter Paralympic Flagbearers

From Kyodo

January 18 2026

TOKYO – Gold medal hopefuls in snowboarding and wheelchair curling will be Japan’s flagbearers at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Paralympics.

The country’s Paralympic Committee named Aki Ogawa, one half of Japan’s mixed doubles wheelchair curling team, and para snowboarder Junta Kosuda as the flagbearers while announcing the first 40 members of its delegation on Friday.

Both have won world championships in the run-up to the March 6-15 games in northern Italy.

“I feel both the joy and the weight of carrying the Japanese flag,” Ogawa said, noting it has been some time since her last Paralympic appearance in Vancouver in 2010.

Ogawa and partner Yoji Nakajima are contesting the inaugural Paralympic wheelchair doubles competition and aiming to break a Japanese curling medal drought.

Kosuda won the men’s banked slalom gold at the 2025 world championships and aims to lead Japan’s snowboarders back to the podium after they came home empty-handed from the 2022 Beijing Games.

“I feel my appointment to this important role is a strong message that I am expected to win,” he said.

Among the 40 athletes named, 61-year-old Nakajima is the oldest, while para ice hockey team member Yusei Kawahara is the youngest at 16.