MASH JAPAN PREMIERE: N.B.

0 Comment

We are back in San Francisco after touring Japan and Korea for events last week. With a few days to get acclimated, we are finding fun photo sets from these trips, and want to share them here. The first set comes from N.B. who works at Blue Lug, and took time to show us around while in Tokyo. With Hiro, the team had a weekend full of events, and a new city to explore for many. Enclosed are some of N.B.’s images from that weekend in Tokyo.

We met at the airport on Wednesday, and celebrated Chas’s shorts birthday ever, as we flew forward a day, landing in Tokyo Thursday. Nine of us flew out from SF, bikes are built, and we explored, quickly mapping routes to the event spaces we would be using in the days to come. Open Distribution set up the Tokyo events, and we could not believe the details that went into this packed weekend. Friday, we met at the gallery, where a team was fast at work setting up a large photo show, and had flown the 10 year Cinelli Parallax from Italy to have on display. Riders where met with some photo/video press interviews. This was a new experience for many of them, and an indication of what the weekend ahead had to offer. The room filled up as the night ramped up. Many old friends we had med over the years, so so many new faces, excited to better understand what our group of friends/riders are into. Chas was greeted with a birthday cake, and some dudes got loose that night.

Setting up the show

This was the first time we had traveled with Matt and Eddy, and it was a blast for these guys to have time to explore the city together.

We had sent hundreds of photos published in our new book to the organizers, and they in tern sent them to several bike shops and cafes. We did not realize this until we rolled to W-Base and found another full art show, with tons of artifacts from our premieres hosted in 2006 and 2007. Very inspiring for all of us to see the love and respect that came from Moto and his team.




The next stop was another full display at See You Soon Shop. The guys all loved their designs and instantly bought gifts to bring home to friends.

They had a wall of Polaroid 665 prints, and asked the guys to contribute to the prints.


We learned there was a lottery to win tickets to the video screening. The venue seated 250, and the plan to show the new movie two nights in a row made it possible for most interested in checking it out. the following photos are a mix of Saturday and Sunday screenings, that offered a Q&A, as well as a warm introduction of the history of our project, translated.



Martin and Kevin are old friends, and put in endless time to help make the new video strong. We are grateful for their efforts.
On Sunday night, Dylan awarded the first women racer Mone from the alleycat from the night before. Garrett designed special jerseys, and Castelli produced them for winners of all the races that happened as we traveled.
We are a very small project, and bike shop. To travel around the world, and share with others, what we love, was an incredible honor.

Family photo

Saturday night after the screening, Nicolas, and the 25LAS / Black Sox Bicycle Club hosted a large alleycat. 117 racers signed up, and set up for a late night point to point street race. This was the largest alleycat Tokyo had seen in six years. The pressure from police suppressed this community heavily, and we felt lucky so see so many racers come out, and take some fun risks together on this night.

Nickolas



Smoke is always a fun way to start these races, so it was a nice surprise to see these organizers make this dramatic start happen.


The race finished at the cafe where the podium was awarded.
Massa, a messenger from Cyclex was the winner on this night, upsetting Torizo, who has a long standing history of winning Tokyo alleycats.

Sunday afternoon, a large group of riders met up to show the guys the Tokyo streets. The group was maybe 150 riders, so they split up into three smaller groups, and ran around, seeing sites, and finding as many times as possible to stop for ice cream. Mission accomplished. Group ride photos by Takuto Watanabe.



We want to thank everyone for coming out, and the endless amount of support put out by all of the volunteers to make this a massive weekend in Tokyo. We all got on the plane, instantly missing new friendships made. It was a reminder to come back soon.

Thank you!