Koga Hoshino - Off The Leash Video Edition (2024)

Profile and significance

Koga Hoshino is a Japanese freeski original from Minamiuonuma in Niigata Prefecture, a Snow Country city ringed by lift-accessed hills and deep winters. A film-first rider on the roster of Faction Skis, he broke out globally with a run of heavy, highly replayable edits that blend serious urban/street skiing with storm-day powder confidence. After a formative season in Whistler as a teenager, he returned to Japan and built a catalogue that core media quickly championed—season cuts that went viral, the 2021 all-terrain short “MaTaTaBi,” and a starring street chapter in Faction’s 2023 feature Abstract. In early 2024 he closed the brand’s RAW Series Season 1 with “MIND,” shot in Niigata, a part that confirmed his eye for consequential spots and his ability to make hard tricks read clearly at real speed. The net is a rider who doesn’t chase points so much as he sets the tone for style and line choice in modern freeskiing.

Competitive arc and key venues

Hoshino’s pathway runs through films and rider showcases rather than start lists, though he’s sampled freeride qualifiers early on. The anchor moments are cultural: a winter of street-and-pow statements culminating in Abstract’s Japan segment, then the solo-led “MIND” drop that turned his hometown into a canvas. Those edits travel because they’re built on venues that teach repeatable skiing. The everyday lab is Minamiuonuma—densely packed towns and nearby resorts like Hakkaisan and GALA Yuzawa—where long winters and firm mornings sharpen edge feel and speed control. Trips abroad contributed scale and pacing; a year in British Columbia forged timing on bigger features around Whistler Blackcomb, while brand shoots brought him into sessions with some of the most influential park and street skiers in the world. Across these stops the pattern holds: learn it in repeatable parks, prove it on imperfect urban in-runs, then present it in a format that rewards clarity.

How they ski: what to watch for

Hoshino skis with measured economy. On rails he favors a centered stance and quiet shoulders, allowing spin-ons, transfers, and pretzel exits to look inevitable rather than lucky. Approach angles stay conservative right up to the moment of commitment, which keeps lock-ins stable through kinks and over gaps; exits land with glide so the line never dies on the deck. On jumps—be it a hand-built step-down or a maintained park booter—he places the grab early and keeps full-hand contact through rotation. That choice makes axes legible for the camera and, in any jam-style judging, for a scorecard. He scales spin to the day’s speed window rather than forcing a late cork, a discipline that explains why his biggest clips look calm at broadcast speed.

Resilience, filming, and influence

Street skiing compresses the margin for error. Hoshino’s parts reveal a repeatable process for working inside those constraints: scout the feature, measure and shovel, test speed, refine the angle, and only roll when the make will cut clean. “MIND” is a masterclass in this approach—Niigata spots that many locals walk past, transformed into lines where momentum flows and trick identity is unmistakable without slow motion. The same transparency made his Abstract footage stand out alongside a stacked, international cast; viewers can read the decisions, not just the difficulty. That clarity is Hoshino’s influence. Younger riders copy the habits—held grabs, tidy axes, and enders that still have room to breathe—because they translate from municipal stairs to televised rails and back again.

Geography that built the toolkit

Place explains the polish. Minamiuonuma’s winters bring repeatable textures and a dense network of lift-served options around town, including the ropeway lines of Hakkaisan and the fast-access pistes of GALA Yuzawa. That rhythm—firm mornings, storm days, spring salt—turns both-way entries and early-and-held grabs into muscle memory. Urban laps in Niigata supply the other half of the equation: short in-runs, imperfect landings, and light that forces decisive attempts. The earlier B.C. block added longer lines and bigger compressions, a useful stress test that makes Japanese street features feel precise rather than cramped. Stitch the environments together and you get skiing that reads the same in January cold and April sun.

Equipment and partners: practical takeaways

Hoshino rides for Faction Skis and has been welcomed into the off-snow cohort at Phaenom. The useful lessons from his setup are about principles, not product names. A true-twin mounted near center supports both-way spins and stable pretzel exits at speed. Keep a consistent tune with a thoughtful detune at contact points so edges don’t hook on steel while pop remains for lip-ons and step-downs. Choose boots with progressive forward flex and firm heel hold to finish landings stacked when snow is fast or chattery. Bindings should be set for predictable release across repeated impacts. Predictable, neutral, and repeatable is the recipe—and it’s the backbone of how his lines stay intact from street to spring parks.

Why fans and progressing skiers care

Hoshino matters because he makes modern freeskiing easy to read without making it easy to do. If you are learning how to evaluate runs, watch how he preserves glide through multi-feature rail sections so the closer still has room for an ender, and how early—and held—grabs keep rotation obvious at full speed. If you are building your own projects, study the workflow as much as the trick list: plan the spot, test speed, and commit to the version that will look inevitable on camera. From Niigata streets to brand features, Koga Hoshino’s clips are a dependable reference for substance over spectacle in today’s freeski culture.