Richmond yo-yo champion wows community at Steveston Salmon Festival

Terrance Wang was one of the performers at this year’s Steveston Salmon Festival, and he’s a familiar face to many.

The 16-year-old R.C. Palmer secondary student is a two-time Canadian National Yo-Yo Champion who has been competing in the sport since 2015. Richmondites might also remember him from his performance at the Richmond Night Market back in June.

“It has been a while since I’ve been able to perform at a festival since COVID-19 happened,” said Wang, who told The Richmond News that he was excited to perform at the Steveston Salmon Festival.

“It was a great experience to be able to show my passion. I’m glad that people enjoyed watching me do whatever yo-yo trick that comes to my mind,” said Wang.

Since the News last spoke to Wang three years ago, he has been documenting his yo-yo journey on Instagram, and his passion for the sport remains the same.

“Yo-yo means a lot to me as it’s how I've met many amazing people and travelled the world. The main thing that makes me motivated to keep on practicing are competitions,” said Wang.

Although it takes a lot of time and effort to prepare for competitions, he always has fun during the process. 

“I think everyone else who yo-yos competitively can say the same,” he added.

As restrictions loosen and national and international contests return, Wang is excited to hear the sound of clickers again.

“The way you are judged at yo-yo contests is by trick difficulty and performance evaluation (such as choreography, construction, showmanship, body control, and control.) Judges have two clickers (like hand tally counter or golf clickers) one in each hand,” he explained.

Players receive positive clicks for successfully completing tricks and negative clicks for mistakes, and multiple positive clicks might be awarded depending on the difficulty of the trick.

Two competitions Wang is most excited to attend next year are the Canadian Nationals in Toronto and the World Yo-Yo Contest in Japan.

“I definitely plan on continuing yo-yoing, competitively and for fun,” he said.