www.kingofground.com, april 2007: In the middle of 1998, Japanese top riders, Takashi Ito, Kotaro Tanaka, and York Uno launched a plan to provide a riders oriented flatland contest series by riders to gain public recognition and progress rider's status at public society. The first King of Ground contest was held at ROX3 Multi court, Asakusa, Tokyo on August 23rd, 1998. And now, over 100 riders that include foreigner riders from France, Germany and USA come to every contest. KOG is recognized one of international contests now.
En 1997, il n'y avait aucune série de contests au Japon. En fait, il y avait bien quelque chose, une sorte de championnat mais trop de problèmes d'organisation en ont écourté l'existence. M.Nakayama, Takashi Ito et Kotaro Tanaka ont alors commencé leur propre série de contests.
Medias: Dig it zine january 2000.
Medias: Inside #2, www.agoride.com, Cream #10, ...
Place: Tokyo, The Rox Place (terrain de foot en salle).
120 inscrits.
Thomas Bernard, www.agoride.com: Bien que simple streeter à deux pegs, je ne pouvais rater l’opportunité de partir 10 jours au Japon pour assister à l’un des plus importants contest de flat au monde. Bref me voilà parti dans un monstrueux Boeing 747 pour 10 heures de vol, avec 40 cm pour caser mes longues jambes. Vers 19h local time, arrivée à Tokyo pour 10 jours au pays du soleil levant. Premiers jours, et premières galères.
DAY 00. Takashi Ito vient nous chercher pour nous amener chez Richard, un gars aux yeux bridés et aux monstrueuses dreads. Première galère, les portes au Japon mesurent 1m80 de haut, et je fais 1m85; je me suis donc éclaté la tête.
DAYS 01. Yuho vient nous chercher, direction l’unique shop de bmx du Japon. Puis, bonne session de flat dans un pur spot à l’entrée du métro, avec carrelage bien plat. Des Américains de passage, l’un avec des grands pieds et une voix de canard et l’autre plus typé indien. Le premier rentrait un tomawak 360 whip to tomahawk, alors que le deuxième prénommé Anthony se permettait de sortir des death truck en turbine avec la clope au bec. Un local prénommé Shinosuki avec un style bien perso, fait une sorte de inside squeak to 360 body varial to funky.
Days 02. Deuxième galère: plus de tunes et surtout, il n’y a pas moyen d’en retirer même avec une " carte visa mastercard gold sans plomb 16 soupapes ". Bref, 2 heures de voiture pour prendre 2000 francs. Au Japon, évitez la voiture: c’est long, c’est dur et surtout c’est cher, genre 140 francs pour 1h15 dans un parking. Le contest King Of Ground. Direction The Rox Place, le site du king of ground qui est en fait un terrain de foot en salle (rappelons que Tokyo accueille des épreuves du mondial de foot 2002). Sur le spot 20 gars qui practicent fort alors qu’il est 23h. Ce sont des découpeurs de vaches folles: un niveau que je n’avais vu auparavant.
DAYS 05. THE KOG DAY. Dès 8h du mat, c’est déjà blindé devant les portes. À 12 h le chiffre tombe: 120 inscrits pour un contest de flat. Les novices sont les premiers à passer. A ce moment, j’ai pris la claque de ma vie, car le niveau des novices égalait, voire surclassait, le niveau de certains de nos experts français. Le premier attaque fort avec un hitchiker whip. Les novices japonnais attendent beaucoup avant de faire des contests. Le plus surprenant entre les riders, c’est la bonne ambiance qu’il y a entre eux, beaucoup plus cool qu’en France.
Au tour des experts, c’est Akira qui prend le micro pour deux heures de tchatch et là, 2ème claque. Certains experts sont bien meilleurs que certains de nos pros. Les turbines, les changements de pieds, les bunny hop tailwhip n’ont plus de secrets pour eux, et le public commence à devenir chaud. Les Japonais aiment la vitesse, tous leurs tricks sont faits à vive allure, à l’image de Wuki Maehata, qui roule trop vite pour moi. Je n’ai pas réussi à prendre un barwhip en photo tellement sa vitesse frôlait le mur du son, ou alors les gars restent tellement peu de temps sur leurs tricks que ça tient plus du tricot.
En matant les pros j’ai changé d’avis sur le flat, mais je n’ai encore rien vu. Le public était déjà excité mais le pire restait à venir quand Richard prit le micro pour enflammer la salle. J’aurais bien voulu savoir ce qu’il racontait car ça avait l’air drôle. Ce gars se mouchait, toussait, crachait ou bien rotait et tout ça avec un public en délire.
En pro il y avait: Takashi "le sex symbol", Akira, "playmobil" Steingraber. Il y a un moment où le niveau est tellement haut qu’il est difficile pour moi simple streeter à 2 pegs de comprendre et expliquer leurs tricks.
DAYS 06. Riding à Sinjuku, un pur spot malgré un sol un peu trop agressif pour les pneus. Puis directions le bowling pour une partie très animée. La peur du caissier quand nous sommes arrivés à 30 riders bien excités et prêts à foutre la merde. Vers 4 heures du mat la sécurité nous fait évacuer.
DAYS 07. shopping
DAYS 08. La journée débute par une session à Jinjuku pour les flateux, personnellement je suis parti voir un peu les spots de street histoire de... Pour moi, la défense, c’est déjà un must ! Mais là !!! Des purs gaps, des feebles à kick, des rails par centaines. De la folie… La soirée en boîte, l’un des moments de ce séjour. Ahhh le Asia Club: une boite très sympa avec des filles et des garçons, des gros et des maigres, des petits et … des petits ! Le Show de la soirée fut une démo de flat sur un sol recouvert de confettis et de bières et surtout 6m sur 4m pour rouler ce qui n’a pas empêché les Japonais de rentrer toutes les figures. Vers 6 heures du mat, visite du mont Fuji et photos avec des peloches Fuji bien sûr.
Le dur retour... DAYS 09. Couché vers 7 h du mat, levé vers 14 h, nous partons à Yokohama à trois heures de route pour visiter. Finalement direction l’aéroport pour rentrer en France. Un grand séjour au Japon duquel je repars la tête pleine de choses et le sac plein de pellicules. Un grand merci à Takashi et ces parents, Akira, Yuho, Artzone pour avoir trouvé les billets, Gougoule, et tous les riders du japon.
Rox3 multi court, Asakusa, Tokyo, November 10th, 2002.
Medias: Cream #19 january 2003, www.agoride.com
Report, results.
1.Ryoji Yamamoto (yanmar), 2.Akira Okamura 3.Yoshihiro Shinde 4.Yasusi Tanabe 5.Takahiro Enoki 6.Kotaro Tanaka 7.Takasi Ito 8.Eiichirou Watanabe 9.Makoto Sezaki 10.Shinichiro Hara 11.Yosuke Suzuki 12.Tomoaki Nakatuji 13.Hideki Kawai 14.Takuma Kawamura 15.Yutaka Tamaki 16.Yuji Shirai 17.Kazuma Nakajima 18.Yosuke Sakuma 19.Seiji Sakata 20.Kenji Horikawa 21.Yuhou Azuma 22.Terry Adams 23.Viki Gomez 24.Alex Jumelin 25.Michel Steingraber 26.Hiroya Morisaki 26.Cory Stratycheck 28.Travis Colier 29.Alexis Desolneux 30.Filipp Frueh 31.Magrow James 32.Frank Lucas 33.Gabe Kadmiri 34.Jeff Desroche 34.Cédric Borghi 36.Brian Tunney 37.Raphaël Chiquet 38.Armin Batoumeni 39.Christophe Dassié 40.Leif Valin
April 20th, Asakusa Rox3 multi courte, Tokyo
Round 2
June 28th, 29th (2 days), Oasis 21, Nagoya
Round 3
September 7th, TWIN 21, Osaka
Round 4
November 15th, 16th., Asakusa Rox 3 multi courte, Tokyo
May 29-30, 2004, Oasis 21, Nagoya, Japan.
August 1st, 2004, Nigata phase, Nigata, Japan.
23 et 24 octobre ROX 3, Tokyo, Japon
2005 King Of Ground Flatland #1, National arthritic meeting memorial gymnastic hall, Fukushima, Fukusima pref, Japan. Start: Sunday April 24, 2005. End: Sunday April 24, 2005.
Medias: Cream magazine #13, www.fatbmx.com, ...
www.fatbmx.com: The King of Ground contest series over in Japan has started. The KGB crew flew over from Europe to do some damage. Kuoppa finished in 11th but Gomez got 4th and newest KGB member Alexandre Jumelin grabbed the win. The Japanese filled in the rest of the spots.
KOG Round 1 Pro results: 1.Alex Jumelin 2.Takuma Kawamura 3.Kotaro Tanaka 4.Viki Gomez 5.Hiroya Morizaki 6.Youhei Uchino 7.Yoshihiro Shinde 8.Shinichiro Hara 9.Eiichirou Watanabe 10.Hideki Kawai 11.Matti Kuoppa 12.Tsutomu Kitayama 13.Seiji Sakata 14.Yutaka Tamaki 15.Shintaro Misawa 16.Kousei Suzuki 17.Tomoaki Nakatuji 18.Yuhou Azuma 19.Yoshihiro Nishikawa 20.Junichiro Sakamoto 21.Hisashi Takeda 22.Shinichi Kiba 23.Namito Watanabe 24.Fumiaki Okayama
Hyogo pref, Kobe city, Horbor land, July 30th and 31st.
Day 1 for novice and expert and day 2 for pro.
Entry fee: Pro 5500 yen, Expert 3500 yen , Novice 2500 yen.
Bobby K. Carter, www.global-flat.com, august 2005: I`m back in Japan, this time at KOG Round 2 in KOBE. I`m wiritng this on the fly from a bike shop in Yokosuka called Cycle Cave. (Thanks Jun for the use of the laptop!) Thanks to Ken-san and his JYKK tour bus, we able to travel across the island from Yokosuka to Kobe. After about 8 or 9 hours we parked at Kobe docks at about 2:30am. In celebration, we decided to session a little bit before crashing out. The contest venue was at a large mall with about 5 levels. There were people on every level watching the riders battle it out.
EVERYBODY that I had seen at last year`s KOG in Nagoya had progressed. This year there were about 6 girl riders entering and many more spectating. One girl was nine years old, rocking firehydrants! The future of flatland is going to be crazy.
There were a wide range of skill levels in the novice and expert classes. Some of the novice class riders were at expert skill level. The winner of the expert class was riding at pro level and did some crazy back wheel combos with his foot on the seat post. After winning expert, he proceeded to make it to the finals in pro the next day.
The level of the pro class is skyrocketing. It`s amazing to see these riders and think about the time everyone has dedicated to mastering their art. A Tokyo rider named Yohei Uchino took the gold medal. He was on fire as he owned all turbine halfpacker variations. The guy can pump turbine any trick. He looks like he`s dancing on his bike. Omedeto! (Congatulations!) to this swimming instructor.
MC Sharlee and his partner held it down with their colorful conversations about flatland and kept the crowd hyped for two days straight. Going to one of these competitions is always motivating. The diverse styles and dedication are sure to pump anyone up!
Pro: 1.Youhei Uchino 2.Takuma Kawamura 3.Seiji Sakata 4.Yuki Maehata 5.Hideki Kawai 6.Hiroya Morizaki 7.Kotaro Tanaka 8.Hirokazu Miura 9.Shinichiro Hara 10.Yoshihiro Shinde
Expert: 1.Hirokazu Miura 2.Keisuke Tanigawa 3.Akira Okamura 4.Yousuke Yamaguchi 5.Akihiro Matsuura 6.Takayuki Iwa 7.Yasunori Nakano 8.Yuki Takeuchi 9.Keiji Nakamura 10.Yorimitsu Miyata
Novice: 1.Syunsuke Komatsu 2.Tasuya Fujii 3.Go Wakai 4.Kensaku Nishino 5.Kenjiro Okada 6.Daisuke Miyazaki 7.Kazuhiko Hamasaki 8.Takahiro Seki 9.Raiki Yonehara 10.Kenzo Harada
Tokyo , Asakusa, ROX3 multi court, Oct 22nd and 23rd.
Day 1 for pro and day 2 for novice and expert.
Entry fee: Pro 5500 yen, Expert 3500 yen , Novice 2500 yen.
www.global-flat.com: Whatever you thought you knew about Flatland contests or Flatland in general, if you have not been to one of the King of Ground contests in Japan, in the best case the finals of the three contests a year series, you might have to think again. As far as I have experienced it, it seems in Europe and the USA, too many riders do mostly the same tricks. Sure, everybody has their own style, some do tricks that are a little more difficult, some even do really, really hard stuff. But in the end, only a few riders stand out, the rest pretty much looks the same to me.
At this years KOG finals in Tokyo, my mind was once again opened to how beautiful a thing Flatland can be. It was a two day event, with 194 riders in total. When I got to the venue at 9:15 Saturday morning, riders stood next to one another along the barriers surrounding the contest area, leaving no gap for another rider. But only four of them were riding at a time, giving each other enough space to try their tricks at least a few times before the contest would start at 10 o’clock. This was the novice class, and I was impressed with the quality of riding. I had the feeling that most riders rather tried to do some tricks very well instead of doing too many tricks and pulling none. With 90 riders in this class, there was no space at all for me to ride. I went for a walk around the Asakusa area, where the contest was held in a multi sport court next to a mall called Rox. This court can be rented for events, as done by the crew around Takashi Ito, who organizes the KOG series. While I was wandering around, the contest progressed and in the early afternoon hours I came back to see the expert class riding. This class had 79 riders, many of them so good it embarrassed me to be riding pro. Earlier this year the expert class has seen York Uno and Akira Okamura, who was riding expert again at the Finals. This is the 2004 pro World Champion if anyone forgot. That seems rather strange to many, but it is simply a result of the strict rules for KOG.
Unless you are a visiting foreigner, you have to qualify for the pro class. You can either do that by winning one of the expert events on a Saturday and turning pro the next day, or by getting top three in the year end standings. Since both Akira and York did not compete in 2004, they had to qualify for the pro class for 2005. Yes, Japan can be very strict, but I think this is a result of so many people living on such a small area. If you don’t obey the rules, you will end up in total chaos all too soon.
Back to the contest: Sunday was the day for the pros. Since Akira won the expert class, that qualified him for the pro contest on Sunday. He actually had an awesome run in the expert finals, but could not repeat it in pro qualifying, so he missed the cut. Foreigners who came to ride in the KOG Finals were Art Thomason from the US, Martti Kuoppa, Alexis Desolneux and myself. Not very many compared to previous years, for reasons I don’t know. Anyway, Sunday started with some early practice, registration and then what was called the “One Touch Jam”. Whoever wanted to take part signed up for it and had a maximum of three tries to pull a difficult combo that represents his style. Before that started, I realized Martti had disappeared and not returned. He mentioned before he had some stuff to do at his Hotel. Until he came back, nobody knew what he had to do. When he returned, it was pretty obvious. He had decided to paint his face in warrior style, which earned him the nickname “Mr. Pumpkin” for the day. To me, it was a thing that one could think about, but would never have the courage to do. Martti did it and it was great! Well, 17 riders signed up for the “One Touch Jam”, and as you know the winner turned out to be Martti Kuoppa!
For the actual contest we were 29 riders in the pro class, riding the prelims in three groups, with 15 minutes practice time in between the groups. I was nervous, because you can imagine it is tough to qualify in a strong field of mostly Japanese pros. Since all amateur prelims and finals had been held on Saturday, there seemed to be a bit of a gap after the prelims with everyone wondering what was to happen next. Some riding took place and soon the finalists were announced. Long story short, Martti qualified first. I also made the cut and was happy! Everone warmed up again and as usual, the tenth place qualifier started off the finals and the number one qualifier ended the finals. In this case it was Martti, who also won the Finals.
Other stand outs were Kotaro Tanaka with a very dialled run and great showmanship and Hiroya Morisaki, with his all or nothing attitude.
I did not actually see their runs, but they must have been good, because they got third and second respectively. After the finals were over, everyone was just waiting for the trophies being handed out, the pro year end standings, which Takuma Kawamura won with Kotaro Tanaka in second and Hiroya Morisaki in third. After a closing ceremony everyone went their ways, many probably thinking of the next KOG.
Pro: 1.Martti Kuoppa 2.Kotaro Tanaka 3.Hiroya Morizaki 4.Michael Staingraeber 5.Hirokazu Miura 6.Eiichirou Watanabe 7.Takuma Kawamura 8.Shinichiro Hara 9.Yoshihiro Nishikawa 10.Seiji Sakata
Expert
1.Akira Okamura 2.Eiji Kataoka 3.Hidekazu Kuga 4.Tomokazu Morinaga 5.Yorimitsu Miyata 6.Koutarou Arai 7.Norihiko Kouno 8.Yousuke Yamaguchi 9?Kenshirou Hori
Novice
1.Masato Ito 2.Katsushi Tanaka 3.Yukiya Murata 4.Kouhei Fujii 5.Shouhei Okamoto 6.Takumi Etou 7.Kouichi Higo 8.Yuuki Sugimoto 9.Fumihisa Maeda 10.Kazuya Kuwahara
Expert Year End Standings: 1.Yousuke Yamaguchi 2.Eiji Kataoka 3.Takayuki Iwa 4.Hironao Doukou 5.Yorimitsu Miyata 6.Masataka Yamamoto 7.Yuki Takeuchi 8.Tomoyasu Nozaki 9.Keisuke Tanigawa 10.Akihiko Takahasi
Michael Steingräber, www.global-flat.com, april 2006: On April the 8th and 9th, stage one of the 2006 King Of Ground series took place in Fukushima City in Japan. Fukushima is located only one and a half hours from Tokyo on the Bullet Train, but it’s a four hour drive. That’s four hours north, and you could tell by the chilling temperatures and the snowy mountains in near view. Luckily the contest was indoors, but that did not help much, since the place wasn’t heated. At least for most of Saturday it wasn’t, until a few industrial heaters were organized and things got a bit more comfortable.
The KOG crew had worked out a battle format for the pro finals for this year, and a lighting system was set up on scaffolding around the main riding area, so everyone seemed curious what this event was going to turn out like.
After eight hours of setting things up on Friday, a welcome party was held at a restaurant near the station with the KOG crew, with lots of beer consumed in little time. It seems most people hit the sack in time though, because nobody was late for Saturdays novice and expert classes. Once again, the level of riding in the amateur classes was very good, quite mind blowing in some cases. That is in part due to the fact that riders actually have to qualify for the pro class at the KOG, so they have to work their way up the ranks, quite literally.
Anyway, with the odd 90 amateur riders, it took all of Saturday to go through novice and expert prelims. I did not envy the judges! The riders Japanese names are a little hard to remember for my western memory, but I do want to mention that Moto Sasaki won the expert finals on Sunday morning which earned him the right to compete in the pro class as soon as one hour later. Quite cool for him. But let me also tell you that he was not the only expert class rider who would fit right into every pro class at any other contest around the globe.
With only twenty one pros competing and twelve of them going to the battle, surely none wanted to be one of the ten not making the cut. That made the two minute runs in the prelims exiting to watch, but the real excitement was going to start with the beginning of the finals held in a battle format! For this the riders were grouped in threes, according to their prelim results. Each got a coloured sweatband, either red, blue or white. The winner of these first round battles were signaled with red, blue or white flags from either of the judges, according to what their calls were. And only the winner stayed in the competition, actually making it through to the round of the last four. For the out ridden two it meant the end of this contest, which resulted in quite some pressure for those battles. But I guess that’s normal for most contests. It also meant it was going to be only four more one on one battles, the semis, the battle for third and main final. While a battle format does not necessarily guarantee you are going to see the best riding in the final, because some riders get tired or are just unlucky at some moments, it sure makes the contest very exciting to watch and with a darkened venue and light up main riding area, the atmosphere was unreal. A setting that made the true performers rise to the top like cream. An interesting point was the fact that both finalists did back wheel tricks only. Is the back wheel the new front wheel…? Anyway, Takahiro Nishikawa won his first KOG with unreal riding throughout the weekend, especially one looong link at the end of the final battle. Lets hope everyone is going to get to see a bit more of Takahiro in Europe and other parts of the world in the future.
With a few side shows of traditional dancing and a Japanese drum performance, the added heating and great riding, Sunday was a day you should not have missed.
Novice 1 Kairi Funbiki 2 Yu Uchida 3 Yuya Morita 4 Raiki Yonehara 5 Kouichi Nozaki 6 Kou Yoshida 7 Hideaki Suzuki 8 Kazuki Yoshikawa 9 Keita Uchino 10 Koji Takahashi 11 Masafumi Saino 12 Yurin Hidaka 13 Katsuji Miura 14 Naoto Tamaru 15 Nao Yoshida 16 Kei Takaishi 17 Kazuhiro Masuda 18 Miyuki Dezaki 19 Akira Ito 20 Gun Hagiwara 21 Takeshi Okazaki 22 Masanori Wada 23 Tomoya Sasaki 24 Yoshiyuki Konno 25 Yasuhito Yoshitomi 26 Tomoyuki Hariya 27 Masako Yamamoto 28 Yosuke Minami 29 Kazuaki Kohasi 30 Takeshi Matsunaga 31 Takahiro Kato 32 Yutaka Hasegawa 33 Naoyuki Yoneyama 34 Yoshio Goto 35 Takahiro Suzuki 36 Manabu Nakamura 37 Takuya Takahashi 38 Masaki Tomiyama 39 Emiko Fuya 40 Motohiro Watanabe 41 Toshiaki Sasaki 42 Takahiro Yabuki 43 Kazuki Minakawa 44 Yuki Watanabe
Expert 1 Moto Sasaki 2 Keisuke Tanigawa 3 Hironao Doukou 4 Keiji Nakamura 5 Akihiko Takahasi 6 Yoshiki Uchino 7 Masataka Yamamoto 8 Yorimitsu Miyata 9 Ikkou Tanaka 10 Syuichi Osada 11 Tomoyasu Nozaki 12 Kazuma Nakajima 13 Shinpei Hanawa 14 Kazuma Sakou 15 Tomokazu Morinaga 16 Yoshiki Higuchi 17 Keisuke Matsumoto 18 Yoshiaki Mukai 19 Fumiya Sasagawa 20 Toshihiro Mitsuda 21 Yosuke Sakuma 22 Takeshi Hiraguri 23 Yukihiro Kurashima 24 Masato Ito 25 Tatsuya Hori 26 Ryousuke Kobayashi 27 Norihiko Kouno 28 Yousuke Shibuya 29 Taikou Kaneta 30 Keiji Sasaki 31 Masanori Takayama 32 Takahiro Abe 33 Daiki Aono 34 Kenshirou Hori 35 Kazunori Miyamoto 36 Brett Dighton 37 Michitarou Abe 38 Yuki Sakai 39 Shouhei Okamoto 40 Satoshi Ojima 41 Takahisa Mitaki 42 Kouji Touyama 43 Takashi Ishida 44 Yuki Sugimoto 45 Yorihisa Shiota 46 Takahiro Matsuo 47 Masatoshi Karino 48 Takayuki Nakamura
Pro 1 Takahiro Nishikawa 2 Kotaro Tanaka 3 Michel Steingraeber 4 Youhei Uchino 5 Takuma Kawamura 6 Hirokazu Miura 7 York Uno 8 Hideki Kawai 9 Hiroya Morizaki 10 Shintaro Misawa 10 Shinichi Kiba 12 Yoshihiro Shinde 13 Yutaka Tamaki 14 Seiji Sakata 15 Shinichiro Hara 16 Fumiaki Okayama 17 Tomoaki Nakatuji 17 Moto Sasaki 19 Junichiro Sakamoto 20 Yousuke Yamaguchi 21 Namito Watanabe 21 Takayuki Iwa
Osaka.
29th-30th of July 2006.
Pro: 1 Moto Sasaki 2 York Uno 3 Michel Staingraber 4 Hiroya Morizaki 5 Matti Kuoppa 6 Shintaro Misawa 7 Hirokazu Miura 8 Kotaro Tanaka 9 Shinichi Kiba 10 Seiji Sakata 11 Yoshihiro Shinde 12 Hideki Kawai 13 Fumiaki Okayama 14 Eiichiro Watanabe 15 Youhei Uchino 16 Takahiro Nishikawa 16 Yutaka Tamaki 16 Shinichiro Hara 19 Takuma Kawamura 20 Junichiro Sakamoto 21 Yuki Maehata 22 Tomoaki Nakatsuji 23 Namito Watanabe 24 Takayuki Iwa 25 Yousuke Yamaguchi
Asakusa, Tokyo.
Michael Steingräber, www.global-flat.com, 2006: I went to Japan for all three times in 2006 to go to all the KOGs. I thought maybe I have a chance to be KOG champion for this year. I actually got two third place finishes in round one and two, and I was ranked third for the year before the finals. York was in first and Kotaro in second, and the points were still very close, so I had to get another good result at the finals and maybe I could be champion. I tend to get quite nervous at contests, so I did not really want to think about that situation before the comp. But I knew I had a dream…
Sunday, oct.22
00:30h fall asleep
07:00h wake up
07:30h do my workout, get some food
09:00h arrive at the venue for some early practice and signing up
10:00h watch the expert final
11:00h more open practice
12:00h the prelims start, i have to wait for my group, the third
12:15h try to find something at the convini that i haven’t had yet: difficult!
13:15h practice for my group. only 15 minutes between 11 riders. no time to get nervous.
13:50h only three riders left, my turn to ride: mess up my first trick, then make it, then hit the only big bump on my second trick and fall of my bike again.. will i make the finals?
14:30h finalists and groups for the battles are anounced. made it!
15:00h first battle group with york. sure he will survive!
15:05h york is out. is that my chance?
15:10h my group: hiro, bram and me. i should make it! i mess up a little, hiro rides great, and so does bram. what’s the result?
15:15h i’m out. oh nooo! i can’t beleve it. will kotaro take the title?
15:20h kotaros group is up-he’s out, too! what the heck!
15:21h i think to myself: I qualified better than york and kotaro. how many more points did i get. did i overtake one of them? or both of them? have to wait! The contest goes on
image16:30h contest is still going on, hiro is in the final four. where was he ranked before the comp? can’t remember! does he have a chance?
17:00h matt and raphael just battled for third and matt won. he had a strong day!
17:15h the final battle between hiro and vicky is on. they both seem to mess up a bit. it was a long day!
17:20h vicky is declared the winner of the day. what about the year end standing? guess i have to wait.
18:00h closing ceremony: the expert results have been anounced, and the ranking for them, and the pro class riders have been given their trophies for the day. what about the pro ranking? finally: the top ten are being counted down. when will i be called. did i overtake anyone with my good qualifying result. where does hiro fit in? they call kotaro in fourth. so i’ll be third at least and get a trophy. yes, i’m next. third for the year in japan is not bad, but i’m a little disapointed with my riding today. should have ridden better.image
hiro gets second and york ist he champion for 2006. congratulations! he was very emotional about it, because it was his first title in japan and a lot of his friends were on the winners ribbons already. you can be proud, york! there is a ribbon with your name on it attached to the cup!
19:30h back to the hotel for a quick shower, then to another hotel for some real food, finally. A few drinks at the bar, then back to my hotel before they close the door at 01:00h
oh what a weekend!
So, my dream did not come true, the title stayed in Japan. Who know’s if I get a chance like that again. It will be a little while before I can be proud of getting that third place trophy for the year 2006 at the KOGs. Well, I will be proud at some point. And I will be back in Japan.
Thanks to everybody that made these events happen, and thanks to Eastpak for helping me fly to the Osaka KOG.
Viki Gomez, www.global-flat.com: It's the 3rd time I win a KOG in Japan ! So it s just one more number to add to my contest victories list. It has been very important for me to win this contest and proof to myself that my new tricks are now ready for competitions. Because this year my most important goal has been come up with new tricks , cause even if I won many contest last year, my inside proud dont let me repeat myself over and over just to win a contest. I like to win making what I want to show. Some look for the fame and others for the money, but I just look for new tricks. And have Hiro as a competitor was a pleaure! The KOG is a good contest that promotes flatland and this important for all of us who loves this sport, even if there are still many black holes not solved. I look forward to come back to Japan very soon!
Bram Verhallen, www.global-flat.com: The kog is nothing like the contest we are used to in Europe. Everything is done its own way there and i liked it alot. The vibe was so good there that it makes me wanna go back every year. During the riding i have done there i felt different from how i felt 100 times before. Probably because its all so far away from Eindhoven hehehe.. But it feels good to ride for hundreds of riders that know what's up but that have never seen you riding before..just in vids etc.
Pro class results: 1 Viki Gomez 2 Hiroya Morizaki 3 Matt Whilhelm 4 Raphael Chiquet 5 Matti Kuoppa 6 Michel Staingraber 7 Takuma Kawamura 7 York Uno 9 Tsutomu Kitayama 10 Kotaro Tanaka 11 Bram Verhallen 12 Eiichiro Watanabe 13 Shintaro Misawa 14 Yoshihiro Nishikawa 15 Shinichi Kiba 16 Yoshiki Uchino 17 Yoshihiro Shinde 18 Moto Sasaki 19 Seiji Sakata 20 Fumiaki Okayama 21 Hirokazu Miura 21 Namito Watanabe 23 Hideki Kawai 24 Yousuke Yamaguchi 24 Keisuke Matsumoto 26 Yutaka Tamaki 27 Art Thomason 27 Shinichiro Hara 27 Tomoaki Nakatsuji 27 Takayuki Iwa 31 Keisuke Tanigawa 32 Akihiko Takahasi 33 Junichiro Sakamoto
April 22nd, 2007.
Tokyo , Asakusa, ROX3 super multi court.
Pro class results: 1Yoshiki Uchino 2 Yoshihiro Shinde 3 Hiroya Morizaki 4 Shintaro Misawa 5 Hirokazu Miura 6 York Uno 7 Ryoji Yamamoto 8 Shinichi Kiba 9 Syuichi Osada 10 Moto Sasaki 11 Keisuke Tanigawa 12 Michel Staingraber 13 Kotaro Arai 14 Yoshihiro Nishikawa 15 Seiji Sakata 16 Fumiaki Okayama 17 Takayuki Iwa 18 Keisuke Matsumoto 19 Akihiko Takahasi 20 Junichiro Sakamoto 21 Takuma Kawamura 22 Hidekazu Kuga 23 Yousuke Yamaguchi 24 Shinichiro Hara 25 Hideki Kawai
22 juillet 2007
Fukushima (Japon)
Pro: 1 York Uno 2 Hirokazu Miura 3 Yoshihiro Shinde 4 Hiroya Morizaki 5 Yoshiki Uchino 6 Shintaro Misawa 7 Takayuki Iwa 8 Fumiaki Okayama 9 Pichit Woraa-nan 10 Akihiko Takahasi 11 Yoshihiro Nishikawa 12 Takuma Kawamura 13 Ryoji Yamamoto 14 Shinichi Kiba 15 Moto Sasaki 16 Shinichiro Hara 17 Junichiro Sakamoto 18 Hidekazu Kuga 19 Seiji Sakata 20 Keisuke Matsumot
Pro: 1 Yoshiki Uchino 2 Hiroya Morizaki 3 Martti Kuoppa 4 Youhei Uchino 5 Ryoji Yamamoto 6 Keisuke Tanigawa 7 York Uno 8 Shintaro Misawa 9 Takuma Kawamura 10 Yoshihiro Shinde 11 Shinichi Kiba 12 Syuichi Osada 13 Akihiko Takahasi 14 Moto Sasaki 15 Sebastian Pospischil 16 Hirokazu Miura 17 Hironao Doukou 18 Hidekazu Kuga 19 Kotaro Arai 20 Seiji Sakata 21 Akira Okamura
Expert: 1 Akira Okamura 2 Tsutomu Kitayama 3 Tomokazu Morinaga 4 Takahiro Ikeda 5 Eiichirou Watanabe 6 Yorimitsu Miyata 7 Makoto Sezaki 8 Hironao Doukou 9 Katushi Tanaka 10 Yuki Sakai 11 Yousuke Sakuma 12 Tomoyasu Nozaki 13 Kenji Mori 14 Yousuke Shibuya 15 Mitsuki Itou 16 Gou Takuno 17 Kousei Suzuki 18 Yoshiaki Mukai 19 Yukinobu Kamura 20 Kazuma Sakou
Tokyo.
King Of Ground Round 3 Results: 1st Matthias Dandois 2nd Sam Foakes 3rd Yohei Uchino 4th Hiroya Morizaki 5th Matt Wilhelm 6th Hirokazu Miura 7th Terry Adams 8th Akira Okamura 9th Dominik Nekolny 10th Yoshiki Uchino 11th Viki Gomez 12th Michael Sommer
April 3rd - 4th.
Oasis 21, Nagoya, Japan.
2010 KOG Nagoya Pro Semi and Final.
July 24th - 25th.
Horborland, Space Theater, Kobe, Japan.
Pro Results: 1st Moto Sasaki 2nd Takahiro Ikeda 3rd Nao Yoshida
Expert Results: 1st Fumiya Kanna 2nd Kazuma Nakajima 3rd Yasushi Tanabe
Pros highlights video by BMX Boze.
TBD, middle of October, Yokohama, Yokohama International Passenger Terminal (Oosanbashi)