Japan is the land of Flat and Tokyo the city of shopping then when Yasuyuki asked me to come to judge, I didn’t think. I know the contest will be perfectly organized because the Japanese don’t mess. The best riders was invited to compete like a show for 10000 $. The contest is the same style of the Circle of Balance or Flatring, in a circle floor. All riders announced was there except Terry (not ready) and Raphael (missed the flight). Even Martti came but for Holydays with sunglasses, flowers shirt...
10 riders was qualified for the final tournament (battles) and 6 from the open qualification. This qualification was cool with lot good riders with different styles. The 5 judges was ok for the 6 best to go in final, the show can start. The spot was dark with enough light on the perfect dance floor. After a show with young dancer hip hop, the tournament start like a TV show. Matthias vs Shinde was the first battle. The half whooper to whiplash from Shinde can do nothing against the world champion. 2nd battle is for Kiba vs Tomokasu. The Paul Oskika style of Kiba was better than Tomokasu and his back wheel staff (backpacker kaboose on pedals, bike flip...). I voted for him but I was alone... The 3rd battle is for Misawa vs Moto. Misawa was very smooth and Moto too stressed. Moto is the next japan star with clean links but too young for this time. 4th step with Jesse “from L.A” vs Hiro. The run of Hiro is famous and Jesse was not at his top after a riding crash. 5th step with Adam vs Akihiko. The good links on back wheel can do nothing against the Hungarian machine. No new trick for Adam but better than Akihiko. 6th Battle is for Viki vs Ikeda. The Viki is cool but Ikeda don’t joke with Time machine. Ikeda is a magician, he can do everything in Time machine (undertaker on the pedal, spinning to decade with brake to spinning of the hat...). I like his style, he is very good and impressive but not enough to beat the Viki. 7th stop for York and Yasunari. York stay the same, same style, same tricks, same speed but too old this time. The style of Yasunari is very clean like US rider with good links like 3 backyard whiplash to halfpacker. The last battle is for Ucchie vs Kitayama. Ucchie is my favorite rider but he failed his run. He pulled only one fucking link on back wheel but the other judges didn’t see. Kitayama was good too and very new with some trick like turbine karl kruzer with a very good style. Ucchie killed the back wheel but not enough.
We have now 8 riders on half final. No surprise for the winners of this step, the suspense was only for Viki vs Adam. Viki win in front of Adam too tired. Adam pulled the trick of the contest, pervert brakeless pedal to pedal, but Viki was better.
And now everybody understand that the finale will be Matthias vs Viki. The contest was in very cool ambiance, not too stressed and smooth, the rappers and the DJ’s show was good too, he speaker from TV show was perfect (very good hair cut), the big final can start. Matthias do the same run like past year, déjà vu but very good. He won lot of contests with this run then no worries for him. Viki did a great job with spinning to turbine death truck, good stuff on back and front wheel, Viki style... The level of both fighters was the same but Matthias was more clean and he killed Viki with an ultimate weapon : 3.6 half cab to half cab whooper ! This tricks for street riders but here it was crazy. Matthias win again.
Who can stop him ? The party after the contest was cool with Ucchie, Kotaro and every Japanese riders, I like them... Everything was perfect. Thanks so much to Yasuyuki to make flatland alive in Japan. Now it’s time to shopping in Harajuku.....
Contest Results:
1st Matthias Dandois
2nd Viki Gomez
3rd Hiroya Morizaki
4th Tsutomu Kitayama
5th Shintaro Misawa
6th Shinichi Kiba
7th Adam Kun
8th Yasunari Ishijima
9th Yohei Uchino
10th Jesse Puente
12th Moto Sasaki
13th Yoshihiro Shinde
14th Tomokazu Morinaga
15th Akihiko Takahashi
16th Takahiro Ikeda
PS: complete report in the next Cream (#37 / February).