**DISCLAIMER**: STICKYDILJOE.COM does not approve, condone, nor promote street racing of any motor vehicles on public roadways, which include but is not limited to; interstates, highways, or any public motorway as defined by local, state, or federal law, code or regulation.

This is RAW footage that was captured in Japan as merely an observational piece documenting a historical part of Osaka’s car enthusiasts culture. What you see is not scripted in any way nor was it planned. What you will witness is incredibly dangerous and should not be attempted, recreated, or practiced at any time.

All parties who participated do so at their own risk and hold any and all persons associated with STICKYDILJOE.COM harmless of any and all liabilities.

As I discussed early on in my coverage of my journey to Japan last month, there wasn’t a whole lot of planning involved. Everything that I initially had planned seemed to have fallen through the cracks and was disrupted by the huge fallout from the major changes at Source Interlink. Originally, I was set to meet up with Jonathan Wong (Then with Super Street) and Brandon Leung (BOWLS LA) to create a major project documenting the famed Osaka Kanjo underground culture. It was supposed to be huge. I mean, I had already planned to meet up with some guys in Osaka to experience the Kanjo Loop but when Brandon approached me with the idea for this project, I was stoked. After I found out, it honestly became the centerpiece to my trip. Tokyo Auto Salon was of course the main objective but it almost seemed less important once this project fell into my hands. Once everything happened, I felt like as easily as it fell into my hands, it just as easily slipped through the cracks of my fingers and was out of my control. The possible funding for it became non-existent and the opportunity to create something incredible seemed lost. Brandon, who is an incredible videographer, was no longer able to make the trip and because Jonathan Wong had left Super Street, he would not accompany me on the journey either….

The project became an afterthought but with some insistence from friends, particularly Ryan Der, who was just as excited about the entire thing as I was, I decided to move forward with the project….whatever it is I could salvage of it that is. We had already laid plans to meet the Kanjozokus when we arrived in Osaka so we knew that they would come through. There would at least be something for the site. I would capture whatever I saw and blow whatever I did last year when I met with some of them out of the water. Last year’s documentation of our meeting with the Kanjo Loop runners was cool and everybody loved it, but I was ill-prepared to take advantage of the opportunity. It was almost a complete surprise actually as I didn’t know that we’d be meeting them until a few days before it actually happened. This time, I told myself that I would do what I could to create something special. Meeting up with these guys is an INCREDIBLY RARE opportunity. As little as I knew about them, they knew just as less about me…I was insignificant really. Thanks to my friends in Osaka, they were able to tell these guys what I was all about and they were eager to arrange a gathering for me. I so humbly respect them for blessing me with the opportunity to witness what is so completely rare and special to them. Osaka Kanjo is a shadow of what it used to be, thanks to major law enforcement crackdowns over the years. Whoever was left was the dedicated few who decided to carry on the tradition and spirit of Osaka Kanjo Racing. For them to put together something for me is amazing. One of the hardest things to do when putting this piece together is to ensure that I did whatever I could to respect what they did and what they were representing for Osaka’s underground automotive culture…

So I lost my main Japanese contact when JDM Wong left Super Street and I no longer had a video guy to capture incredible footage for me. Luckily I had great friends in Japan who I could rely on with Tactical Art who were instrumental in helping to create this piece. For video, I said, “fuck it”. I am no video guy by any stretch of the imagination and barely a photographer but I was going to just capture what I could. Honestly, I barely even know how to use the fucking “record” function on the video side of this camera that I use. I literally had to learn on the fly because I had only accessed it once or twice previously. Ryan Der had a camera with him as well and I knew I could count on him to capture some extra footage if needed. So when we arrived in Osaka, we were basically ready to cover this and try to create something worthwhile. What we ended up seeing was just mind-numbing and nothing what we expected to see. We are familiar with the Osaka Kanjo runners and have a basic idea of their history but man oh man, this was a complete eye-opener….

I should mention that you might want to be prepared to read a lot today. I’m sorry if reading troubles you but if you don’t read all of this word for word, you will not understand any of it. No truer words will ever be spoken on this site. IF YOU DON’T READ AND HAVE AN OPEN-MIND, YOU WILL NOT UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU WILL BE SEEING BELOW. So if you’re eyes are tired from reading what I’ve already written, just stop here, go take a fucking nap, and come back when you are ready…

Let me give you a basic idea of what Kanjo Racing is because many of you will not know what it is. Hell, most Japanese outside of the Kansai region don’t even have a grasp of what it is. I first came upon Kanjo Racing like some of you. I accidentally stumbled upon some photos of some Kanjo cars while searching the web and also like some of you, I watched the old JDM Insider DVD that did a interesting story on it. For that time, it was a big deal to get a look at this scene because everyone was going crazy over drifting and this was nothing like it. This type of “motorsport”, if you will, is native to only the Osaka region and nowhere near comparable to the more popular, and more well-understood, Wangan Racing scene in Tokyo. The Wangan is a long, straight highway where running it is based on power and speed. Kanjo consists of driving in a “loop” of highway in Osaka that is much smaller. Racing on the Loop is all about agility and maneuverability. It’s not so much based on pure speed. It’s rise in notoriety, particularly within the Honda community, spawned in the 1980s when guys in Osaka would race third generation Civics (What we know as the AT or E-AT) through the loop. Multiple car clubs arose and would battle each other on the loop. Over time it grew in popularity within the underground subculture of Osaka car enthusiasts and peaked in the early 2000s. Things died down significantly when Osaka law enforcement became fed up with the dangerous and reckless driving of the Kanjozoku and cracked down on it, HARD. People were being arrested, spending time in jail because of it, and those who were caught paid a hefty price for their actions. There were guys who were with us that night we went out that had spent time in jail because of it and have since removed themselves from the Loop. Many retired from running the Loop, some transitioned into circuit racing, some just grew old and decided that it was better to live a normal life. Only the diehards stuck around. The ones who stayed hid in the depths of the night and would only occasionally make the risky drive out to run the loop with friends and rivals. Osaka Kanjo became a shadow of its former self. You would be lucky to catch a rare glimpse of them on the Loop and even when you did, you would only see them for brief moments before they blasted by and disappeared into the night. Why this gathering on this particular night is special because it not only was an important meeting for me, it was also a special moment for the Kanjozoku because they too had not been together on the loop in a long time. It was almost a reunion of sorts for them as a grouping this big had not been arranged in over SIX years. I will say it again, I was honored to be in their presence because I understand how important it was for them….

What you will find below is what I captured that night. Though I must admit that I was a bit in shock, I tried my best to capture the essence of the gathering. Last year we had an encounter with two individuals who were kind enough to give us a glimpse into their world. This year, We had roughly 20 cars, maybe more. I couldn’t tell you the exact numbers because they were coming and going and many disappeared into the darkness…

It was vital for me to make sure that everyone’s identities remain a secret and to ensure the privacy of all individuals involved. These guys are some of the last remaining Kanjozoku around and I would not play a part in potentially getting any of them caught-up in anything. I respect what they do and what they are about. This is something unique to Osaka and has a rich history that they intend to continue to push forward with as long as they can. I think people would be foolish to attempt anything like this at home. It doesn’t matter where you are, driving the way they do and performing the “stunts” that you will see is highly illegal and incredibly dangerous. It is important to remember that when you get into your own cars. It all seems like fun and games but when it comes down to it, you should not attempt to be a “Kanjo Racer”, because you never will be. Many have tried, many have failed. Look to this piece more as a documentation of Japanese car culture and not as an instructional piece on how to drive your vehicle with your friends. Let’s be honest with ourselves. If you tried this at home, it wouldn’t be an instance where you would just get shunned by the police and asked to go home; it would turn into a high-speed chase where you would either end up getting arrested or dead. Helicopters would follow you home and police would take you away (granted that you survived) and you would get charged with reckless endangerment and even maybe vehicular manslaughter if you accidentally crashed into someone else along the way. Just because you see it, it doesn’t mean you have to mimic it and do it at home. Save it for the track and run your cars out there in a protected environment where you aren’t putting the lives of other people at risk because you want to believe that you are a “Kanjo Racer”. Again, you will fail, and you might potentially kill yourself and maybe others….

DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME.

On the other hand, I see people building Kanjo-inspired builds here in the U.S. and it is almost kind of refreshing. Hopefully you guys actually never attempt to run your own “loop” but I see the style growing in popularity this year. If you find inspiration from the way these cars look or how they come together, it’s all good. There is a ruggedness about them that expresses function. It’s not the type of ruggedness here that screams “I just don’t have enough money to do anything to my car”. They also tell you that they don’t really give a shit what other people think. These guys have their cars set-up this way for a reason and I will explain to you exactly why they look the way they do further down with photos. There is a very particular way to put these kinds of cars together that I don’t think a whole lot of people understand yet. There are little details that make this style incredibly unique more so than just having a half beat-up looking car with a colorful scheme….

One more thing to add to all this before we get to the photos and video is that this will be unlike anything you have seen on The Chronicles before. The photos are edited in a fashion that doesn’t resemble anything I’ve done in the past and I understand that many of you probably won’t like it…and that is completely fine. A lot of the photos are also done differently than one another to create a sense of disorder and confusion. I did this because I want you guys to embrace the chaos that we experienced that evening. I also did it because it makes the cars a little more unrecognizable in a real world setting. As stated, this is a very secretive group of people who choose to keep their identities unknown. It doesn’t hurt to try something a little different every now and then and since this piece is so unique and foreign to almost everything else you’ve seen on The Chronicles or any other automotive site that you follow, it should be treated as that. The video is incredibly shaky and all raw as Der and I captured it. I originally had the video clips sent off to my friend Sam Ip who took a lot of time trying to clean it up and to stabilize the video so it was less shaky, but I just wasn’t happy with the overall results. It’s not Sam’s fault, as I appreciated his time and efforts but the shake was so bad that the stabilization process actually took so many frames out of the video that it made the final product even harder to watch. I ended-up keeping the video raw and mostly unedited because I just felt it was best to see it as we captured it. Keeping it all raw also goes with the rawness of everything else that you will see. There is nothing refined about Osaka Kanjo Racing; the cars are raw, the people are raw, so why not deliver everything to you as raw as it should be. I hope that you watch it and read the captions that lead up to it so you understand why it was captured. I don’t produce filler content so don’t expect to see me plug some video in just to kill your time. Everything comes together in controlled, chaotic bliss and overall, I am happy with the presentation….

**I shouldn’t really need to remind people to not steal my photos and reproduce it as their own. This is incredibly rare footage that you will see and everyone will know where it came from. Save yourself the shame of being called-out for being a content-stealer to promote your own endeavors. I paid for this trip out of my own pocket and risked my fucking life to create this original content for everyone to see completely at no cost to you. Please respect what I do and keep these photos and video only to this site. If you plan to re-post a shot or two, at least be decent enough to post appropriate credit and links back to STICKYDILJOE.COM….Thank you…**

Okay, so that night after dinner, we met up with some guys from “NO GOOD RACING”, one of Osaka’s famed Kanjo Car Clubs. They were parked along a side street by the restaurant we ate at and we were able to get a good look at their cars…

I had never seen the white EG6 previously but I was familiar with the blue EG because I had seen it before in some photos. You can look back at some old photos that I put together a couple years back that will probably give you a good idea of who used to own this car. One of the guys we were with that night that was showing us around was once a member of NO GOOD RACING but has since moved-on. This was his old Civic and he sold it to another NO GOOD member who kept it in the family….

These are probably two of the cleanest Kanjo cars you will see in Osaka. Many of them have colorful liveries or have some significant battle scars and are far from perfect. As clean as it is, it still carries with it the details of what you would find in an Osaka loop runner; minimal aero, a rear wing (This one had a J’s Racing wing), side moldings removed with the holes covered up and a number plate along the sides of each door. Many of them have vented FRP hoods and some have widened front fenders. The interiors are gutted completely and many have cages in them. Wheels vary but often times, you’ll see them mismatched as they go through tires quite a bit and need to switch to a fresh set without having to mount/dismount….

There was some excitement when we came upon these cars. We hadn’t even arrived to meet up with the whole group yet but just seeing these cars parked along a regular street in Osaka in the evening where everyone could see them was really cool. These guys lurk in the shadows usually so for them to just be out in the public was a sign of respect to us and we knew it was going to be a special night….

Love how the SSR Type-Xs look on this car and how it has almost remained unchanged over the years. Note the exhaust and how it is tucked up into the rear bumper as well. This is also a mod that you will see a lot on Kanjo builds…

The signature hand logo that signifies a NO GOOD RACING car. The hand is actually supposed to mimic a gun if you didn’t notice…. “Bang bang”….

All identities concealed, faces blurred like a vagina in a Japanese porno…

Team NO GOOD RACING, Since 1985…

After I got the shots that I needed, we set off to go meet the rest of the group….

I didn’t have any expectations going into it but was told that there would be a pretty large group of guys meeting up. I thought it would just be guys from NO GOOD but I was wrong. A bunch of Kanjozoku from NO GOOD were also joined by guys from TOPGUN RACING, CLUB WHARP, and LAW BREAK. These are just three of the infamous car clubs that roamed the Osaka highways. Many are still around like TEMPLE RACING but these are the most active in this decade…

Just a small sample of the grouping that gathered along the Osaka seaside docks in the midst of a random week night…

In the group of Civics, it was quite surprising to encounter this CF4 Accord Euro-R on Volk TE37s. You may remember seeing this car from my coverage of the Stance:Nation G Edition event from last year. It was the one that I mentioned had no door handles. Well, it is now complete. I thought it was a track car but had no idea that it was a Honda that cruised the Loop…

There was already a good-sized group but then more started to come in. Since it was in the dead of silence in the middle of the night, you could hear these cars coming from miles away. It sounded like a hoard of bees ready to swarm and attack….

Various cars from TOPGUN and NO GOOD rolled through screaming bloody hell….

The white EG6 from NO GOOD that you saw earlier on white Enkei NT03….

Primered Grey EK9 CTR from TOPGUN RACING on 15-inch Volk TE37s with meaty Yokohama Advan rubber. Note the J’s Racing fenders and center-exit exhaust….

Another unexpected sight was this crashed EG Civic from TOPGUN. Apparently he had wrecked the car in the canyons somewhere one night but just continued to drive it just as you see it with no hood, front bumper, and just one headlight…. Nothing screams “I’m down for whatever” more than just cruising through the streets in a car that had no face….

For those of you wondering, many of their graphical liveries and schemes are heavily inspired from the Japanese Group A motorsports series. While the Civics of that time were dominating on the circuit, Kanjo Racers followed suit in a similar fashion on the highways of Osaka. The EF9 you see above is a near identical replica of the old JTCC Championship-winning Idemitsu Motion EF9 Civic SiR Group A Racecar. There is also an EG that also wears this exact scheme and you can often find them together, though they are both from different factions; The EF is from TOPGUN and the EG from NO GOOD RACING….

The ones that don’t bear a resemblance to actual motorsports vehicles are done in a way to not only stand-out, but also to fool local law enforcement. When the Kanjo scene was more active and heavily populated, guys would often change their color schemes and liveries to make their cars unidentifiable to the police. Some would even change their cars up on a weekly basis to evade the police. That is another reason why you see the cars in such a raw appearance. They just didn’t care because they had to constantly change their cars anyways. They can kind of get away with it now because they aren’t being tracked by law enforcement so you will see the cars with the same schemes for months to even years….

The group continued to get bigger as the night carried on….

One of the cleanest builds that night was this EG from CLUB WHARP. It looked like the scheme had just been freshly applied. The odd-looking image on the “OKRC” number plate is actually an outline of the Osaka Loop….

This TOPGUN RACING EK made it very apparent that it was not fond of the police….

Though there may have been rivalries in the past between the various car clubs in Osaka, they all seemed to get along when they were together. Maybe the major crackdown from years ago brought them all together and united them as Kanjo Racers more than rival clubs. On some of the cars, you’d even find different car club logos on a car that was from a notable crew. This TOPGUN Civic also beared a LAW BREAK decal on it….

Upon closer inspection, it seemed to be a collaborative effort between the two crews, LAW BREAK and TOPGUN, as the “Special Brothers” logo on his license plate beared the logos of both crews together. This shows solidarity between the two clubs and expresses a mutual partnership….

Pretty cool livery on this TOPGUN EK that was emblazoned with Honda’s signature “VTEC” logo across both sides….

I thought this “ELITE GROUP” logo was bad ass. Imagine if you were a cop and chasing these guys down, staring at this logo that basically says “fuck the police” knowing that you probably couldn’t catch them….

Another shot of the CLUB WHARP EG….

One of the questions that I get asked the most and one that I was wondering myself was why are all Kanjo Racers drove Civics. I actually asked and the answer is quite interesting; They all drive Civic hatchbacks because they are very nimble cars that are light and responsive. You don’t see anyone driving an Integra or anything because they are bigger than Civics and can’t maneuver around things as easily if necessary. When I say “things”, I mean that if they had to evade the police and had to drive onto the sidewalk or any other areas that weren’t considered normal roads, a Civic could easily fit through those areas better than an Integra could. That all sounds a little crazy but we actually witnessed one of the cars drive into oncoming traffic later that night and at the point when they were about to run into other cars, it quickly darted onto the sidewalk past a 7-11 before turning onto a narrow street to catch up with the rest of the group….I swear on my life. You can’t even make shit up like that because no one would believe it. We didn’t either until this guy was driving on the sidewalk like it was a regular thing!….

A more simple answer would be that the Civics they use have responsive chassis’ that were perfect for the tight corners of sections of the Osaka Loop…

A really clean EF build from TOPGUN RACING on silver SSR Type-X…

Another interesting story that was told to us by a former NO GOOD RACING member was the secret code of owning a Civic in Osaka. These cars were so revered in Osaka at one point that car enthusiasts had to literally ask for permission from Kanjo racers to own one. It was automatically assumed that if you owned a Civic and planned to mod it in Osaka, you were expected to run the loop or be a Kanjo guy. If you weren’t and just up and bought a Civic without abiding by this unspoken rule, you’d likely get your Civic taken away from you. Things are significantly different now in this decade of course but you have to remember that not all these guys were the most legitimate, law-abiding folks. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see someone have their Civic stolen and see it reappear weeks later as someone else’s toy on the Loop….

We didn’t encounter any TEMPLE RACING cars that night but I did see their club logo on one of the cars. I’m not entirely sure how active TEMPLE even is anymore in the Kanjo racing scene. From the photos that I’ve seen recently, it appears that some of them have transformed their cars into full track builds and only race on the circuit now….

I absolutely loved this TOPGUN RACING hoodie that all the TOPGUN members were wearing….

LOOP SOLDIER, Since 1984….

They were all gathered together and chatting so I had our friend translate so they could line-up for a photo. This turned-out to be one of my favorite shots from that night. It could be a photo taken at any point in any decade from 1984 to 2014 and it would represent the same thing…

The cleanest Civic that night was probably this white EG from BRUSHUP. It didn’t actually run the loop but looked to be there just as a support vehicle to check out the festivities….

Really liked this NO GOOD RACING EG with its orange accents and SSR Type-C wheels…

Another common theme that you see with all these Kanjo cars is that they all utilize window nets. Unlike actual competition cars that use them for safety, they use these Nascar style nets more as ways to further protect their identities from law enforcement and onlookers. They all wear masks of course but the nets help to distort possible identifiable facial features. One of the old NO GOOD members that was actually captured and who went to jail for a period of time because of their exploits running the Osaka Loop mentioned that he was caught even after wearing a mask. There’s no such thing as a “sure thing” when protecting one’s identity so it was a further reminder to obscure all faces and any mention of names…

One of the NO GOOD RACING guys saw that we were taking photos so he decided to do some posing for us. It was one of the photos of him that ended up being another favorite shot of mine and I didn’t even capture it on my dSLR….

…it was captured on my phone and I just processed it in a way to make it look like a really old, gritty photo. Again, like the TOPGUN shot, it could have been taken at any point within the last 3 decades and it would still represent the same thing….

Another row of Civics parked near the group that I initially captured…

The whole gathering was a great opportunity for photos and to see these cars in person, but the main reason why we gathered was because we were waiting for a man that is considered the “Kanjo King” in Osaka who is the head of NO GOOD RACING. He was still prepping his car and out of respect to him, nobody would run the Osaka Loop on that night until he arrived….

Our group got increasingly larger with some more cars to come so it was decided that we would move to another location to await the arrival of the “King”….

It was incredible to see all these guys cruise together on the streets and it was obvious that it was a special moment for them as well to all be united again….

The tunnel provided a moment in time that I don’t think I’ll forget for a very long time. Just to hear them rumble like an angry swarm of bees was enough to make my entire trip worthwhile…

Here’s some short clips of the cruise that both Der and I captured…

I apologize if the photos and videos aren’t the greatest but its either we have crappy vids and photos or nothing at all, you take your pick, haha…

Here is the NO GOOD RACING EG that wears the classic Idemitsu Motion livery…

Eventually, we arrived at a secluded street in an unknown location in Osaka to await the arrival of the “Kanjo King”….

NO GOOD RACING….

At one point you could kind of notice how angry a truck driver was to see these guys on the street. Maybe he had some flashbacks when he saw these guys terrorizing the highways because he drove full speed right at one of the cars that was in his way like he was purposely trying to run him over. It is very rare to see this type of behavior from Japanese men who are usually very calm and reserved. It was a weird but memorable moment that night….

Here is a glimpse into the inside of one of these Kanjo-bred Civics. They are all pretty similar in that they are all gutted bear with a bolt-in cage and bucket seats. Nothing really showy about it as it is just assembled for function…

If you ever wondered what these cars had going on under the hood, I think you’d be kind of disappointed to see that there isn’t a whole lot. Most of them run B16A or B18C engines and everything else is pretty much stock other than a header and intake. As I said before, these cars were never built for power or speed. It is more important to them that the cars remain well-balanced so that they can make the most out of the chassis more so than the motor. That and you also have to consider that these cars can be lost at any time, whether it be by the police taking the cars away or by an unforeseen accident. It just makes sense to just keep the motors the way they are. A B-series motor is more than enough to get you around the loop. There are a couple of K-swapped cars but it is really rare to see, especially in the Kanjo racing world… Make note of the EF bay above with the VIN plate and firewall numbers completely cut-out. This isn’t common with the others but I noticed this one had it all removed…

Another EF engine bay, I believe this was the TOPGUN Idemitsu-themed Civic. Again, nothing crazy and far from any of the tucked showcar bays you see out here. These engine bays weren’t made to be looked at and if you got a glance at them, they probably have some form of trust in you to even let you be that close to their cars…

This spot here where we stopped was our first official encounter with the Osaka Police. Someone must have seen the gathering and reported it to the police because a single police vehicle rolled-up and sort of ushered us out of the area. They weren’t aggressive or anything and in true Japanese fashion, sort of just asked us to leave because we shouldn’t be gathered there. It wasn’t a big deal but the moment those sirens came on, it was like the old street racing days where you got into your car as fast as you could and made a break for it. Everything seemed like it was just a short amount of time we were gathered together but we were out there for a couple of hours. The King was fashionably late and our contact made a couple calls to him and he just let us know that he was taking care of some stuff before he could make it out. There is an aura of mystery around him like everyone else there but he seemed to be a very unique character…

After the police came and told us to leave, we all separated for a while into separate groups until whatever heat there was died down. Some cars took off and never came back, some stopped at a local 7-11 to hang out, and others just dispersed into other smaller groups until the call was made to reconvene. During that time, we met up with the Kanjo King himself. I actually have quite a bit more video than what you have seen before of moments that we captured during the trip but after going through them multiple times, I came to the conclusion that it was just to risky to present them to the world. Some of our GO-PRO footage even has some faces in plain sight along with some viewable plates. Though they are temporary plates, it is still risky to be able to see all the details of them because they could possibly be traced back. When we got footage of the meeting with the Kanjo King, I had to trim it down significantly to make any of it usable…

As an example, here is a screen grab of one of the videos on my computer that I couldn’t use. albeit with the important stuff blurred…

I’m not proficient enough with video editing and honestly, the video isn’t that great anyways, so some of this stuff will just be saved for my private collection…

The car you see in the video in blue is the EK that belongs to the one they call the Kanjo King. You saw his car last year as well in my Japan Trip coverage. The car hasn’t changed in years so it wasn’t a surprise to see that it looked as it did before. The white EK9 Civic Type R is from LAW BREAK. The shop that put that car together also has a K-swapped EK9 that runs the Kanjo but we unfortunately did not encounter that car on that evening. Once the King arrived, it was time to prepare for our parade lap through Osaka before hitting the famed Loop….

Here is a better look at the Kanjo King’s EK. If you watched the JDM Insider special on Kanjo Racing from almost ten years ago, you will probably spot this car in the video looking exactly how you see it now. The owner is actually in his early 40’s and has an unquestionable amount of respect in this world since he has been running the Osaka Loop for two decades. He is one of the few that continued to stick around after the massive crackdown and that is probably why he is so revered. I didn’t have any means of communicating with him since he didn’t speak English but our encounters have always been good. He was even nice enough to give us a whole batch of rare NO GOOD RACING decals for us to take home….

Considering how good the car looks, it makes you wonder how many times it has been redone. It’s retained the same livery over the years which means he either hasn’t been caught, or he’s not worried about the police because he can get away from them. Running the Loop for 20 years will give you a bit of confidence in evading whatever and whoever you need to….

Check out the rear bumper cut-outs and the widened fenders up front….

Also notice this custom rear piece that helps to block the license plate from view….

The King is the mysterious face of the NO GOOD RACING team as well as a representative of Osaka Kanjo both past and present…

The other face of Osaka Kanjo is the mask you see above. We know it as the “Jason” mask from the horror flicks but to the Japanese, this is an image that is synonymous with Osaka Loop runners. The mask not only protects their identity, but also creates a bit of a menacing, intimidating, appearance….

Unfortunately, these are easy to come by because they are very common. Now every kid that gets a hold of one of these masks and drives a Civic and claim to be a Kanjo racer by taking a selfie with the mask on and hashtagging “#kanjo” on their Instagram accounts….

My favorite of the evening had to be the LAW BREAK EK9 from IMPACT. It was just so clean with the C-West front bumper, and the mismatched Volk CE28s and white Kosei wheels up front. Don’t quote me on this but during our runs later when the Kanjo King wasn’t around, the owner of this car took the reigns of the entire group so he might be the next in line or equally revered as the King…

BATTLE TEAM LAW BREAK…. Love the stick of dynamite used in their logo….

Red EK that cruised with the group of four that included the Kanjo King….

And the EG that you got a glimpse of last year during our first encounter with the Kanjozoku….

Here’s the engine bay of the LAW BREAK CTR….I was hoping they would pop the hood and a K would be under there, haha…

Now, this is where we get to the good stuff…Hopefully you thought most of the other stuff you saw above is good but this is the stuff you probably want to see more than anything….

After some photos, it was time to gather the entire group for a parade lap through the streets of Osaka. Before all this happened, I always thought that these guys just went straight to the Loop to run but that is not the case. Since they had everyone together, it became sort of a celebration and we just mobbed the streets…

The videos you will see below are shaky but please try to take it all in and study everything that is going on. Make note of the environment and what they are doing…

You’ll notice that they act as if traffic lights do not even exist and just use the streets as their playground. What they are doing and driving is already “illegal” so you might as well just do whatever you want (within reason of course)….You will also see that some of the guys decided to take a drive on the other side of the road. This was the point when I mentioned that we saw one of the cars drive onto a sidewalk and blast off into the night before reappearing in front of us….

I told you, this shit is crazy and a little unbelievable. Again DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. Don’t put your life at risk just because you want to call yourself a “Kanjo Racer”. In reality the only loops you’ll be running are the ones where you put both wrists through them when you’re getting locked up in jail…

This view right here… Priceless…I still couldn’t believe we were in the midst of what is going on. I mean, this is sacred coverage right here. Even if you mutter the words “Kanjo” to some of our other friends from Japan that live in Osaka, they won’t even speak of it because it carries with it some very negative connotations. During my stay in Japan, this was like eating raw beef, horse, chicken, anything else I wouldn’t try anywhere else. It was a “You only live once” type of scenario and we just said “fuck it, let’s do this”….

As I’m typing this right now, I just got this message from a buddy of mine from Japan…

“I’m glad you know how sacred the tradition is and that you’re censoring a lot of stuff. I think a lot of other people in the industry don’t have that type of censorship or understanding that some things are best left untouched. Some people don’t deserve to see what you saw…”

And I hope you guys understand how sacred this stuff is as well. It’s not everyday we can dive into this world and see what we all get to see today. Please be respectful and don’t exploit my work or what these guys have taken decades to create….

What is being explained to us in the video above in Japanese is that we were entering the “not so safe” part of Osaka aka “the ghetto”, if such exists in Japan. It didn’t matter where it was we mobbed right through it like we owned the place….

This was one of the craziest things that happened. Once we got to this part of Osaka, there were actually other cars on the street and light traffic going both directions. The group then decided to stop in the middle of a crowded intersection and got out to take pictures!! It was insane. Everyone who wasn’t involved with the Kanjo racers just kind of froze in their tracks and watched it all happen. Not only that, the owner of the LAW BREAK EK9 even got out of the car and started dancing in the intersection, haha….

If there was a shot that put our entire experience into one photo, it just might be the incredible capture that Der got when we were driving alongside all the Kanjozoku. This is the TOPGUN RACING EK on the other side of the road driving into oncoming traffic while the passenger was taking a picture… Just pure insanity….

Eventually, we made our way onto the highway. I wish I could have captured the actual Kanjo action but our chase car just could not keep up with them. We spent the rest of the night/early morning just circling the loop and watching everything happen. Once the cars got onto the Loop, you couldn’t even find them. They were so fast that they all didn’t even stay in a group together. Guys separated into packs and just ran the Loop the entire time…

If you’re wondering what happened to the Kanjo King and why you don’t see him in any of the videos, we actually lost him during the parade lap through Osaka because he had to stop to use the bathroom, haha. Again, you can’t even make this stuff up. The guy is older and has other things to worry about, what can I say? He didn’t end up on the Loop though and was mobbing with everyone else but we couldn’t find him….

I did however, catch some of the other guys on the highway…

They do that weaving back and forth a lot because it not only is a driving technique of theirs, but it also helps to warm up their tires for better grip. Remember that the weather isn’t exactly warm in Japan during the winter, especially during those hours so it helped to keep the tires hot and sticky….

After some time on the loop, we did eventually run into the police. They circled the loop a couple times too but it was actually only one police officer the entire time. Over the years, they cracked down on Kanjo racing so hard that it almost killed the entire concept of it. Since this was a rare night when these cars were on the Loop again, I don’t think they made too big a deal of it. They just roamed the highway and tried to chase the cars away so that they would just go home or something. Eventually the cop just gave up and pulled over on the side of the highway to try to capture photos of the cars possibly for their records….That or maybe the cop was a fan as well and wanted to get some rare footage…

This was the last encounter that we saw with the police that evening. The three Civics were just toying with him and turned off their lights and just cruised up to the police car before turning their headlights on right behind it and blasting by….

As far as photos go, that was about it. I just put everything away and just embraced the moment and watched it all happen. We eventually called it a night and decided to go home as the Kanjozoku continued to run the Loop. It was a remarkable experience that left us all a little dumbfounded…

Below you will find some GO-PRO footage that we captured that night. It is about 20 minutes long and could have been longer had we not run out of memory card space. I know what you’re thinking… “why didn’t you put the GO-PRO on one of the Kanjo cars?”…well that’s simple, we weren’t entirely sure that we would even get the fucking thing back if we did. Whose to say that shit wouldn’t have flown off or if one of the guys got caught by the police. We had no idea what we were getting into so we didn’t even try. The group dispersed so quickly that it was almost certain that we would never see the camera again so it was best to just keep it on our chase car. If we ever do this again, I’ll try to be more prepared, but that is a big “IF” because we just don’t know if we can get a group like this together again….

This is all a lot to take in for all of you, especially for those who have no idea what Osaka Kanjo is all about. I hope that I have presented it to you in the appropriate way to both give you the information that is important, while still remaining completely respectful to the Osaka Kanjozoku that were kind enough to bring us along on this incredible ride. I don’t think I need to remind you guys anymore to not attempt to replicate this stuff at home because it just wouldn’t work. Trust me, being someone who has been all over the country and other parts of the world and has experienced car culture from all angles, this just isn’t something that should be done in America or anywhere else outside of Osaka, Japan…

I did it more as a cultural study on something that we all wanted to know more about that has to do with one of the many layers of history that exist in the Japanese tuning world. There isn’t a whole lot of content and information out there but maybe this will eventually become the place marker for people to come to if they want to learn about it. Hopefully I have done it justice…

This is a special day folks. I don’t know if many of you understand the gravity of what you have seen today. For those who took the time to read through the entire thing, I thank you for looking and for understanding. This was a labor of love that often left me torn at nights because I wasn’t sure if I wanted to even put it together. Thank you to everyone involved who made this possible and who put themselves out there to risk everything so that we could have this. Thank you to NO GOOD RACING, CLUB WHARP, TOPGUN RACING, LAW BREAK, and the other Kanjozokus for helping and for carrying on a tradition that is an essential part of Osaka’s legendary tuning culture…

If there is one thing to take away from all this, it is this quote…

“There’s just something so poetic about a culture that is so secretive that screams so loudly in the way their cars are assembled and driven….”

That’s a wrap. Thank you.

I’ve been presented with many great opportunities in my life. For the most part, I think I deserve it because I work incredibly hard. People say I’m “lucky” to do what I do but honestly, I mean, this is a result of the work I’ve put in over the years. There are things that I’ve seen that some would never believe and I’m proud to be able to bring you some of this content because you won’t likely see it anywhere else. I love documenting car culture all over and anytime I am able to get something good from Japan, you better believe I’m going to bring it to you guys in full detail. One of the incredibly rare doors that opened up a couple years ago was a gateway into the mysterious underground culture of the Osaka Kanjozoku. I did a piece on it a couple months back and it was mostly met with great acclaim, but of course, anytime there is success, you will have your detractors. I went into it knowing that it was a polarizing topic because not everyone is going to agree with what they saw. On paper, it is illegal street racing at (probably) it’s most extreme and it is something that many car enthusiasts in Osaka won’t even speak of. There is a lot of speculation behind exactly what goes on after hours but it is most speculation and little truth. Anytime you have something dangerous and illegal, most people will only assume things because they won’t even touch it in fear of getting caught-up. Being that I know certain individuals in Osaka, I was placed in a very advantageous position to document the activities of the Kanjozoku. I didn’t do it to promote illegal activities whatsoever and I don’t think I have ever said anything that would lead people to believe that. I am merely putting everything at risk simply to document a cultural activity in a part of Japan where Hondas reign supreme. When I first did the Kanjo piece for The Chronicles, I was told that it was something that not everyone deserved to see, and up until now, I still firmly believe that. It isn’t for everyone and not everyone will understand it. I am in it solely to collect information and to cover a world that is often misunderstood. All I can do is provide a perspective to the world, what you do with it is your own prerogative…

With that said, some will see it and perceive it incorrectly and somehow convince themselves that they too are “Kanjo Racers”. Let me re-iterate that YOU ARE NOT A KANJO RACER. Anything that you even do to mimic the activity will not make you a Kanjozoku. You do not live their lifestyle, you do not put yourselves in risk for the same reasons they do, and obviously, you do not live in Osaka and/or drive on the Osaka Loop. Please stop while you’re ahead and sit back so you can appreciate it for what it is; an activity specifically for Kanjo hobbyists in Osaka, Japan…

Today, I’m proud to show you guys something entirely new. Instead of the Kanjozoku ripping through traffic in the early morning hours and parading through the streets, I’m offering you a look at these guys running their cars in a more conventional venue; the track. Over the years, many of the Kanjozoku have taken their driving expertise to the circuit where they can race legally. Some still do run the streets but many more have decided run the circuit where their inspirations first lead to the creation of the Kanjo community over three decades ago. LAW BREAK is a Kanjo car club that is now celebrating their 30th anniversary in 2014. To commemorate this glorious occasion, they decided to organize an event where all can celebrate. They wanted it to be at a location where they would be undisturbed by local law enforcement so they organized a track event and meet at Motorland Suzuka. This event not only allowed for all these guys to gather in a safe environment, but also for a spirited circuit competition. You probably had no idea, but many of these guys actually track their cars. Just because you don’t see it, it doesn’t mean that it isn’t happening. Many just continue to run the Loop for fun and to preserve their culture….

The meet was welcome to all and enthusiasts who were into both drifting, Boso bikes, and everything in-between were invited to attend. If you’re wondering, LAW BREAK is still a very highly-respected car club within the Kanjozoku circles. In fact, the head of LAW BREAK is actually one of the most vocal about the culture and you’ll soon get to hear from him in a video piece put together exclusively by BOWLS LA. The guy has some information that you’ll definitely be interested in knowing and though he is an older Honda enthusiast, he is still very much in-tune with what is going on globally in the Honda community….

Congratulations to LAW BREAK for 30 great years and here is to many more. Thank you for preserving original Osaka street car culture and pushing tradition forward in 2014.

In Part 1 below, we’re going to check-out the early morning hours of the event and the set-up before the actual competition took place. Enjoy…

LAW BREAK 30TH ANNIVERSARY

PHOTOS BY YASUTAKA SHIMOMUKAI

POST-PROCESSING & WORDS BY STICKYDILJOE

The guys from Tactical Art decided to check out the event so they met up early in the morning hours to caravan to Motorland Suzuka…

You wouldn’t think that this clean EF9 Civic was a loop runner but it actually is…

…If you remember my last visit with the Kanjozoku, this EF9 was not only out on the Loop, it was probably one of the quickest and most aggressive….

Arrival at Motorland Suzuka. Design-Studio-Shin was the company that was called upon to not only design the artwork for the LAW BREAK 30th Anniversary event flyer, but also to design the exclusive t-shirts for it…

Yasu’s HKS Supercharged S2000 from Tactical Art and the EF9 from NO GOOD…

It is incredibly rare to have any sort of apparel available to the public that has a Kanjo car club logo or anything related to their existence but being that it was their 30th anniversary, event-goers were able to purchase this limited-run of LAW BREAK t-shirts…

LAW BREAK’s EK9 Civic Type R, not to be confused with the LAW BREAK EK9 that you saw in January with the C-West front bumper….

This one retains the factory EK9 CTR front but with Shift Sports fenders that have been widened considerably. Also really dig the SSR Type-C in the rear and the Volk TE37 up front. This is almost as good of a pairing as Volk TE/CE together….

Speaking of which, one of my favorites from this event was this yellow EK4 Civic SiR….on bronze Volk CE28 and TE37 in the rear. Just a lovely combo especially in bronze on the yellow body…

The EK9 unloaded and ready for some track duty…

The EK9 with a giant LAW BREAK sticker in Kanji plastered across the rear window….

…and the exclusive LAW BREAK 30th Anniversary decal. Luckily my friends in Japan were able to score me a couple of these decals and some t-shirts….

What was surprising about the LAW BREAK EK9 was the K20 engine swap under the hood. It is really rare to see K-swaps in Japan, especially on a loop vehicle…

Engine swap executed by tuning shop, Impact Magic….

The Sparco wheel inside the EK9 looks like it has seen better days, unless there is a specific reason why it was done otherwise…

Traditional Bosozoku motorcycle….

On the back of the high-bolstered seat are traditional Boso bike club decals…

After the EK9 was brought down, it was time to unload the yellow SiR…

LAW BREAK EK9 and EK4….

It was an honor for the owner (who shall remain nameless) to put a STICKYDILJOE.COM decal on the LAW BREAK EK9. I had no idea he was going to do this so I was stoked to see it…

The LAW BREAK EK4 is also another car that was prepped by Impact Magic…

Racepak/Haltech digital display replaces the factory instrument cluster…

B-series motor with individual throttle bodies and coil-over-plug conversion….

Such a good look….

The 30th Anniversary track day event was Civic heaven….

Legit, authentic, NO GOOD RACING hooded sweatshirt, not to be confused with that knock-off fake shit that is sold by some random guy in the U.K. We actually asked some of the NO GOOD RACING guys how they felt about seeing their logo (or the fake wanna be NGR logo no less) being sold by someone who is not at all associated with them in another country. They are definitely not happy about it and hope that they never run into the guy if/when he ever visits Osaka…

LAW BREAK hoodie that was also available for purchase at the event….

A couple of NO GOOD members getting together for a rare photo….

NGR Kanjozoku…

What was cool about this particular event was that it had a little bit of everything; legit track cars, Kanjo racers, drift cars, and Boso bikes…

EK from NO GOOD on black Volk Racing wheels…

Another K-swapped Civic, this one an EG circuit racer with aggressive front aero….

LAW BREAK members getting ready to go out for their first session…

D1 Street Legal drift S13 Silvia on Rays Gram Lights….

A couple of beautiful S30Zs even made an appearance at the LAW BREAK event…

Swag level 999+…..

Wish I could tell you more about these bikes but unfortunately, I do not know a whole lot about them…

EG6 Civic from NO GOOD RACING…

Rare to see these guys in the daylight but its good that they were cool with taking photos…

NO GOOD logo exposed with the license plate flipped up on the tailgate….

A quick glimpse inside the EG and its single racing bucket….

Gotta Ziptie the bumper on just to keep everything in place….

“Enjoy Driving With NO GOOD….”

EK9 Civic Type R from NO GOOD with widened front fenders and SSR Type-C up front…

Idemitsu Motion-themed EG6 from NO GOOD that you’ve seen a few times before….

The Kanjozoku head-out to the track for their first session…

Carmake Across EF9 Civic SiR from CLUB WHARP. You’ll be seeing a lot more of this car later in Part 2 since it played a prominent-role in this event….

Another white EK9 CTR from LAW BREAK….

The EG Civic that you saw earlier….

LAW BREAK really loves their CTRs….

And we’re gonna cut it off here for today with a very big announcement below…

As some of you may have seen already, I have been a creative consultant for a huge Kanjozoku docu-piece that is being produced by BOWLS LA. It features all new footage that has never been seen before, as well as some great information provided by the Kanjozoku themselves. This is unprecedented footage that will not, and cannot, be seen anywhere else. I promise you, it’ll change your way of looking at things after hearing what they have to say. Even those who hate on the Kanjozoku will probably even have a better understanding of these guys after you hear what they have to say. It is incredibly rare to see these guys even speak because they are such a secretive group of enthusiasts that choose to remain in the shadows. We were lucky enough to be presented with the opportunity to capture all this content for you guys and I hope you take the time to enjoy it…

We wanted to present it in the right way so BOWLS LA and I have decided to dedicate a media hub specifically for this piece, titled “The Kanjozoku” (www.thekanjozoku.com), where you will be able to view this video as well as further articles about Osaka’s famed Loop Soldiers. The video is near completion and there are just a couple of things we need to finish before it is released. Please take the time to get on a PC or desktop computer to view the site in its original format. You won’t regret it. Looking at it on a Smartphone just doesn’t do it justice. Check it out now and let us know what you think! Full video will be released on 7/14/14!!!

CLICK BELOW FOR YOUR FIRST LOOK AT THE NEW SITE!!!

The Kanjozoku *NEW* 
The Kanjozoku *NEW* 
The Kanjozoku *NEW* 
The Kanjozoku *NEW* 
The Kanjozoku *NEW* 

For the last couple of months, I’ve been working closely with Brandon from BOWLS FILMS and Jonathan Wong (Former Editor-In-Chief of Super Street magazine) on a once-in-a-lifetime video piece documenting the ever-mysterious underground Kanjo racing subculture from Osaka, Japan. I had done a huge piece on it after my visit to Japan earlier this year, but this video piece would be the epitome of all you would ever NEED to know about the Kanjozoku. I put emphasis on the word “need” because well, it really isn’t anything that you should know too much about. First of all, this subculture is so shrouded in mystery that even the newer generation of car enthusiasts from Osaka do not even know about it. The mystery doesn’t come because the Kanjozoku died off and people just forgot about them. It is a relative unknown to many because it was done so purposely because many in Osaka did not want anyone else to know about it. For the ones that do know about it, they don’t really like to talk about it. Many times, they will even pretend to not know just so you don’t speak of them anymore. There are some individuals from the past who were heavily involved in this underground world that your average everyday Japanese wouldn’t exactly call “good people”. I myself do not want to speak too much about it but there are definitely some things that I have been told in confidence that I wouldn’t even repeat…

The more Brandon and I got into this project, we were told by some in Japan to please be careful, and to be weary of what exactly we are expressing to the rest of the world. There are some things that are better left unsaid and we definitely understood that. We weren’t profiting at all from doing this and there are no investors involved, so we could have easily stopped. The reason why we continued to push forward with this is because it is a true passion project for us. We cast a spotlight on this world for you guys to see because we think that it is an important part of the development of today’s car culture worldwide. The point of this whole thing was never to promote “street racing” or any sort of illegal activity. We knew that all along going into this. It is the history that we want to showcase and the passion that these men possess for their hobby. We didn’t want to get involved with anything more than that. I didn’t want to know anything about their personal lives or what they do outside of the Osaka Loop. The less we knew the better in that aspect because we respected their privacy. All we wanted to do was to capture the essence of why they loved what they loved and why they continue to put everything at risk, especially for the guys who have been in it for a long period of time. At the end of the day, when you strip it all down, I think we all want to have a better understanding of why we do what we do. That love, the drive to do anything that you feel is important…that is what I am after. Anybody can show you car shit from anywhere in the world. Social media has dictated that anyone can be a “photographer” these days. The story, the MEANING, is what is the pinnacle. You can show anyone anything and they can assume whatever they want. If you can tell them a story and light some sort of fire inside of them, and help them understand something that they didn’t understand before, fuck man, that is an incredible thing….

For the Kanjozoku, I believe that story is coming. I’ve done my part to explain the logistics to you guys and give you a glimpse into their world, but what you will see next week is unprecedented. At last, we can finally hear from the major players involved and you will not only understand their passion, but it’ll teach you something about Japanese car culture that you probably had no idea about before. We knew going into this what was at risk, and we’ve done our best to protect those involved. We also knew about the dangers and those who have asked us on multiple times to stay away, and as of now, this may be the last time we ever touch on this topic. I don’t think the world should see anymore of this and whatever else I do in the future I will probably keep for my own eyes. There is a lack of understanding and a lack of appreciation for the Kanjozoku and its history, and hopefully that changes after our project is revealed next week. If not, then it’ll be buried back in the shadows where many believe it belongs. For what its worth, I was honored and proud to have been invited into this secret world. There are some over here in the States who have made it a purpose to hate or make fun of anything related to this topic, and by all means, it is a free country, “do you”. By that same token, you’re still looking though, and spending time out of your day to waste your time belittling our efforts. That speaks to your lack of understanding and maybe you need to better devote your time to improving yourself, rather than to waste your energy. We are not hear to worry about the least common denominator.

We did it for the love of it, because we cared about it.

To check out the media hub that we have created to showcase our forthcoming video piece, appropriately titled “The Kanjozoku”, please click the link below.

THE KANJOZOKU
THE KANJOZOKU
THE KANJOZOKU

The site features the trailer as well as some small stories related to it. Next week when the video releases on the 14th, we will also have some new stories for you to read thanks to Japanese car culture guru, Mike Garrett. There are basically three guys who have been specifically invited into this world who have been allowed to document it and to produce content for it; that is Brandon from BOWLS, Mike Garrett from Speedhunters, and myself. Anything that you’re getting that is media-related or stories that you hear/read otherwise are from third-party sources. Be weary of what you read from these sources because they have not been verified. WE are the direct sources and I’m happy to have all of us together to present this the right way…

Today, we’re going to finish off some coverage that I worked on detailing the LAW BREAK 30th Anniversary Event. It was a track day event that was organized by the group and was held at Motorland Suzuka. The first section covered the set-up of the event but Part 2 has more of the “action” and gets more into the core of the event…

Here’s the link to Part 1 just in case you missed it:

LAW BREAK 30th Anniversary Coverage…Part 1…

LAW BREAK 30TH ANNIVERSARY

PHOTOS BY YASUTAKA SHIMOMUKAI

POST-PROCESSING & WORDS BY STICKYDILJOE

And now we continue with the rest of the photos from the 30th Anniversary Celebration…

Before the actual track competition could take place, everyone got together for a group photo along with supporters…

EF9 SiR Civic wearing traditional Mugen colors….

Behind-the-scenes look as the group gathered for the photo-op…

…and this was the result. The shot was actually published in a Japanese magazine as well…

My buddy Yasu actually sent me the magazine as well. You can see the photo at the top corner of this spread. Now, you may be wondering what type of publication in Japan provides Kanjo coverage and I too wondered the same thing. I don’t know exactly what it is but let’s just say that there were a lot of blurred-out faces, some naked Japanese females, and other assorted, not so legal activities…. *wink wink*….At first I thought he just tossed the magazine in the box as cushioning for the other stuff that he sent me but sure enough, I looked through it and found a 4-page spread that documented the Law Break 30th Anniversary event…

After the quick photo session, it was time for a quick parade lap to showcase the cars participating and then the track competition would begin…

The EF9 that you saw above…

Another EF9 SiR, this one prepped by tuning shop, REAL Company, and representing old school TEMPLE RACING family…

LAW BREAK EK9 Civic Type R…

Idemitsu Motion x BRUSHUP Auto Works EG6 Civic from NO GOOD RACING….

LAW BREAK K20 EK9….

A group of traditional Bosozoku motorbikes from LATE RISER….

One of the vehicles on display at the Work Wheels Japan booth was this custom Mercedes Benz from K’s BPA rocking aggressive Work Meister S1R wheels. If you want to see more shots of this car, simply Google Image Search “K’s BPA Benz”. You’ll see shots of it from J.C. of Work Wheels. It’s definitely not to everyone’s tastes but it’s a pretty detailed build. You gotta see the rest of it from other angles…

Carmake Across’ EF9 Civic SiR from CLUB WHARP/WHARP RACING….

I don’t know how many of you reading are aware, but the Kanjozoku have quite a rich history and many of the brands that you see in our tuning industry today have roots in Osaka’s underground street car culture. Junction Produce, probably one of the most globally-recognized Japanese VIP companies, is one of them. They too started out with Hondas and it is a rare sight today, but there are still some Kanjozoku around that still rep the original Junction Produce Racing signage on their vehicles…

Above is a photo of two of the Junction Produce EF Civics from a Osaka car show back in 2010….

Flared S30Z Fairlady cruising the lot…

The Boso/Yanki subculture has always been a big part of Osaka’s history. What many do not know is that female motorcycle gangs were just as big as male tribes at one point. Here are two Japanese ladies dressed in traditional Boso garb. Not something we’re used to seeing and because of its outrageousness, we tend to not take it seriously, but hey, this is culture. Just because it isn’t our culture, it doesn’t make it any less significant….

J’s Racing widebody S2000 from Impact Magic….

Bosozoku cruise around the track at Motorland Suzuka. Helmets optional….

This NO GOOD RACING EG Civic should be pretty familiar to you by now if you’ve followed my coverage of the Kanjozoku culture up to this point…

Unfortunately, I do not have much usable video from this event but Yasu was able to get some pretty good shots of the cars once the friendly competition began. Below is a short clip of what he was able to capture on video. I think he stopped getting video because he was worried about memory card space….

Looks like the NGR Idemitsu-themed Civic has seen some body damage since the last time I saw it in January…

NO GOOD RACING EG dipping through a turn at Motorland….

One of the three/four Civic Type Rs from LAW BREAK…

Of all the photos that I’ve seen online over time, this EG from BRUSHUP is probably the one I see the most on the track regularly…

WHARP RACING EF9….

More NO GOOD…

ACROSS EF9….

The yellow SiR from LAW BREAK ran into some issues towards the end of the day….

Impact AP1 S2000…

Individual throttle bodies…

Enkei RPF1 and Project Mu big brake kit under J’s Racing wide fenders….

Love how unequivocally Japanese the CLUB WHARP EF9 looks. Like, there would be no doubt as to where this build came from. Same goes for the WHARP decals. They are so cheesy but so Japanese and so great, haha…

Lunch time….

Some guys weren’t so fortunate on the track that day and went home with some repairs that needed to be addressed….

LAW BREAK K-EK9 doing work…

LAW BREAK EG….

One of the cars that I wanted to see more of was the ZEROFIGHTER EG. Unfortunately, this was the only shot I was able to find…

As expected, the K-powered Civic from LAW BREAK ended-up being one of the fastest cars of the day…

The Garage Kiyotaki K20 EG is not a Kanjo runner, but did race with the rest of the Kanjozoku that day….

Loved the simplicity of the black EG6 SiR-II

At the end of the day, the competition narrowed down to the LAW BREAK EK and WHARP RACING EF9…

The two then lined-up…

…and the final run began…

The race was close up until the point when the LAW BREAK car eventually spun-out. The translation was rough but I think something happened mechanically…

…which paved the way for the WHARP RACING EF to take the win….

After it completed the lap to seal the win, the EF returned to the paddock, celebrated by those in attendance….

The spin-out caused the front bumper to rip off so fellow LAW BREAK members came out to assist in repairing it before the car was taken off the track…

Group photo of the LAW BREAK family along with friends from WHARP…

Congrats to CLUB WHARP for the win…

After the competition ended, some of the guys got back on the track for some free runs….

Love how the SSR Type-C looks on the front of this EK9…

One final shot of the NGR EG…

That’s a wrap. Hope you guys enjoyed it. Thanks to Yasu for the captures and thanks to all for looking…

Make sure to head on over to THEKANJOZOKU.COM and check out the collaborative effort between BOWLS LA and I. The video piece that has been so long-awaited is finally in its finally stages and drops on that site 7/14/14!! Don’t miss it!!

Part 7 of 8 covers the Phaze2 x Autofasion Night Meeting at the Universal Studios Japan parking lot. We set up this meet prior to our trip to Wekfest to celebrate the thriving automotive car community that exists in Osaka, Japan. The show was open to everyone and for cars of all styles and makes. We went into the event not expecting much but the turnout was just far from anything we could have ever imagined. The entire lot was filled and we ended up with around 1300+ cars at the event. It was incredible. I apologize that the footage isn’t as in-depth as I would have liked but most of the meet was in the dark so it was hard to capture everything. It was one of those moments when I wanted to enjoy what we had put together more so than trying to capture everything possible. With that said, enjoy what we caught and thanks to all those who came out to check out the event.

The Chronicles Vlog #7 is a series of videos documenting my journey back to Japan in preparation for the annual Wekfest Japan event. I was asked to return to Japan a few days earlier than I had originally scheduled to help out the guys over at Tactical Art. They were finishing up some cars and preparing for the event and it was important that I be there early to help. I decided to document the entire thing so that you can see what goes on prior to WFJP as well as after. This is essentially every day life in Japan as we prepared for the big event.

*The beauty of these videos is that they are completely free and you are not forced to watch them. If you do not like what you see, simply close the window and move along with your life. No one is forcing you to watch them. Thanks.

For those who do enjoy them, I appreciate the support.

*I am not a videographer and this wasn’t meant to be a visual masterpiece of any sort. I am merely capturing bits and pieces of my life for you guys to see.

Some of the people that are in this video who have Instagram accounts:

StickyDilJoe (@stickydiljoe)
Dougie Salguero (@phaze2dougie_frezh)
Yasutaka Shimomukai (@phaze2_yasu)
Ryan Der (@ryan.der)
Chuy Navarro (@dpk_chuy)
Fucking Salem (@simplysalem)
Kazuya Kawashima (@phaze2_kazu)
Tomoyuki Sasaki (@phaze2_tomo)
Keisuke Morita (@phaze2_keisuke)

MAKE SURE TO SUBSCRIBE TO MY CHANNEL FOR FUTURE VLOGS!! I got plenty of interesting stuff coming for you guys to watch!

WWW.STICKYDILJOE.COM
WWW.NORIVALNOEQUAL.COM

By now, many of you will have been all caught-up on the newest Vlog series covering our trek to Japan. The most recent episode covers one of the many highlights from the trip; the Phaze2 x Autofashion Night Meet, held in the private parking lot of Universal Studios Japan. It was crazy to see so many cars show up. They filled the entire lot and cars were still trying to make their way into the lot after the meet had ended. There were cops outside making sure no funny business was happening and the meet went on throughout the evening without incident. You should have seen the video by now, if not, please go check it out in the previous post. Today, we’re going to check out some of the photos that I took that night. There were over 1300 cars there but I really wanted to just sit back and experience the moment for once instead of wandering the dark lot to try to capture photos. I hope you guys understand. Between video and photos, it’s really hard to just be able to take everything in with the friends that I had with me. Huge thanks to Phaze2 Yasu for putting this whole event together and hopefully we get to do another one next year. Also, thanks to all who attended and made this such an epic event. Enjoy the photos….

I’ve been following this Nissan Leopard build for quite some time now so it was awesome to finally see it in person. It is every bit as good as it looked in photos. The owner didn’t have the hood popped but it actually has an RB26 engine swap in it from a Nissan Skyline GT-R….

Toyota Mark II with a huge front-mounter intercooler and Volk TE37V….

This EF9 Civic SiR was rocking a graphical livery bearing similar colors to a traditional Mugen theme…

EK9 Civic Type R with a full cage from Impact Magic Ltd….

This DC5 Integra Type R on yellow SSR Type-C was also representing Impact Magic…

I wanted to make sure to get the massive ferris wheel in the distance when capturing this black Toyota Mark X…

Two-Tone EK9 Type R on Kosei K1….

Nicely-done sport-VIP-themed Toyota Aristo on BBS wheels…

Toshiki Omura’s W211 Mercedes Benz represents one of the more radically-styled luxury Euros in Japan…

Classic look for this black EF9 Civic hatchback on SSR Longchamp XR4s….

All the traffic and people walking by really fucked this photo up but it was supposed to be the K-Break Aristo custom convertible….

Keisuke Morita’s HKS GT-Supercharged Scion FR-S…

Yasutaka Shimomukai’s HKS GT-Supercharged AP1 Honda S2000. This is the same S2000 that you guys may have seen in the Vlog when Chuy was driving it to the meet…

The legendary Car Make Across EK with brand new front aero set-up…

Clean Championship White EK9 CTR on white Volk Racing TE37…

The one and only No Good Racing Civic piloted by the man who we have come to know as “The King”…

White-on-white EF9 SiR from No Good Racing…

LAW BREAK AE86 Toyota Levin…

Custom dash display within the LAW BREAK Levin…

Two Hondas from very different ends of the spectrum; Eishi Suzuki’s AP2 S2000 and a red/white EK9 from No Good Racing…

Marvelous Racing EF9 Civic SiR…

Tomoyuki Sasaki’s Civic Ferio that you’ve come to see many times now on this particular leg of our Osaka journeys… Yes in this photo, the driver’s side fender was already fucked-up…

White EK9 CTRs are quite the popular platforms to build in Osaka, Japan…

This coupe was pretty interesting. It has a B16 motor with a coil-on-plug (C.O.P.) set-up and the exterior was outfitted with BBS mesh wheels on a shaved body…

Masashi Kameoka’s EF9 Civic on 15×8 Volk Racing TE37…

This green coupe looked pretty good on silver BBS LM…

Toyota Crown hammered on polished Work Meister S1 3-piece wheels…

Kyosuke Yamazaki’s C35 Laurel on Work Meister CR-01…

Keita Kikuchi’s 326power S15 Silvia on Work Meister M1…

Kazuyuki Kubo’s TRA Kyoto Rocket Bunny R34 Skyline…

White EK Civic that has perhaps seen some action on the Osaka Loop highway…

Wedged in-between the two EK Civics was Hiro’s K-swapped E-AT Civic….

I saw quite a bit of these older Toyota Crowns out and about in Osaka during my travels. They typically wear this two-tone colorway too and are slammed to the pavement…

I think of all the popular VIP platforms out in this area, I prefer to see the JZS161 Aristo chassis modded because they can be recreated in so many different styles….

Definitely one of the cleaner graphical liveries that we saw that night. The addition of the chrome trim is a great detail touch…

Toyota Crown Athlete on Work wheels….

Custom widebody Lexus GS430 which also participated in the Wekfest Japan event….

Phaze2 Hiroki’s C-Class Mercedes Benz….

…and one last parting shot of Phaze2 Eishi’s S2000 on CCW wheels…

I really wish I would have taken more photos that night but there was just so much going on and most of the event was in the dark so it was hard to capture. That and there were so many people there that it made it hard to shoot long-exposure stuff to really capture the cars. Regardless, thanks for looking and making sure to watch the newest Vlog if you haven’t already….

Perhaps the most polarizing “car club” in the last few years in the wide-spectrum of the Honda tuning community are the guys from NO GOOD RACING. I’m not going to sit here and talk about Kanjozoku culture because we’d be here for hours. There would be this huge debate on their history and culture, why they do what they do and why many think it is wrong, etc., etc. I don’t have time anymore to argue with people so you’re either going to enjoy what they do, or you’ll absolutely despise them. That’s just how it is. They are polarizing figures in our car culture because they are very controversial. What started in 1985 has evolved through the years but they are still very much a part of Osaka’s underground car culture. They are probably one of the cogs that helped to create what we now know as Osaka car culture today and what we understand as the foundation of the Japanese Honda scene that we came to nickname “JDM”. While many have moved on and have left NO GOOD RACING, many are still around and keeping their infamously popular tradition alive. A select few still roam the streets and run on the Osaka Loop Line but others have changed the focus over to sanctioned circuit events on an enclosed circuit. Some of the cars pull double-duty but for the most part, the track is where you’ll find most of these Hondas from NGR these days. Kanjozoku culture quietly went away about a decade ago but has recently made a resurgence in Osaka. It will never return to the old ways where hundreds of cars will roam the streets but I’m sure many of you have noticed that you’re seeing more of the NO GOOD RACING namesake in 2015…

Last month, NO GOOD RACING celebrated its 30th anniversary. 30 YEARS. Try to put that into perspective, it’s pretty crazy. Some of the stories that these guys must have and all the things that have seen over the years is probably mind-numbing. Maybe some day someone will be able to tell their story but since much of what they do is in what you’d consider life’s “gray areas” (car-related or not), it would take a lot of trust for someone to get an inside ear on their rich history. To celebrate their big 30, NO GOOD RACING decided to host an event at Suzuka Twin Circuit and hosted many other Kanjozoku car clubs from Osaka. Everyone got together with their cars for a track day and judging from the photos, it looked like an absolute blast. I wasn’t able to make it out to Japan for this event but I was fortunate enough to get these captures from my boy Yasu Shimomukai from Phaze2 Japan. Yasu shot a ton of photos that day that I have just recently found the time to go through. October has been a crazy month but I really wanted to get these photos up for you guys to see. I know a lot of you don’t agree with what they do, but I think we can all come to an agreement that we collectively love Hondas and you’ll see plenty of them here today. Some of these are pure track cars, some are “street” cars that roam Osaka, and some do a little bit of both. Try to just see these cars for what they are and enjoy them as pure functioning machines driven by like-minded automotive enthusiasts…

Don’t like it? Well, turn your head, click the “Back” button on your browser and go on with your life.

For those that are here to see cool shit, welcome.

Thank you to Yasu for the photos and congrats to NO GOOD RACING on 30 incredibly-interesting years….

Enjoy…

EF9 Civic SiR from Hawk Auto Project being trailered into Suzuki Twin for the NGR 30th Anniversary track event…

Though it was predominantly Hondas present that day, there were a few other automobiles that showed up in support like this Nissan Skyline on Hayashi Streets…

No fucks were given as this flyer for the event was taped over the Suzuka Twin Circuit sign…

Mizuho EG6 wearing the new NO GOOD “Shark” livery. Interesting to see that some of the newer NGR builds are running aftermarket aero like this EG with the Chargespeed wide fenders and Sergeant front bumper. Even more interesting is that I see my decal on many of these cars, haha. Pretty surreal sight….

Bosozoku motor bikes had a strong presence at the event as well as they have long been linked with the underground Osaka street culture along with the Kanjozoku…

Love the colorway on this EK from CLUB WHARP on Enkei ES Tarmac wheels…

Zero Fighter EF9 in bright orange…

As mentioned, the event featured a little bit of everything…or a lot of something all in one car…

Interesting, bizarre, and oh so old school Japan…

Happy to see that SSR Type-X wheels are alive and well in Japan. One of my favorite wheels of all-time and apparently they’re also a heavy favorite for the Japanese in 2015…

NO GOOD RACING Red Bull EF9 Civic SiR, once owned by the head of NGR but the car has since been sold. You can tell that the car has been changed here and there from the photos I captured it the last time I visited this EF in Japan earlier this year….

Mechadock EF now wearing some vinyl. You may remember this build during my initial visit to Mechadock in Osaka….

Probably my favorite EF9 ever, the Car Make Across Civic from CLUB WHARP….

WHARP RACING well represented at the NO GOOD anniversary…

Spoon Sports-themed EK9 Civic from NO GOOD RACING. Crazy to see a street car not associated with Spoon wearing its livery…

Another of the Mechadock EF with its custom headlight ram-air duct…

Drift cars were also welcomed at the track event…

Kazu from Mechadock…

Atsuki from Tactical Art checking on Taku Kusugami’s EK before it hits the track…

The “GOD HANDS” EG from TOP GUN RACING…

Itasha-style EF Civic. Not entirely sure what “Subterranean Animism” means…

Zero Fighter EF9 with bronze Volk CEs up front and Enkei RPF1 in the rear…

Tsumori Engineering EF9 looking great in bright green with black CEs up front…

Fuel cell and swirl pot in the passenger seat of the EF9….

Love how the alarm clock is incorporated into the Tsumori Engineering logo. Not sure what the significance of the “44” means. Perhaps it might mean that this car represents another old school Kanjozoku car club; MAGUNAMU…

Mugen CR-X Pro.2 from WHARP RACING…

Some good symbolism in this photo…

EK9 Civic Type R from PANDEMIC…

Civic Type R from RANDAM with an custom front splitter set-up…

Many of the Hondas present at the NGR event were actually strictly track cars, like this EK, and weren’t street cars that ran the streets…

Subtle EK Civic hatchback from TEMPLE RACING on Volk Racing GRN wheels up front….

Rare sight to see an S2000 rocking a Buddy Club front bumper….

Blue/white two-toned EK9 from TOP GUN RACING….

1RANK-UP AUTO EG representing LAW BREAK… I actually randomly came upon a YouTube video of this car in action one day. I’ll attach it below. Kinda long but you get to see some pretty cool stuff…

Anyways, back to the pics…

FIVE MART EG on 15×8 Volk TEs and running a Sergeant front bumper…

EF8 CR-X with a modded front bumper, retro-fitted front lip, Mugen sideskirts and SSR Type-X wheels rocking an old school 5Zigen livery…

Great to see Taku’s EK out and about again after sitting for an extended period of time. It still looks as good as ever and yes, he does track this car. That’s actually its primary-use since he hardly ever drives it on the street…

“Spoon” EK and Mechadock EF9…

Drivers’ meeting for those participating in the festivities…

NO GOOD signage was present everywhere throughout Suzuka Twin Circuit…

Many of you who have followed my journeys in Japan in the past may remember this EG6…

Racing Factory VARON EK4 on WED’S wheels…

Clean EK9 on white Volk TEs from LAW BREAK Family…

EG and EF from NO GOOD RACING wearing matching liveries…

NO GOOD RACING EG in blue wearing the new “Shark” livery…

Loved this magenta/neon yellow EG also with the Shark graphic…

Here’s one in yellow also with matching livery…

..and even Kazu from Mechadock’s daily-driver was rocking the NGR Shark livery…

Ryuji, head of NO GOOD RACING, and his newly-finished Civic Ferio tribute build…

A couple more of the Mechadock EF. Awesome to see my “Tradition” decal represented well…

Joe from ACROSS getting ready to step into his EF…

LOOSE RACING EF with wide SSR SP3R up front and lightweight Type-C in the rear…

The guys from NO GOOD RACING even brought out this B-series powered mini indycar to rip around on the track…

And on that note, this wraps Part 1 of 3 of the NGR 30th Anniversary coverage. I’ll get the other two parts up this week as well so stay tuned!!…

What’s up all, back now with some more great photos from the NO GOOD RACING 30th Anniversary event. Yasutaka Shimomukai did a excellent job of capturing this event so I must thank him first and foremost for presenting us with this coverage. He usually sends them to me right away too so it is just a matter of when I finally have a chance to sit down and go through all the RAW photos. I really don’t have much to talk about today as I am about to hop on a plane to head down to Houston, Texas for the Wekfest event. By the time you guys read this I think I’ll probably already be on my way to Texas. These photos speak for themselves anyway and don’t require much narration. In Part 1, you guys got a glimpse at some of the many Civics that were at the event. Today, in part 2, you get to see the vehicles in action. Wedged in-between the photos are some candids and other photos from the paddock area of the event. If you’re into Civics, this is one of the posts that you shouldn’t miss out on because they are literally just everywhere in every photo of this series. Enjoy…

If you guys are from Texas or plan to attend the Wekfest event in Houston, I’ll see you guys real soon. For the rest of you, have a great weekend. Thanks for the support and thank you to Yasu for the great snaps…

EK and EG entering the pits…

1RANK-UP AUTO EG representing LAW BREAK Racing…

ACROSS EF9 SiR…

Pandemic EK running side-by-side with a really clean EG on SSR Type-X wheels…

TATSUMI ENG Civic bearing the colors and logos of Alied.jp, which is a popular bike company in Japan….

Members of NGR prepping the B-series mini-indycar for the track…

2&4 Hihara Bodywork’s EF also on SSR Type-X…

Limitation-R EG Civic looking good…

NO GOOD RACING Red Bull-themed EF9…

Members of famed Osaka car crew, CLUB WHARP looking on…

Not really sure what the quote on the rear bumper means but in some ways I guess it’s kind of appropriate…

Check out the 70s Corvette on display in the middle of this crowd of vehicles. Looks real mint too…

NO GOOD RACING EF wearing a rich candy red paint job from Mizuho body shop….

Gunmetal gray on white EF hatchback on Enkei ES Tarmacs…

Taku Kusugami getting a little three-wheel motion as he crosses over a berm…

Taku heading back to the pits in his Sepang Bronze EK from Tactical Art…

NO GOOD RACING “Spoon” EK in action…

Tsumori Engineering EF9…

Civics from various factions lining-up to get on the track. Love the “LAW BREAK Tunnel Cars” decal on the back windshield of the white EK…

Overhead view of the NGR Spoon-inspired EK9 CTR…

Love how the Limitation-R EG sits on the Type X wheels….

A slew of EF9 Civics entering the circuit together…

Mechadock EF with the custom front fender treatment on beefy Volk TE37s…

Magenta NGR “Shark” EG. Again, love the neon yellow highlights to contrast the paint…

Red NGR “Shark” EG with the widened fiberglass front end…

After unloading and set-up, it was time for this B-powered racecar to hit the track…

…piloted by none other than Kazu from Mechadock…

Civic heaven at the NGR 30th Anniversary…

Team RANDAM EK….

NO GOOD RACING red/white EK4 SiR Civic…

The Zero Fighter EF9 battling other Civics on Suzuka Twin Circuit…

Green EF9 Civic from NO GOOD RACING. Rumor has it that the owner of this EF actually passed away but other members of NGR have kept it around in honor of him…

RANDAM vs. NO GOOD RACING…

Definitely one of the cleaner Civics at this track event…

Taku in the paddock area waiting for his EK to cool down…

LOOSE RACING EF Civic and driver….

White/pink Tatsumi Eng Charge EK9 CTR…

EK ripping through Suzuka Twin with no livery whatsoever…

ACROSS/WHARP EF trying to overtake the EK9…

EF9 from REAL COMPANY….

This EK9 should be a familiar sight to those of you who saw my last trip to Osaka, Japan this year….

WHARP RACING EF9 is one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen, simply put. Joe from ACROSS just knows how to make cars look fantastic…

Interesting to see this car during the day. Most of the time, I only seeing it flying by the highway system in Osaka at night…

One more parting shot of the WHARP RACING EF9 before I go. There’s still one more part so make sure to come back to check it out. Thanks!!

I didn’t forget about these photos, I swear. I’ve just been spending so much time editing the videos and stuff for the Vlog series that I just get excited about them and want to post them right away. Honestly, you guys already know how hectic this month has been for me so I’m trying to get as much content up as I can. During SEMA week, you probably won’t see immediate updates here on the site so the best way to do it now is to get as much up as possible so you guys can all catch up eventually. I still have more videos coming as well as some photos from FF Battle 7, and then followed by Wekfest Houston leading into my Year 7 event. There’s all kinds of stuff going on here too, especially with my event and SEMA coming up REAL quick. Today, enjoy the last concluding set of photos from the NO GOOD RACING 30th Anniversary event. These are just extra shots and weren’t shot in any particular order. Yasu just floated around the event and shot whatever he thought was cool. It just worked out that they came out great…

Thanks to Yasu Shimomukai for getting these photos to me. I wish I could have been there myself but I’ll have to wait until January to head back to Japan. Enjoy….

A couple shots of Joe from CAR MAKE ACROSS in action with his EF9 race car…

The ACROSS EF in the pits cooling down with the hood up. Such an awesome looking EF…

Great symmetry in this photo, not sure if it was intended by Yasu or not when he captured this shot but the cars are lined-up perfectly, haha…

SIXTYONE/Alied EK9 race car…

EG representing old school Kanjozoku car club TEMPLE RACING…

A bunch of awesome action shots of Taku Kusugami’s EK4 from Tactical Art on the track. Great to see this car out and about again…

This was perhaps the closest anyone will get to “Civic Heaven”, if that were a real thing…

Kazuki’s Spoon Sports-themed EK from NO GOOD RACING….

This EG6 from CRAFT-A was rocking a Rocket Dancer front lip….

Most definitely one of the cleanest Hondas that day to hit the Suzuka Twin circuit….

ACROSS EF8 CR-X wearing old school 5Zigen graphics….

EF9 Civic hatchback with an eye-catching yellow/blue livery executed in traditional Osaka style…

NO GOOD RACING Red Bull-themed EF as you’ve seen plenty of times here on The Chronicles….

One of the first EG Civics that we ran into when we first started documenting Kansai underground car culture…

MECHA-DOCK EF9 piloted by Kazu of NGR…

More great captures of the Red Bull EF9 in action at Suzuka Twin. Love the ones in particular with it side-by-side with the LIMITATION-R EG Civic…

Candy red EF9 Civic from NO GOOD RACING and Mizuho Ltd….

LAW BREAK RACING EG…

A glimpse under the hood of the MECHA-DOCK EF9…

Kazu from MECHA-DOCK hoping into the Formula 3 race car. Great symbolism with him throwing up the NO GOOD hand…

…and he’s off in the B-series powered race car…

Mizuho/NGR EG…

Must have been awesome to see this thing in action with the other Hondas that day…

NGR red “Shark” EG…

MECHA-DOCK EG from NO GOOD RACING. Believe it or not, this is actually Kazu’s daily commuter….

And a final parting shot of the Civics on the track with the Formula 3 car…

That’s a wrap on that. Thanks for looking everybody. Stay tuned for other updates forthcoming!…

The one you’ve been waiting for. ©STICKYDILJOE.COM

Photos and stills attached below the video…

Some of the people that are in this video who have Instagram accounts:

StickyDilJoe (@stickydiljoe)
Ryan Der (@ryan.der)
David Andrade (@dpk_david)
Chuy Navarro (@dpk_chuy)
Yuta Akaishi (@yutaakaishi)
Salem (@simplysalem)

Below are some photos that we captured that night. We focused mainly on video so there aren’t a whole lot of stills to look at so I decided to toss them in here instead of adding a separate post for it…

For those curious, yes this is the same EG that popped up at Osaka Auto Messe this year in a brand new Red Bull-inspired livery. Someone that wasn’t even a part of this group that night lost control and crashed into this EG. If you pay close attention in the video, you’ll see the body damage on the way to the Family Mart meet-up location. The accident happened just after we left the Osaka Night Meet. The entire quarter panel was pretty much destroyed. This is also the current NO GOOD RACING boss’ EG Civic…

The moment I saw these photos, I knew I had to find a way to get them up here on The Chronicles. I usually prefer to run my own photos on the site but sometimes, some really cool stuff from Japan pops up that I really just want to show all of you. Daiki Tamiya isn’t a name that you’ve probably heard before but he is an enthusiast from Japan who has ties to some of my friends from Japan. I never knew he really shot photos until about a year or so ago but it turns out that his stuff is really good. He also attends quite a number of events as well so it is always great to see what he is able to capture during his adventures. Tamiya has popped-up once before on this site during my coverage of one of the older USDM Jam events that my friend Shota Mori covered. Mori owns a CA Accord that actually used to belong to Tamiya. They’ve maintained a friendship over the years and both regularly go to automotive events in their respective areas…

The Akitech Cup is a new series of racing events hosted by a tuning shop known as ASLAN. The people from ASLAN are older race car guys from the famed TEMPLE RACING team. They at one time were heavily involved in the Osaka Kanjo racing scene until they later moved-on to strictly circuit racing. ASLAN now owns one of the fastest Civics in all of Japan and are constantly in competition with a famed tuning shop in the Tokyo region of Japan, GARAGE WORK. The Akitech Cup, held at Central Circuit in the Hyogo Prefecture, played host to a number of Civics as well as other Hondas from all over. Some of the cars you’ll see today are dedicated circuit race cars, while others may be familiar to you guys as they are still active in the Osaka underground street scene. These cars pull double duty on both the street and the circuit but you’ve only been exposed to them during their “night-time activities”, so it may feel a little odd to see them out and about during the day…

I wish there was more information I could provide to you guys about this event but language barriers exist which makes that difficult. As far as rules go, I don’t see it being very different from other timed circuit races. This is probably a traditional time attack series that features mainly the Civic chassis along with a handful of other Hondas not of the Civic-variety. Daiki Tamiya is a good man for allowing me to get these photos from him and also giving me the privilege of processing them to fit the format of this site. Most of the stuff he normally posts is straight from the camera unedited so these shots from the Akitech Cup were processed by me after he delivered them to me. I hope to utilize more of his shots in the future, especially if he continues to cover such great stuff like this. Thanks to him and enjoy…

ASLAN PRESENTS AKITECH CUP 2016

Central Circuit (Hyogo Prefecture)

3/20/2016

PHOTOS BY ©DAIKI TAMIYA PHOTOGRAPHY

POST-PROCESSING BY STICKYDILJOE

WORDS BY STICKYDILJOE

ASLAN EG6 Civic running a K-series motor and individual throttle bodies…

EF9 SiR riding on Osaka JDM coilover suspension and U.S.-market “Black Edition” Volk TE37SL….

The GARAGE WORK team prepping their EK Civic duo for the first session of the morning…

Decal and number plate prep…

Purple/white EG6 Civic from REAL COMPANY…

Akitech number plate for the ASLAN EG…

Interesting front bumper on this EG race car. Despite its dated appearance, it was one of the fastest Hondas of the day…

EF9 from REAL COMPANY…

Another angle of the ASLAN EG, the owner is also a member of the famed TEMPLE RACING team…

Furakawa from FIVE MART looking on…

The guys from ASLAN prepping paperwork for the Akitech Cup…

Makoto Maekakuchi and Yusuke Tokue were all smiles at Central Circuit…

REAL COMPANY….

GARAGE WORK…

Mugen RR from ASLAN with a stout front posture…

Always impressive to see all the custom aero modifications on the extremely lightweight Hondas from GARAGE WORK. This particular EK belongs to Makoto Maekakuchi….

…and this is Yusuke Tokue’s Civic…

Furakawa and friends prepping the EF9…

Driver’s meeting at Akitech Cup…

WHARP RACING EK9 Civic Type R, a car that you should be pretty familiar with by now if you’ve ever watched any of the Vlogs on my YouTube channel…

Civics from various car clubs in the paddock…

EG6 running a beefy 17-inch Volk TE set-up from GARAGE MINDS…

Takumi Iwata from GARAGE WORK…

Central Circuit officials…

A couple of guys who look like they could tell you a few stories about shit they’ve experienced in this hobby that we all share…

Big aero that functions, no matter what the critics will try to tell you…

I love all the custom cut-outs and vents Yusuke’s EK, from the end of the sideskirts to the rear bumper and CTR rear lip…

GARAGE MINDS EG…

Super clean EF9 from TEMPLE RACING running a Enkei NT03 in the rear and 16-inch CE28N up front…

Such a great looking car…

While on the topic of great-looking cars, personally, the Limitation-R EG6 I feel is one of the best looking Hondas from Japan…

WHARP RACING and NO GOOD RACING sharing a paddock space together…

Another EG that should look pretty familiar to you regulars. The front end was recently paint-matched too so the car looks pretty complete now…

Mizuho EF9 from NO GOOD RACING…

Joe from ACROSS and his legendary K-swapped EK9 Civic Type R…

Three sets of wheels that still remain as popular as ever in the Kansai region; Volk CE28, Kosei K1, and SSR Type-X…

EG6 Civic with mismatched Type-Xs from HAWK AUTO PROJECT…

Loving the custom rear bumper cut-outs on this AP2 S2000…

DC5 Integra Type R reppin’ Meishin Tires…

Alternate angle of the ASLAN/TEMPLE RACING EG…

Not sure where this EK4 SiR came from but it looked spectacular…

CAR MAKE ACROSS EK9 looking great with C-West aero…

Another EK9 CTR representing ACROSS, this one running a pair of lightweight Racing Hart CP-035 wheels up front…

NO GOOD RACING EG now with paint-matched Chargespeed front fenders and Sergeant front bumper….

CLUB WHARP EK9 with the signature blue air duct from Billion…

Yet another EG and another set of Type-Xs…

SSR Type-C on the yellow NO GOOD RACING EG6…

LIMITATION-R EG on polished SSR Type-X…

EF8 CR-X SiR representing FIVE MART/OSAKA JDM…

TE37V and a thick front Kumho tire on this EG from AUTO STAGE CLOSE-UP…

Beautifully-executed EK4 Civic SiR from ASLAN…

Clean white EG running a Sergeant front bumper and 15×8 Volk TEs…

Flared CR-X with Lexan windows…

Makoto Onoda, whose photos have been featured a number of times before here on The Chronicles, running the Akitech Cup in his K-swapped Honda Integra on Barramundi Design Eleven wheels. He also has a 98-01 USDM Integra front end…

There are still a ton of photos from this event to come, courtesy of the great work from Daiki Tamiya. Stay tuned for more!! Thanks for looking…

Oh man, I still can’t get over all the great content from the Akitech Cup event. Hopefully you guys got to check out Part 1, if not, it is directly under this post. There is some more information about this event in the first part so be sure to read through it before proceeding further. I mean, you could skip it, but why would you? There are some pretty good photos in that post so you’d be doing yourself a disservice by not looking at it. Not much else really to include in regards to this event. It is essentially a small track day hosted by the guys from ASLAN and it was filled with a pretty solid group of really, really, cool Hondas from Japan. Seeing stuff like this makes me want to organize a track day out there so that we can witness this stuff for ourselves. I mean, the meets that we set-up are usually pretty successful and we already see a similar group of enthusiasts when we are out there so why not, right? I feel like it would be a good way of getting some more cars together and seeing them in detail. It would be cool to have Yuta drive while he’s out there and we could give some more exposure to some of these cars that are very much deserving of some attention. Who knows. Maybe it’ll happen. I just have to talk to some friends overseas and see if it is something that they would be interested in collaborating with me on. Everyone is usually pretty helpful over there, especially when it comes to a hobby that we all love, so I think it is a certain possibility that I can actually pull this off…

For now, take a look at some more great Hondas from the 2016 Akitech Cup, hosted by ASLAN, at Central Circuit in Hyogo, Japan…

ASLAN PRESENTS AKITECH CUP 2016

Central Circuit (Hyogo Prefecture)

3/20/2016

PHOTOS BY ©DAIKI TAMIYA PHOTOGRAPHY

POST-PROCESSING BY STICKYDILJOE

WORDS BY STICKYDILJOE

A rare glimpse inside the cockpit of one of the competitors that day at Central Circuit…

Back in the pits, the ASLAN team preps for their next session…

Ton from TEMPLE RACING, who also happens to be a pretty well-known tattoo artist from the Osaka area, puts on his head sock and readies himself to pilot the ASLAN EG…

Massive front/rear wheel and tire set-up on the K-powered EG from ASLAN…

The GARAGE WORK duo…

Yusuke Tokue’s Civic…

Makoto Maekakuchi’s Civic. Love the front staggered wheel set-up on both Civics….

Lining-up for the starting grid…

Joe from ACROSS’ K-powered EK9 CTR…

Automotive painter Tatsu from Mizuho Co. Ltd. and his EF9 Civic…

Fellow racers look-on as more cars cruise out to the grid…

The yellow NO GOOD RACING EG with unpainted Sergeant front bumper heads out with the LIMITATION-R EG following closely…

I just can’t get over how great this car looks. Hopefully I’ll run into this car sooner than later when I head to Japan…

A closer look at the Osaka JDM EF wide fenders…

E-AT Civic on Enkei NTO3 leaving the paddock…

Sadly, this AT Civic reppin’ Banzai Attack crashed and the front end was damaged…

Not a bad line-up I must say…

If the name “Banzai Attack” sounds familiar, it is the same tuning shop that produced the K-swapped white EF9 SiR that has been featured plenty times before here on The Chronicles…

ASLAN naturally-aspirated K-EG…

GARAGE WORK EK with its modified C-West front bumper and custom splitter/canard set-up…

Pretty awesome seeing the influx of Sergeant/White Crow bumpers popping up in Japan lately….

Another of the TEMPLE RACING Civic…

Tokue’s EK looks to be running a Rando Sports bumper that has been modified to hold a custom front splitter and canard set-up….

The GARAGE WORK team actually made the trek from Chiba, Tokyo area which is about a 7-hour drive to Hyogo Prefecture where Central Circuit is…

Spectacular-looking front end on this EK4 Civic SiR…

I love how Tamiya was able to capture the specks of gravel being kicked-up by the sticky Advan race tires…

REAL COMPANY EF getting some help back into the pits…

A pair of S2000s in the paddock area…

EF and EG from REAL COMPANY…

NO GOOD RACING EG on WEDS wheels going through the S-turn at Central Circuit…

Makoto and his USDM-face K20 Integra…

DC5 Integra running what looks to be a Max Racing front bumper…

Widened Mugen RR from ASLAN…

A battle of 80s-era Hondas ensues…

Banzai Attack AT Civic…

AUTO STAGE CLOSE UP EG and NO GOOD RACING EF…

GARAGE MINDS EG…

DC5 Type R leading the way…

One of the fastest Hondas of the day running its unique aero kit and colorway…

REAL COMPANY EG…

At some point during the day, the double-vented hood on the REAL COMPANY EF broke…

You can see the piece of the mounting area that broke off above…

Makoto Onoda’s Integra was at one time painted yellow with the same 98-01 front end set-up…

Interesting how a lot of the NGR guys run the carbon OEM-style front lip on their EG, even when they run this bumper set-up…

SHINKO SERVICE AP1 S2000…

Mizuho EF after a small collision on the track…

CAR MAKE ACROSS EK9, one of my all-time favorite Honda builds EVER….

Right up there on the list is the LIMITATION-R EG on SSR Type-X wheels…

TEMPLE RACING EF9 Civic…

WHARP RACING EK9 Civic Type R…

It’s a shame we don’t see very many sets of Racing Hart CP-035 or WEDS TC005 wheels floating around anymore…

Interesting front bumper on this EK. Anyone know the name of it? I remember seeing it a few years ago but the name eludes me…

Love how aggressive DC5 Integras look with a 9-inch wide wheel up front…

Closing out this particular section with a shot of the Team MEISHIN S2000 in the pits. Love the colorway on the Tracy Sports racing suit the driver above is wearing. So cool…

Anyways, can you believe there is still one more part coming? Well there is! Haha, so stay tuned!!…

Man, moving is mildly stressful. These last couple days or so, I’ve been dealing with a move from one house to another, while also procrastinating  to finish-up my taxes. That hasn’t left me with a whole lot of time to do anything but I really need to get this final set of photos out so we can move forward with some fresh content. Below are the rest of the photos from the event which generated some pretty good traffic last week. I guess it is always cool to see what is going on in Japan and having a rare look into these smaller events. It gives us the opportunity to see cars we’d otherwise be rarely exposed to, if at all, so a huge thanks goes out once again to Daiki Tamiya for taking the time to shoot all these photos. I had the pleasure of processing them for the site and honestly, I was getting more and more excited to see each new photo coming in…

On a side note, I’m not completely sure if I will be attending Formula D this weekend, especially since I am trying to finish up my move but if I do go, I hope I see everyone there. I’d like to go but I’ve been trying to keep some time open to do regular-life-type of things before the season goes into a frenzied state in the coming months….

ASLAN PRESENTS AKITECH CUP 2016

Central Circuit (Hyogo Prefecture)

3/20/2016

PHOTOS BY ©DAIKI TAMIYA PHOTOGRAPHY

POST-PROCESSING BY STICKYDILJOE

WORDS BY STICKYDILJOE

Here’s the final batch of photos from this set, enjoy…

EG from AUTOSTAGE CLOSE-UP on 15-inch mismatched Volk TEs…

DC5 Integra Type R cooling down in the paddock…

I believe this gentleman is either on his cellphone talking or waiting for the GARAGE WORK EK to hover slight over his body…

Takumi Iwata from GARAGE WORK and Ton from ASLAN talking shop…

The front aero set-up on the ASLAN K-swapped EG…

Lightly-tuned S2000 on SSR Executor wheels…

ASLAN EG on the track…

Makoto from GARAGE WORK…

Ton from TEMPLE RACING…

Yusuke Tokue…

Makoto and his towering rear wing…

Joe from ACROSS leads the pack as they exit the S-turn…

EF9 representing Osaka JDM/Five Mart…

Makoto Onoda’s K-DC2 leading another group…

AT Civic following closely behind…

Tatsu from Mizuho paint shop and NO GOOD RACING…

This EG6 on SSR Type-X experienced some minor front end damage on the track…

The lightly-tuned AP1 from earlier putting in work…

GARAGE MINDS EK and its unique front bumper set-up…

LIMITATION-R EG…

The menacing K20 EK from CAR MAKE ACROSS…

The GARAGE WORK team shaving down some R-compounds in the paddock…

NO GOOD RACING EG with Chargespeed wide front fenders, Sergeant front bumper, and WEDS TC005…

Here you can get a glimpse of Makotoman’s billet rear subframe brace and LCAs…

…as well as a better look at the custom-cut rear bumper on the Meishin Tire AP2 S2000…

Five Mart EF9 with their brand of wide front fenders….

NGR yellow EG with the signature NO GOOD livery…

AT Civic from earlier on Enkei wheels…

A few more of the amazing ACROSS EK9…

You can see here that the paint on the rear bumper of this EG has been burned through via the straight-pipe exhaust…

REAL COMPANY trying to figure out what to do with their broken FRP hood situation…

This photo would see much more peculiar and awkward if I didn’t mention that they were shaving the tires down…

Always good to see enthusiasts of all ages being able to share some laughs while in the spirit of competition…

ASLAN EG with the tire heaters hooked-up…

…and here are a couple of better shots of it outside as it leaves the paddock…

Higashino Racing EF9 Civic and its 5-lug, 10-spoke Volk CEs up front…

GARAGE MINDS EG with its 18-inch TE37SL set-up and the ACROSS EK9…

ASLAN EG looks quite good on 15×8 Volk Racing TEs…

ASLAN and TEMPLE RACING’s Mugen RR. Cool to see it running Spoon SW388 wheels in the rear…

DC5 Integra Type R on Advan Racing wheels…

Civic on the grid waiting for battle…

The awards and some bubbly for the podium ceremony…

Not too far behind it was the ASLAN EG…

I apologize for not having all the official times and results from the race but it looked like the guys who won celebrated by leaving no champagne bottle uncorked…

I do know that this Civic ended-up placing 3rd overall in the N2 class…

…and then it proceeded to be crane-lifted onto a flatbed truck by its wheels…

On that note, that’s a wrap on the Akitech Cup 2016 event. I’ll keep you guys up to speed if they do travel to another track for another Akitech Cup event. Thanks for looking!!…

Every time I make my way to Japan, I always try to maximize my time there by taking in as much car culture as I can. Those of you who have followed this site for a number of years now understand that. I just want to see and experience as much as my body can handle. When I first started going to Japan, my plan was to try and visit as many tuning shops as I knew existed and if there was a meet or something going on, I’d try to get to it. I thought it was a solid plan at first but I felt that I could always do more, so one day, I just decided to throw my own car meet. Why not, right? I had solid connections to car enthusiasts overseas and the site itself had developed a pretty decent following through the years. There seemed like no better way to see car culture than to bring it right to us. I knew I had a good grasp on the Honda crowd over in Japan but Yasu and I decided to enlist the help of Freddie from Autofashion USA to pull the Bippu (VIP) crowd. Freddie is usually in Japan with us and his brand has also gained some notoriety in Japan so doing a joint meet would really help to bring in the cars that we wanted to see. I myself am a Japanese Bippu enthusiast as well so I was excited to see some VIP-styled builds from both Osaka and Tokyo. I think we’ve organized around 4-5 meets now in Japan over the past two years and they’ve all been pretty successful. I never go into these things expecting anything but am always appreciative of the enthusiasts who do make the trek to come hang out…

For the May Osaka Night Meet, I almost expected no one to come out because we literally organized the meet 6 hours before it actually happened. I was on the fence about doing a meet because we were so busy heading into Wekfest Japan that I just wanted to take a break from car stuff. The weather was so nice though that it seemed like a waste not to do a car meet so I put a flyer together in the early afternoon and posted it up on various social media outlets. We went about our day like normal and even did some touristy stuff in the late afternoon. Around 9 PM, we started getting everyone together to head over to the meet. When we arrived, the parking area for the meet was completely filled-up! Cars were any and everywhere you could fit them and we ourselves had a hard time finding a spot to park. The great thing about Osaka is that their car culture is incredibly rich and diverse. There were VIP builds, high-end luxury exotics, and of course, Hondas. You don’t see Civics driving around in Osaka during the day time but if you have a meet or anything car-related going on, you better be ready to see an influx of Civics because they come out in full-force. You’d never think that Osaka had any Civics at all judging by the types of cars you see driving around during the day but I can’t recall the last time I seen so many EGs and EKs together in one place. It’s crazy…

Hopefully you watched the Vlog by now which covers this meet, because you’ll get a better feel for the meet in video than you do in the small photo set I captured. Luckily, I had Tiffanie with me and she shot a ton of photos at the meet. I like her photographic eye because she sees things very differently than I, especially since she’s still very new to this whole car “thing”. It’s interesting to see what catches her eye and I also like the fact that she covers more of the “human” side of things. I used to do that a lot more and I know I’ve done less and less of it over time because I’d rather use video to capture the true “lifestyle” feel of things. Tiffanie helps re-introduce that personal side to my photo coverage and I’m very happy that she cares enough to do so much car shit with me, haha… I think I shot like 20 or so photos and she just beasted through the entire meet shooting continuously…

Anyways, sorry for the lack of updates lately. I have so much content loaded-up to post, I just really need to find the time to post them up. There’s so much going on lately with real life stuff that at times it can be difficult to just sit down and work on the site. There’s more on the way and I’ve even started shooting more photos again. June is a little slower compared to how April and May was so I’m gonna start unleashing a hoard of content in the coming days and weeks. Stick with me and I promise you’ll have plenty to see. Thanks for the support as always…

THE CHRONICLES x AUTOFASHION USA OSAKA NIGHT MEETING

Photos by STICKYDILJOE & TIFFANIE.MARIE

Seeing this Civic above was one of the many highlights of my journey to Japan this year. I’d seen glimpses of this EK before on Instagram as well as some other photos floating around online and was stoked to finally check it out in person. The owner goes by the nickname “Wharp Dumbo” and dubs the EK the “Miracle Civic No.1”. Love the livery and how the wheels were coated to match. The owner and car are also from the legendary Osaka underground “Wharp Racing” car club…

EK9 Civic Type R on SSR Type-C from car club “Pandemic”…

Beautifully-done Toyota Crown Athlete on Work Meister M1… For those that don’t know, VIP-style or “Bippu” culture is huge in Osaka and it is believed that the style originated and was popularized in this region…

Oka’s Z33 with Rocket Bunny kit is by far one of my favorite builds in Japan. Not simply because of the Rocket Bunny aero, which I am not honestly that huge of a fan of but I love this build as a whole because of all the unique and personal details. You can spend quite a bit of time looking the whole car over from the custom interior to the Air Jordan/Nike-inspired wheels…

Another favorite is Mao Nakai’s Nissan Skyline GT. His car defines the new era of the “GT VIP” look and encompasses both the sporty and luxury aspects of many custom builds coming from all over the world today…

One of the cars that I had been hoping to run into this time around in Japan was the new “Red Bull” NO GOOD RACING EG6 Civic, owned by the current NO GOOD RACING boss. This EG used to be the red NO GOOD RACING “Shark” Civic that shared the same livery with a couple of the other NGR Civics. In January, while leaving the Osaka Night Meeting that we hosted, someone actually lost control of their car and crashed into the rear quarter panel of the Civic. I don’t think there are any solid clips of it in the Vlogs from January, but the damage was pretty significant. The car was set to be on display at the Osaka Auto Messe event so the guys from Mizuho Ltd. actually repaired and painted on this brand new livery in just about one week’s time. It’s interesting because it looks so different now but back in the early 2000s and before, it was pretty common for cars to change liveries overnight to avoid the local authorities…

Tomoyuki Sasaki’s Civic Ferio built by Tactical Art is one of the finest examples of a COMPLETE Honda build anywhere in the world…

Waki’s EG from NO GOOD RACING. You may have seen this Civic in action at some point in the Vlogs though you may not have actually “seen” the car, if you catch my drift… *wink*

This EG looked pretty interesting with the mismatched Volk TEs…

NGR EG Civic wearing the notable “Shark” livery in blue…

Check out the custom rear bumper cut-outs and the Osaka JDM “Devil” rear wing. Also interesting to note is how Osaka Honda guys run rear window banners…

25mm-wide Chargespeed front fenders with spaced Volk Racing CE28N wheels in bronze…

Every time I see this EG, I can’t help but think of the old “Red Bull” EF9 Civic which sadly, has since been repainted. It would have been great to have both cars together for a photo…

Always enjoyed the sleek body lines of the S180 Crown Majestas. This one looks especially good pancaked to the floor on BBS LMs…

Yasu Shimomukai’s custom widebody Audi A6 on 19×12 CCW wheels…

This Jaguar XJ-series looked so cool on BBS LMs. From the back window decals, the owner looks to be a member or supporter of TOP GUN, another infamous car club from the Osaka area…

The face of the Pandemic EK9 CTR…

Any and everyone was welcome to come join the festivities that evening at the Osaka Night Meet…

A nifty little Honda Today Kei-car wearing the famous Motul livery…

Another of the Miracle Civic No.1…

Nakai’s V37 reppin’ Phaze2 Japan…

Yuta mentally questioning what the hell Tina was doing…

Tina, for the newbies, is Phaze2 Mikey’s wife. This was her first time in Japan and experiencing the night/car culture in Osaka…

Happy to see that I am well-represented in Japan…

The Red Bull car from Tiffanie’s point-of-view…

Angel from Nemo’s-Garage taking in the Osaka car life…

We welcomed all makes and models to the meet so there was a wide variety of vehicles that showed-up, including Lowriders…

The Yellow Fever is strong in JC from Work Wheels…

Two AP2 S2000s styled very differently…

It wouldn’t be an Osaka car meet without at least one set (or pair) of SSR Type-X wheels…

A rear angle of the blue NGR Shark EG6…

JC Pepino’s AE86 Trueno…

The proximity of jacket zipper-to-S2000 ratio makes me cringe a little bit every time I look at this photo…

Lost in translation or nah?…

Lam-bat-ghini, perhaps?….

EK9 Civic Type R on Barramundi Design forged 3-piece wheels…

Yasu’s A6 was just finished days before the Wekfest Japan 2016 event took place. He had the car painted awhile back but was unhappy with how it came out, so he sent the car all the way to Tokyo to have another reputable body shop re-spray it in the same black…

Ken from Wekfest and friends chatting at the meet…

Many others also stopped to check out the Wharp Racing EK…

Someone was making a video for something or other that night…

Myself and Yuta looking on excitedly as things were going on…

A subtlety-executed Civic Type R is one of the rarer things to see in Osaka…

Autofashion Freddie and David from VIP Modular sharing some laughs…

A photo-op featuring a Toyota Celsior and its owner…

Tomomi Fukujyu was the model for Autofashion USA’s booth at the Wekfest Japan event…

EF9 Civic SiR on SSR Type-C…

A couple more of the Honda Today…

Photographers and videographers worked through the night to capture content for various websites…

JC Pepino’s Trueno on Work CR01 wheels…

The ever-eccentric JC was also found making-out with his own vehicle…

More of the slammed Bippu Jag…

WHARP RACING…

The parking area started to thin-out as the night went on but many of Osaka’s night runners stayed to enjoy the rest of the meet…

R32 Skyline on Volk Racing GT-P wheels…

Yuta Akaishi, serial squatter…

That’s a wrap folks. Wekfest LA 2016 event coverage coming right up! Stay tuned!!…

After chatting about it a bit on the latest podcast, I was asked if there were photos that I shot back then that I’d like to go back and reshoot. I thought about it a bit and was perfectly frank in admitting that I’d pretty much like to go back and reshoot everything that I captured since I first started shooting. With photography, there is so much to learn and improve on. Styles change over time of course and you just gather more information and develop better technique as you keep shooting. I myself have never claimed to be the best photographer in the world, but I see my fair share of cool shit and I think I do a pretty decent job of capturing it. These past two years have been the best for me, in terms of personal development of my photography skills. I’ve learned so much just from shooting a lot and watching Tiffanie Marie shoot. She’s shown me things that I never even knew existed about photography and I’ve just been watching her develop into a better photographer as well and trying to learn along side with her. Photography is a fantastic hobby and I’m fortunate enough that a lot of the stuff I shoot gets me paid as well so everything just sort of works, you know?…

With The Chronicles heading into it’s tenth anniversary, I thought it would be cool to go back and dig up some old photos from my early journeys to Japan. I didn’t start going to Japan until 2013 but the content I’ve captured since then while visiting has helped me develop a pretty big following. I’ve always shot more for content instead of strictly to shoot for ‘art’ I guess you can say, so I shot as much as I could while in Japan. Looking back through my old hard drives now, I’m actually pretty pleasantly surprised but what I had collected and thought it would be cool to pull some of my favorite photos from back then and re-edit them with the new techniques that I’ve learned in the past two years. I wanna say that it won’t make too big of a difference to some of you, but they look night and day different to me so it is fun for me to mess around with these older photos. For Part 1, I went through years 2013 and ’14 and grabbed about 50 or so photos that really stood-out to me. Some were because of the photos themselves and how they were captured, some were chosen because of the content that was in said photos. I won’t dig too deep into the backstory of these photos, as the old coverage still exists, but I’ll give you guys an idea of what you’re looking at…

The photos will be in the order in which they were captured from 2013-14. Enjoy…

2013

Salem, who has been with me on our Japan trips since the very beginning, missing only one year due to a last minute illness…

This train station seemed like a ghost-town with no one remotely in sight…

Seeing the Kakimoto Racing NSX for the first time in person was pretty awe-inspiring. The car is just simply beautiful and incredibly raw. Of the probably thousands of cars I’ve seen in all my years at TAS since my first trip, this NSX still continues to stand-out…

Carbon air box set-up on the Kakimoto NSX for the individual throttle bodies on the six-cylinder engine. It’s always a little cool to go back and look at old photos because I don’t even remember even taking this photo or having it in my possession after…

Another car that always stands out in my memory is this UCF20 Celsior with a Toyota Century front-end conversion. I remember the guys from Super Street trying to shoot this car after TAS on the streets of Tokyo and almost got arrested for it…

The first-ever Rocket Bunny Scion FR-S (It was a LHD USDM model) in Japan, parked inside the Enkei wheels booth back in 2013, then promoting the new Enkei RS05RR wheel…

The famed RE Amemiya ‘Hurricane7’…

I regularly ran into Jonathan Wong back when he was the head guy over at Super Street magazine…

My buddy Nick Caster came along with us for our first trip to Japan to enjoy all that it had to offer, which often times was raw fish…

Ryan Basseri from Rywire taking a Sake shot out of a fresh crab shell…

During our travels would often run into random car things while taking piss breaks at rest stops. This was definitely one of the more unique encounters….

The memorable Castrol #16 Accord Touring Car wearing its signature livery, parked inside the Honda Collection Hall…

Raybrig Kaneko NSX. I remember being inside the Honda Collection Hall and just being overwhelmed with things to look at. Crazy to think that they regularly rotate vehicles in and out of this display area. Imagine what they have in storage…

It wouldn’t be a collection of classic Honda race cars without the original #16 Mugen E-AT Civic with the centerlocking Mugen MR5 wheels. This is the livery that later inspired one of my current decals which pays tribute to the Mugen Motul livery…

The Beams Racing DC5 Integra Type R endurance race car, once piloted by famed driver/drifter Keiichi Tsuchiya…

Der was stoked to be in the presence of anything remotely related to Ayrton Senna….

My good friend Takeshi Kobayashi was kind enough to take us to Twin Ring Motegi to visit the Honda Collection Hall. This has always been one of my favorite photos…

Motorcycle circuit racing was going on that day at Twin Ring, and this Repsol bike was one of the ones I captured in the paddock…

Yosiyuki Hatano’s S2000 Type-S before he went with both the Spoon Sports and Mugen variations of it…

Takeshi always driving something left-hand drive….

The Tactical Art EG6 race car long before it was completed and long before it eventually was wrecked on the track…

The earlier years of Tactical Art when all the Civics weren’t even close to being the show-winning cars they are now…

Yasutaka Shimomukai working the JBBQ grill during one of our first big dinners in Osaka. We’ve since had many, many, memorable nights having amazing dinners with our Japanese friends…

I honestly really miss some of those earlier days when everything seemed simpler and everyone was just around to have fun…

Our first time visiting J’s Racing in Osaka, with their Fit endurance car and GT widebody S2000…

2014

One of the many incredible RWB Porsche builds at the annual Rauh Welt Begriff Party in Roppongi Hills…

One of the more interesting sights at the RWB party. Completely random and awesome…

I thought it was really cool how this Kei car looked wedged in-between two mini vans in the parking lot at Tokyo Auto Salon 2014…

Fujita Engineering (FEED) FD3S RX-7 with its crazy front end and headlights. One of our favorite things to do whenever we went to Tokyo Auto Salon was scouring the parking lot for cool builds….

A year later, another photo of the insanely aggressive RE Hurricane7…

The all-carbon Overtake R35 GTR showcasing the debuting Volk Racing TE37 Ultra wheel at the Rays Engineering booth. Such a fucking cool build…

One of the more popular builds during 13-14 was the Ben Sopra R35-powered RPS13 180SX wearing Rocket Bunny aero. This was when the whole ‘no rear bumper’ look was at its peak…

On this particular year, the GReddy display at TAS featured model Dannie Riel, someone who the Japanese were not aware of at all, haha. The GTR drift car however, looked spectacular under their spotlight…

I made it a mission to get at least one photo of the Top Fuel S2000RR every year since I first saw it in 2014. One of the greatest Honda builds ever. EVER.

Liberty Walk Performance and there always over the top displays. On this occasion they brought out their Kenmeri Skyline…

Ryan enjoyed his many beers in Japan…

Hiro Ueda, long before he realized that every restaurant we ate at was actually the #1 restaurant wherever we went…

One of the coolest cars I ever found lurking in the TAS parking lot was this BN Sports JZX100 Chaser…

R32 Skylines are plentiful in Tokyo, but not too many sat as great as this one did, nice and low on bronze TEs…

One of the craziest things I ever saw was seeing an Ferrari F40 LM on Roberuta air suspension. This vehicle also happened to have its own private security watching over it…

2014 was the first time we got to meet the guys from Lowered2Perfection and saw their collection of amazing, classic, Honda builds…

Kohei Taguchi’s Integra Type R on the move…

Takeru Tojo, who now owns a Mugen RR, then driving his Honda Element SC while Shota Mori shot photos of us taking photos of them…

Masaki Fukuda’s EG6 SiR is one of the best EG builds ever, especially in Spoon Sports-form…

Der and I taking in the sights at Arvou, which was deep in the middle of nowhere, Tokyo. This was perhaps one of the coldest days we had ever experienced…

Arvou is known for their fast S2000 builds, this white one wearing Amuse aero featured an HKS GT Supercharger…

One man’s trash is another man’s treasured photo. This Kakimoto Racing exhaust was just wasting away outside of Arvou, but turned-out to be one of my favorite photos ever…

FEED RX-7 on Advan Racing wheels at the famed Tatsumi PA lot where Japanese car guys often congregated for late night car hangs….

Porsche with a minimalist-take on a Martini livery, looking like something straight out of Wangan Midnight parked at Tatsumi PA…

It wouldn’t be a trip to Japan without a visit to Spoon Sports and Type One. I’ve come to see this S2000 race vehicle quite often during my many return trips to Japan. I always wanted to turn this photo into a poster. Maybe I will one day…

To be honest, the Spoon Sports EG6 build that you see above was so much better before it was completed. I loved how the car looked in this stage before they installed the yellow CR93 wheels on it. This too will some day be a print…

The Kanjozoku when we first started meeting up with them to go explore the Osaka highway system…

One of my top 5 favorite photos ever, captured luckily in focus with a member from every Kanjo club that cruised with us that night (Top Gun, Club Wharp, No Good Racing, and Law Break) all in one photo. This later turned into a poster and there is one actually still hanging right above my computer monitor now…

It wouldn’t be Japan without all that amazing food.

Part 2 coming soon…

When I really sit down and think about it, the 2015 trip to Japan was probably the best, just in terms of sheer visual content and experience. I shot so much that trip. Even going through the photos now, I find it a very difficult task to really pull out all my favorite photos from that trip because there were just so many. I don’t even remember shooting that much but I guess that just goes with us being exposed to so much amazing shit. This was also the first year we started doing Vlogs of our trips to Japan and boy was it worth it. We were able to capture some shit that NOBODY got to see or capture before, and I think it really solidified The Chronicles as a major source for automotive content in Japan. I think we really turned things up a few notches with this trip. This might have been the trip when I realized that I was finally getting the hang of this photography thing. Everything just fell together so perfectly in 2015. It’s nice to be able to go over the photos again now and apply new tricks to old shots. I love reliving this stuff and I hope you guys enjoy the select photos that I pulled from my external hard drive to show you guys now nearly three years later…

I can’t believe Tokyo Auto Salon is in a few weeks. Let’s hope I see even a fraction of the amazing things I saw in 2015 on this upcoming trip…

Enjoy…

Our trips always start at the RWB Party in Roppoingi Hills. Depending on how crazy it gets on that first night there, you may or may not be able to get some solid photos in…

Luckily, I think we went there a little late that year and most of the people had already left to go inside the Hardrock Cafe for food, leaving the cars outside unattended. With little to no spectators, I think this was the only year I was able to really get some crisp photos in without people walking around…

While scouring the Tokyo Auto Salon parking lot, I spotted the first and only Ferrari F355 Berlinetta I had ever seen in person, this one modded slightly running a Racing Service Dino front lip, sitting on BBS LM wheels…

Also in the parking lot was this Mazda Cosmo coupe, which is not a very common sight in Japan in 2015. Such an oddball car but looks so cool with its very-90s styling…

…2015 also provided some really unique sights, like this Ford Mustang sitting on Panasport C8 wheels…

Keiichi Tsuchiya’s famed AE86 Trueno on a very unique display set-up by Fujitsubo on the then newly-released Work Meister CR-01 wheels…

Artis and Kuhl Racing debuted this insane R35 GTR which featured a hand engraved paint scheme. They would later follow it up with a Toyota Vellfire done in a similar scheme…

The debuting Rocket Bunny NSX at the Enkei wheels booth. This was actually Kei Miura’s personal NSX and the second to feature the Rocket Bunny kit. The first one went to the U.S….

The Kyushu-Danji R34 Skyline GT-R was quite a sight to see…

Attending the famed Robot Restaurant for the first time in Shinjuku allowed us with quite a memorable experience as well as some really cool photo opportunities…

I thought this looked pretty cool in an old film-like look in black and white…

The insanity of the Robot Restaurant is something that must be experienced for those who are going to Japan for the first time…

One more…

One of my favorite photos ever, captured inside the work space at ASM Yokohama of their time attack S2000…

My dude Robert Chew holding-up a carbon S2000 driveshaft with just two fingers, showing-off how light it really was…

It wouldn’t be Japan without the amazing eats. Gyutan (beef tongue) is my preferred meal…

Like any good meal there, it just wouldn’t be Japan without us making a trek to Spoon Sports and Type ONE. Not everyday you see an NSX-R engine just sitting on a rolling cart…

All you guys who model your builds after the Spoon Sports builds and want your engine bays to mimic their’s. There is no better example than an ACTUAL Spoon Sports engine bay…

One of the coolest things about the 2015 trip was being able to get out to Japan with my friends Robert and Yuri Chew…

A different take on the traditional Kanjozoku mask inside an EF hatchback in Kyoto…

The old IMPACT MAGIC LTD before they moved shop with the EK9 that eventually crashed and landed Sonoda in the hospital for a good few months…

I think 2015 was also one of the first trips we went to Japan with Sara Choi. We’ve made many trips back since then. On this night, she wasn’t feeling very well and rested while we ate dinner…

Hiro aka Japanese Yelp, always showing the world the #1 restaurants wherever we go….

Mecha-Dock EF race car during one of our first visits to their shop in Osaka…

One of the coolest Kanjozoku cars ever, the Red Bull EF9 Civic Si-R, then owned by No Good Racing boss Ryuji…

A bright red siren beacon lighting up the inside of the Red Bull EF…

I can still remember the excitement and awe that we all felt just hanging out at Car Make Across and seeing all these crazy Hondas…

The infamous Across EK9 Type R with its meaty Volk CE/Yokohama Advan combo in all its grit and glory…

The NSX that Joe from Across owned at one point, with LED taillights lighting up the night…

We ran the night that evening in Osaka, following the Red Bull EF9 and Across EK9 through the city until we met up with everyone at a Civic Meet, organized for us in a off-highway parking area…

A good friend later showed-up to grab some dinner with us after the meet. You should be familiar by now…

I can’t say I care that much about J’s Racing, but we wanted to show Robert and Yuri their shop so we stopped by. Good thing we did because they had some pretty cool cars there that day, including this J’s GT widebody S2000, naked and stripped of any graphical livery…

Hiding inside one of the service bays was a TODA ITB’d AP2 S2000 from Auto Produce PRINCE…

Raw beef sashimi? Okay.

Japanese Yakiniku or JBBQ is one of our favorite meals there…

I’ll save the 2016 and 2017 trip photos for another time, maybe in a few years. Let’s just say I’m ready and very excited to go back in a few weeks to see what Japan has to offer this time around. Thanks for looking…

This is the good stuff. I’m serious. If there was a “meat and potatoes” of my Osaka photo coverage…this is the post. Some of my favorite photos ever might actually be in this single post alone and it all just kinda happened by chance. I didn’t plan it, none of these shots were predetermined, I just shot what was happening in front of me and just doing whatever I could to freeze time. We were all just having such a good time in Osaka that I just wanted to see if I could hold onto it somehow and make it last forever. Realistically I just have no idea if we will ever experience these types of moments again with these people, in this environment, so it was important to capture it…

Having Ryan Der on this trip with me really helped to reinvigorate my creativity. Often times I think I can get into a mode where I’m just going through the motions and treating this like it is a job. Being in Japan usually helps me get out of that “auto pilot” mode but seeing Der get so excited about what was going on gave me new energy. We’ve had some great times together in Japan through the years but this trip was definitely one of the best ones that I can remember. Everything just seemingly fell into place. I guess you can say the stars aligned for us and all this great car stuff was just happening around us all at once…

Osaka Auto Messe itself was a three-day event for us from set-up to roll-out. And a few days after the show it felt like we had already seen more than most people would and we weren’t even in Tokyo for Attack Tsukuba yet! Spending three days at the same show sounds like it would get monotonous but there was always something interesting going on that we never even had a chance to get bored. The show and the people involved are just so quirky. I loved it…

Another friend I had with me for the first time in Osaka was Yonas Liu from Australia. You may know Yonas from JDMYARD who came out last year for Attack Tsukuba. He wanted to experience something new this year so he flew to Osaka to see what all the hype was about. When we were in Tokyo last year, Yasu and I were telling him how different Osaka was compared to Tokyo. Hondas and Civics in particular, are treated differently in Osaka and I think that made him interested being a diehard Honda enthusiast himself. Auto Messe had a pretty small gathering of Hondas and since he was only in Japan for a few days, we wanted to squeeze as much Honda culture out of Osaka as we could—so we decided to host a car meet after the second day of the show. I pulled my laptop out, put a quick flyer together to inform the people of Osaka, and shared it online. I really wish I had shot more photos from that evening but I’ve included what I did capture that night within this post. It was a bit dark at the meet and the cars were packed tightly into the parking area but I managed to get some good photos out of it…

The day after our successful night meet was the final day of the Osaka Auto Messe. I spent most of the weekend hanging out and doing mostly video but I really ramped it up with photos for day three. Towards the end of the day I even got to experience the roll-out and shot a bit during the evening. It started raining pretty heavily on the third and final day so many of the exhibitors rushed out of the venue as soon as they could to get their display vehicles back to their respective shops/garages. I’ve never seen a show clear-out so quickly. One minute they were trying to get spectators to leave and at the blink of an eye the convention halls looked like a ghost town. I thought we were gonna just go and grab dinner after we dropped-off some of the NO GOOD RACING cars but boy was I in for a surprise. We head outside, spot Tsuyoshi’s two Civics from NGR on the street, and Yasu tells us that he actually has to drop off his cars at the shop as well.  NO GOOD RACING Civics smashing down the Osaka highway with torrential downpour? YES PLEASE. Of course I’m gonna try to capture that with my camera. I’d be a fool to not take advantage of the opportunity. I’ve been so much more confident with my camera lately that I’ve been willing to try new things to really try to push my dSLR to its limits. I think you’ll see some good results from those risks that I took.

If you missed Part 1, click the link below to view it.

The Style and Nuance of Osaka Auto Messe 2020… Part 1…

There’s some chronology there if you need or want context to what you’re seeing. If you just wanna get to the good stuff, scroll past the link and get right too the meat and potatoes…

Before we begin, I’d just like to give a huge thanks to the NO GOOD RACING Family, Yasu from Exceed, Masao from Mode Parfume, Chiba from X-Point, and everyone else who was so courteous during our visit. Having these people around is what makes these trips worth it!…

After I spent a few minutes going through the full Junction Produce G50 President that you saw at the end of the previous post, I walked over to this beautifully built Toyota Aristo from Exchange Car Shop. The body has been widened and radiused, the aero looks custom, and the entire car has been resprayed in this pewter tone…

Here you can see how the widened rear quarters can house these deep, step-lipped Work Meister M1 wheels…

Full custom interior inside the Aristo redone with white vinyl and red suede. The plastic trim pieces in the dash are painted to match the suede and the MOMO steering has also been reupholstered…

Recaro SR3 seats reupholstered as well to match along with the two-tone headliner and center console with the “Exchange” logo stitched in…

Before the second day of Osaka Auto Messe ended, I wanted to get some more shots of the Civics from NO GOOD RACING. This is Tsuyoshi’s Japanese Highway Maintenance-themed EG6 which was once the NGR “Green Shark”. Other new additions since the respray are the white Volk CE38 wheels and the Exceed x Mode Parfume front aero lip…

Love the tagline for Shine Motor: “I SUPPORT ANYTHING WITH AN ENGINE” (SP)…

215/50-15 Yokohama Advan A050 wrapped around classic white Volk CE28N with the sidewalls painted with the Shine Motor logo. I’m glad the Chronicles’ decal suits the theme of the vehicle…

Kentarou’s Red Bull-themed silver EK9 Civic Type R with a carbon Tactical Art front lip and black Volk TE37…

The sideskirts and CTR rear lip have been redone in a high gloss black to match the carbon front lip and TEs. From this angle you can see the rear bumper cut-outs and the LED taillights…

Stoked to see The Chronicles decal together with a NO GOOD RACING one on an actual NGR Civic…

Ryuji from NGR’s Japanese Police Car-themed EF9 Civic SiR complete with an inflatable police woman in the passenger seat and handcuffs…

After day 2 of the show wrapped, we grabbed a quick dinner at Coco Ichibanya and proceeded to the Higashi Parking Area for the Osaka Night Meet we were hosting. It’s been a while since we planned a gathering in Osaka so I didn’t really know what to expect or if people were even going to come. It was so last minute but the good thing about having meets in Osaka is that it usually goes smoother than Tokyo. They’re less strict in this area with car meets and police typically will cruise through the meet a few times but never really cause any disruption. All we had to do was keep everything a bit low key, don’t cause too much trouble, and make sure nobody drives through like a crazy asshole. A few minutes after we pulled-up, cars started to come in to park at whatever spots were available to them. Not long after,  the piercing sound of straight-piped Civics echoed in the distance like a hoard of bees signaling the impending arrival of NO GOOD RACING…

The guys from NGR pulled-up and parked as others continued to drive into the meet…

One of the original Red Bull Civics that we’ve seen before, the other Ryuji from NO GOOD’s freshly painted Red Bull EK, and Tsuyoshi’s BP-themed EF9 SiR…

The EF9 hatch is a car that debuted last year at the Osaka Auto Messe show…

This Red Bull-themed EK was painted just last year around September by Yasu and Exceed. The owner, T.Ryuji also owns the “Blue Shark” EG6 from NO GOOD RACING…

Osaka loves their EF9s and the meet definitely hosted a pretty solid collection of them…

Though it was quite dark inside this parking area, there were just some shots that I envisioned that looked so good that I couldn’t pass them up. Luckily I had my tripod with me but it took multiple attempts to try to capture these moments as people and cars were zooming by…

Yuuki Yoneda’s 20Crown laid-out on BBS wheels was definitely a vibe…

One of the Civics that I’ve been waiting to see since my return trips to Osaka was “Dumbo” from WHARP RACING’s EK. It was one of my favorites when I first starting seeing it online and finally had a chance to see it in-person a couple years ago. Since then, the car has been completely redone with a new livery and all…

What I really wanted to see was how the new Mode Parfume front bumper looked on the car, being that Dumbo was one of the first guys to have one. Not only does he have the new bumper on this Civic, he also owns an extremely clean blue EK with the same face…

The colorway, parts utilized, and how the Civic sits just gives it so much presence. In a sea of other Civics with wild race liveries and TEs, this WHARP RACING build still commands attention…

You have a lot of Civics in Osaka with full graphical liveries and then you have some of your cleaner, more subtle examples like this silver Zenki EK sitting on Sprint Hart CP-R wheels and color-matched EC Works/Five Mart reproduction mirrors…

A couple years ago, I spotted this white EK hatchback inside Speedforme’s body shop over in Sakai. It was all completely torn down and going through a rebuild but what stood-out to me was the “WHITE HAWK” graphic across the rear quarter panel. I didn’t think I’d see it again or really had any idea what it would look like when it was completely but I started seeing it appear on my social media feeds about a year later…

I finally got a chance to see it when it came by the meet and was able to get some cool shots of it with the city in the distance. I’m pretty sure that is a “love hotel” in the background which is a place that you can rent hourly to umm….“spread some love”…lol…

Every now and then a unicorn silver EK9 will appear and when it does, you better make sure to get some photos of it because these are pretty rare to come across…

And that was it for the photos from the meet. I spent a lot of my time trying to capture video of it and if you missed it, you can see that Vlog episode HERE…

The next morning was a damp one. It rained pretty much the entire morning and since the cars had to roll-out of the show in the evening, the parking lot we had to use for exhibitors of the show was this mud pit across the street. Everybody had the park there, even cars like this custom painted Toyota Century on Work Wheels…

Inside, Yayo was still doing her thing at the NO GOOD RACING display but luckily we had some reinforcements. Some of the guys from NO GOOD stepped-in to create a human barrier so the creepers didn’t get too close. They risked old man boners poking at the back of their heads and probably a good amount of open-mouth coughing…

In the Vlog, I showed you guys a car that hadn’t been unveiled yet at the Liberty Walk display and people in the comments were coming up with some pretty wild shit. I think some guy swore it was a blue Ferrari F40. Little did they realize that I actually showed you guys what the car was towards the end of the video, lol. It was this Calsonic-themed Liberty Walk R35 GTR…

I’m not 100% exactly what the back story was on this build but from what I gathered, it was actually based off of an Liberty Walk model car that a 16 year-old kid created. It won a model car competition, I believe, and Kato from Liberty Walk liked it so much that he built a real-life version of it…

So a guy builds a car that inspires a kid to build a model version of it, and then the guy likes it so much that he is inspired to build a real life version of the model the kid made which was originally inspired by said guy. Are you confused yet or is that considered things coming full circle?…

One of the cars that I was finally happy to be able to get some photos of is this one-off Liberty Walk R34 Skyline which is an homage to the DR30 Skyline Super Silhoutte race car. Kato’s new line of aero, the LB-Silhouette Works, is a modern approach to this style of aero so it only made sense for him to debuted an homage to that style but on a chassis that no one would expect…

Even more interesting was that under the hood of this R34 “Silhouette” Skyline was an old dual carb’d Nissan L-Series swap. The original DR30 Super Silhouette was powered by a 570 PS LZ20B engine which is definitely not the same as this, but those are difficult to come by these days and this motor is derived from the same family of engines…

The great thing about Osaka Auto Messe is that it isn’t nearly as crowded as Tokyo Auto Salon so you can actually get clear shots like this whereas in Tokyo, you’d have to be climbing over people or waiting until the very end of the day when the show has ended to capture cars like this…

Speaking of the LB-Silhouette Works line, Kato also debuted this one-off dry carbon fiber Silhouette Works GT kit for the R35 GTR…

An overhead look at the aggressive lines of the Silhouette Works GT kit with its dry carbon aesthetic…

I know people are getting tired of all the widebody craziness but I honestly really like the new LB-Silhouette line. It’s so different than what we’ve been seeing the last five years and it really does have a look all its own. I’m glad they went this route to keep this genre alive…

Not too far away from the Liberty Walk booth was this Ferrari 458 Italia wearing Liberty Walk aero that looks like it could have once been a race car that has since been retired and recreated. Some of the parts on it just look like they’ve been used heavily in competition while the aero looks pretty fresh…

One of the major indications was the center-locking hub and wheel set-up, along with the carbon ceramic brakes which look like they’ve gone through some duty cycles…

The body itself is fresh LB-Works kit just executed in a flat black to contrast the gloss black roof and wheels. The acrylic window and rear hatch also give indication that it was once a race car but I could be wrong and these could just be parts that were purchased second-hand from a race car…

A caricature of Kato from Liberty Walk on their new Jimny build…

Back in the hall where the NO GOOD display was, we took a closer look at the East Ball 240Z done in their signature gray color but wearing a Rocket Bunny widebody kit…

The L-series engine under the hood of the 240Z looked great, though it was still missing an engine harness to get the car fired-up…

The centerpiece of this set-up were the Jenvey individual throttle bodies which eliminate the old carburetors and gives the L-series a more modern direct-injection set-up…

One of the cool things about the NO GOOD RACING booth was that they were actually quite welcoming to families with kids. They allowed the kids to sit inside the cars for the parents to get photos of them and everything. A kind gesture from some of Osaka’s more notorious groups…

I’m sure you guys remember Mori’s Milano Red EK9 CTR from last year’s Wekfest Japan debut. The car hasn’t changed much since then being that Yasu has been so busy with other customer builds but for Osaka Auto Messe, they decided to roll-out the EK9 on a custom set of Desmond Regamaster EVO II wheels…

The turbocharged B16B is the same as you saw it last May but many Osaka car enthusiasts had yet to see this car, so it brought a pretty big crowd throughout the weekend…

For Honda enthusiasts like us from North America, we’re used to seeing engine set-ups like this nowadays but in Japan, it’s pretty rare to have a B-series turbo set-up like this with the dump tubes coming straight out of the front. One of the reasons why Yasu chose to build a Honda like this is because its completely new to most Japanese car guys…

Debuting this year at Auto Messe was the brand new Mode Parfume EG front bumper on this Civic bagged on SSR Formula Aero wheels…

Right next to it was Masa Chiba’s Candy Apple Red EK from X-Point, also wearing the new Mode Parfume front…

I personally like the EG Mode bumper more because I’m just more of an EG6 kind of guy but I’m glad these new aero bumpers are getting so much attention…

Towards the end of the day, we were all getting a little delirious so we had some fun shooting with Yayo. Here’s Der with his Mugen hat on and our friend Masa who came on the last day to hang-out…

I wanted to get one more clean shot of Yayo with the Civics so that the boys could use it for their own socials and I literally had to wait until the very end so we wouldn’t get swarmed…

One last look at the NO GOOD RACING display before it was all torn down…

We moved the NGR EF9 police car out first because it had to go back on a trailer, and then the Shine Motor EG6 drove out, which allowed for this clean look at Kentarou’s silver EK9…

The boys pushed Mori’s EK9 out to the trailer soon after. Again, as mentioned in the beginning, it was pouring rain so everyone was trying to get their cars loaded-up as soon as possible…

The beautiful Works-style S30 on SSR Win Mesh being carefully guided onto a flatbed trailer…

Mori’s Civic Type R being loaded…

I do love Japanese trailers and seeing people load their cars onto them. They just do it so gracefully, lol…

Though it was a fun weekend, it seemed like everyone was excited to get their cars outta there and go home…

The NO GOOD RACING booth came down quickly while we were outside watching cars roll-out…

I’m always happy to see the NO GOOD RACING family so willing to represent The Chronicles on their cars…

Finally at the end we had some space to breathe and shoot…

Before we departed, Ryuji wanted to get everyone together for a group photo. Pretty rare to see so many NGR members in one place. They wanted us in the photos as well so I actually had to prop my camera up on a ladder for this shot. I put that 10-second timer on and ran over to the group hoping my camera didn’t fall off the ladder…

After roll-out, I thought we were just gonna drop off some cars at the shop and go grab dinner but then we ended-up cruising back on the highway with the two Shine Motor Civics from NO GOOD. It was raining so hard by this point but the cars just looked so photogenic, and I was hoping the wet pavement would help give some light to the photos I’d attempt to take…

I guess you can say I was pretty happy with the results considering the conditions…

At first I thought these cars were gonna go onto a trailer but I think Tsuyoshi let someone else borrow his trailer so he just drove his EG6 and had another NGR member drive his EF9…

Advan A050 in the rain on the highway? No problem right?…

The BP livery just pops…

So fitting with the NO GOOD RACING “gun” hand gesture…

Most likely the coolest Japanese Highway Service vehicle you’ll ever see on the highways of Osaka…

I don’t imagine it was a very fun drive with the downpour inside a Civic with a fully gutted interior and likely no climate controls…

Somehow the photos just came out amazing whenever we had any glimpse of light…

At one point I was like “Man, can you imagine seeing something like this on the highway?”, only to immediately realize that I was ACTUALLY seeing this on the highway…

The crazy part was not only their driving, but the fact that my window was completely rolled down and rain water was just spraying into Yasu’s Civic interior. Yonas was sitting right behind me and he had to turn around and shield himself from the rain so I could get these shots…

At one point when we got closer to the city, I just risked it all and stuck my whole arm out of the car with my camera sliding off my wet hand and started firing away in hopes of getting one shot that came out decent with the city as my backdrop. It was all risk, and all reward as I churned out what is likely one of my favorite captures of all time. Everything just worked out perfectly with the distance of the two cars, the lines in the road, the way the city and the rain lit-up the road for me. What a way to close this year’s Osaka Auto Messe…

Hopefully you enjoyed the photos. Thanks for looking as usual and stay tuned because there is so much more coming from my Japan adventures…

It seemed like I had just visited ACROSS not too long ago but since Ryan Der was returning to Japan with me for the first time in what seems like forever, we had to go back to one of his favorite shops in Osaka. Joe’s a bit of an enigma so I just never know when or if I could even visit him but the last time I was there in January, I told him I’d come back to give him one of my old Volume 1 Chronicles books because I dedicated a chapter specifically to his shop and cars. He didn’t even know I did that so he was surprised to know that he was even in a book in the first place. We weren’t sure when he was going to be around so I just kept a fresh copy of the book in the trunk of Yasu’s car so whenever we did go there, I’d have a nice little gift for him…

After Osaka Auto Messe, we had some shops to visit and we also had to take Yonas to the airport so he could fly back to Sydney, Australia. His trip was pretty brief but I think experiencing Auto Messe and the Osaka Night Meet the previous weekend was already way more than he expected to see during his visit. We also weren’t going to stick around in Osaka much longer because we had to take a bullet train to Tokyo so we could attend the Attack race event at Tsukuba. Der also wanted to make a stop in Sendai before Attack so we wanted to make sure we had a few days to spare on the Tokyo side. The night before our journey, Yasu made a call over to Joe to see if he was around. I guess he hadn’t expected anyone to come by and was going to take a day off, but when he found out we wanted to come by, he told us he’d open-up the shop for us. I didn’t want to trouble him and stay too long so I thought we were just going to stop by for a few minutes and then go back to Yasu’s house to pack. What ended-up happening that night was so much more than any of us anticipated…

Joe’s black EK9 Civic Type R is far and away Der’s favorite EK of all-time. The car just has so much history and is just so incredibly raw that it became a favorite of both of ours years and years ago when we first spotted a photo of it in a parking lot of some car show. It hasn’t changed much over the years, which is great, but Joe has tinkered with it some and added some new aero pieces here and there…

The last time I went to ACROSS, the car was stuffed in the back corner of the shop so I couldn’t even get a good shot of it. This time when we stopped by, the car was front and center loaded onto his trailer which is stored inside one of the unit’s within his shop space. If you remember my photos from last time, the white EK9 was sitting in this spot…

That same white EK9 was parked in the adjacent spot this time around. It was nice that the car was just parked inside and nobody else was around because then we were able to move the car out to get some more photos of it…

If the black EK9 was the raw and gritty one, the white one could be considered the opposite. It’s still got a presence about it that gives it that “ACROSS” gritty feel but its much more refined in comparison. The exterior is just a factory CTR lowered on Crux suspension and 15-inch Volk TE37 with some decals and a number plate added…

The “Falken” inspired ACROSS logo across (no pun intended) the hood was likely a logo that was created for the EG6 which wore a full Falken-style livery that was crashed and under a car cover that I showed you guys the last time I was there…

I always love how rough Joe’s shop looks and how the surrounding buildings are equally as weathered and cluttered. The environment just creates a great vibe for photos, especially with a clean white CTR as the focus…

I really liked this angle with just half of the CTR poking out past the wall of ACROSS…

On one of the pillars of the building you’ll find old Advan tire labels affixed to the rusty beam as well as a “CLUB WHARP” racing team tire stencil which was likely sprayed as a test…

The ACROSS EF9 race car was moved out of this section of the shop on this particular visit. With the chairs there I assume Joe just wanted to use the space as a hang-out to chat with friends on one of the many cold winter nights in Osaka…

Again, the surrounding environment at ACROSS just makes for some awesome photos. Eventually Joe moved his black CTR out and I captured this shot of the white CTR before he moved it back inside…

What was completely unexpected about this visit was that we just wanted to see the black EK9 to get photos of it but then Joe asked if we wanted to go for a ride in it. I guess he’s been itching to drive it and since he knew Der loved the car so much, we could go for a quick Touge run in the mountain areas nearby. Der was a little nervous at first since he hadn’t experienced Joe’s driving before. Over the years, we’d heard some pretty amazing stories about his driving abilities and this was seriously one of those “bucket list” type of opportunities that we knew might never happen again—so of course we had to go…

Der hopped in, I handed him the GoPro, and told him to record everything that happened. Yasu and I would follow closely in his FK7 Civic but we knew there was a strong chance we’d lose them since that area was so dark…

I tried to get some rolling shots of it but we weren’t offered too much light on the highway so this was the best I could do…

There’s just something so incredibly surreal about seeing the ACROSS K-swapped EK9 on the streets. The last time we went out back in 2015, we definitely made some memories. To this day, it is still one of our most viewed YouTube videos and we didn’t even know how to film anything back then…

We weren’t on the street very long before they just disappeared into the night. Joe was on the move and we quickly lost him and Der at a turn and just waited for them as they went up the mountain. If you haven’t seen the Vlog yet, here’ it is so you can see exactly what happened…

It would have been nice if they had stayed up there longer but it started raining soon after and it was a little too sketchy to drive so hard with the roads getting damp…

We reconnected at a Family Mart parking lot after they came back down. Any time you have a modified vehicle parked in front of a Family Mart, Lawson, or 7-11, its an absolute MUST to take photos. I mean, it’s basically an unwritten rule of Japanese car culture, lol…

Joe’s EK9 just looks fantastic in black, with the blacked-out headlights, Tactical Art front lip and carbon doors…

The 17/16-inch staggered Volk TE set-up also helps to give it this menacing stance wrapped in Yokohama Advan A050 rubber…

Here you can see his rear bumper cut-outs as well as the concavity of his 17×9 +22 front TE37 wheels…

We spent almost 30 minutes at the Family Mart just taking photos of the car because we weren’t sure when we’d see the car outside again. Der was shooting film with his Leica, I was shooting my usual Canon digital shots while Joe and Yasu were just hanging out and drinking coffee…

At one point, a car pulled-up to the Family Mart and blocked my shot, not realizing that I was even taking photos of the Civic. Joe and Yasu asked them if they could move and it turned out that they were car guys as well and knew of Joe and ACROSS. I don’t know if they were intimidated or what happened but they jumped right back into the car and just drove-off without buying anything…

I wanted to take a close-up of the widened front fenders and the 17×9 TEs up front because I know it is always a topic of conversation online with people constantly inquiring about the FRP fenders. Just last week I made a post on Instagram to provide some more details on them just because I was getting so many messages about it…

Here’s the caption:

I’ve been getting a ton of DMs and questions in my comments section about the fenders on the @carmakeacross EK and I’ll try to give you as much information on them that I can, based on my experience with them, so that you guys can stop wondering. These fenders are essentially OEM style fenders which have been cut and extended to about 50mm in width. They are WIDE. A company in Japan manufactures them and they have been around for ages. I first encountered them years ago on the original LAW BREAK/Impact EK9 before that car was wrecked. You know them more commonly as “ACROSS” fenders because they have become popularized based on the Black EK9 from ACROSS. They have been private labeled before and are available via Yahoo Auctions and at one point, we even decided to try to bring them into the US to make them available here. You’ll hear some people claim that they are the first to have them on their Civic in the US but we’ve actually had a set on @studytuned’s Civic for about two years now. You just don’t notice them as much because there is a livery covering it. @latommyla is trying to get his set to fit right now and he’s making good progress but the main reason why we haven’t brought more sets in is because of fitment issues. Yes they are wide but they are OEM style which means they still use the OEM mounting points. The problem with that is that you cannot turn if you wish to run a 17×9 +22 wheel as seen here. The tire will hit on both ends. To alleviate this issue, custom brackets have to be made for clearance and that means the bumper and headlight fitment will be compromised. That and not a whole lot of people are willing to put in the time to massage these to fit. There’s actually quite a bit of trimming and cutting involved around the wheel arch. Tommy and @wil1ywonka are currently doing that from what I’ve seen. They are your run of the mill FRP fenders and also don’t fit true to OEM even with stock bodyline. You can probably clear them if you raise your car up but who wants to do that? Joe’s Civic is the perfect example of how to make them work and his car is great because of how rough and unpolished it is. I hope that clears up any “mystery” behind them.

After we finished getting photos, we said our goodbyes, thank yous, and then we parted ways. We had to get back to pack for Tokyo and Joe headed back to drop his car off at ACROSS. What an incredible night it turned-out to be and completely unexpected. Just another great time in Osaka where you never know what will happen on any given night. As always, thank you to Joe from ACROSS and thanks to all you guys for looking. I hope you enjoyed another rare glimpse into Car Make ACROSS…

I’ve been wanting to do some prints for a while now and finally pulled the trigger and two of my favorites photos and cars from my recent journeys to Japan. The first one is of Tsuyohi from NO GOOD RACING’s two Civics during heavy rain on the Osaka Kanjo and the second, one of the best of all time, the Car Mark Across EK9 parked in front of a Family Mart on a night after Joe took @ryan.der on a touge run in the mountains. Both are 24×36-inches (2×3 ft) in size, printed on high-quality durable 100lb. gloss cover paper in a matte finish. Limited to only 200 each, all will be individually numbered and labeled like my previous prints, and can be signed upon request. Super happy how these came out and even happier that these will be hanging in some of your garages or homes. These are now available over at our official storefront, NORIVALNOEQUAL.COM!!…

It’s been a strange time for me. I mean, there’s a ton on my plate lately but it’s just been a really odd feeling just being stuck here and not being able to go to Japan. Typically my Japan trips are amazing adventures for me to capture new content but the actual traveling part of it is usually my time to reflect and think about things going on in my life. It hasn’t been easy trying to process all that is going on in my mind just sitting in my office because I think the movement is important for me. Just the physical act of going somewhere allows me this type of release that I can’t get here at home. My moments of reflection are vital for my sanity. I need to escape from my own mind sometimes but without these long flights and quiet times for me to just process, I honestly feel like I’m going a little stir-crazy…

While I’m still unable to travel, and for good reason because Japan is currently in yet another state of emergency, Yasu has been carefully managing life and business in Osaka while still attending events. He doesn’t go out too much because work has kept him pretty occupied, but whenever there is an opportunity to go do some car stuff, he’ll likely go to support friends. Like the Asanoshima FF event, Yasu randomly let me know that he was gonna go to Central Circuit for a small track day and wanted to know if I wanted photos. I’m not gonna say no to new content so of course I was all for it. He also hadn’t shot in a while so it was probably a good idea that he got back into it since there were more events coming up as we head towards the summer. I don’t think there was anything major going on at Central Circuit that day. It didn’t even look like a competition or anything from the looks of it. I can safely assume that it was probably just more of a test and tune or simple track event for fun. You’re gonna see a lot of cars you haven’t seen before since many of the cars that attended aren’t the typical Japanese show cars you see that we post photos of. These are more local guys with cars that they only bring out for racing. Some of them are very rough around the edges and some represent an older style that was popular back in the day from the Kansai area. Once you see the photos you’ll understand what I mean. Enjoy and thanks to Yasu for shooting!…

Kakeru from NGR’s freshly-painted EG6 which was actually done by Exceed Japan. Rare to see a Civic from NGR without a livery but when you have quality paint, there’s really no need…

TRD widebody SW20 MR-2 which has been further modified in the rear with an additional flare. Very aggressive front splitter and canard set-up as well along with what looks to be carbon doors…

This event had a little bit of everything from your wild widebody MR-2s to this classic two-toned AE86 Levin running some SSR Longchamp wheels…

Black EF8 CR-X SiR with widened front fenders and a headlight-delete to bring some additional airflow into the bay…

White EK9 Civic Type R on white TEs from WHARP RACING…

A little surprising to see more than one CR-X at a circuit event being as we rarely see them much here stateside anymore. I had noticed that they were also starting to become a bit more scarce in Japan the last few years I’d been there…

Not sure what wheels these are but this EK4 Civic had a nice carbon duct in the front bumper as well as a fiberglass headlight replacement duct…

Do you guys remember the Banzai Attack EF9 that I used to always post about back in the day? The white one with the BMD wheels and the K-swap? Well that car is long gone now, I assume either sold or parted-out, but Banzai Attack is definitely still around and still messing around with the EF chassis. Here he is with his current Civic, this one still possessing a B-series powerplant…

One thing I’ll always appreciate about the Kansai area is their undying love for the SSR Type-C wheel. They always seem to pop up on Civics in that area, almost as much as TEs do…

Quite the diverse collection of FF Hondas that day at Central Circuit…

This EK9 was very wild in appearance, featuring a orange/blue/yellow motif with color-matched canards, and blue accents throughout, including the trim of the custom headlight duct…

Many cut-outs in the rear bumper with an OEM CTR rear lip still affixed to it in blue…

Under the hood is a B16B motor utilizing a modern coil-on-plug set-up and individual throttle bodies…

Here’s a better angle of the individual throttles…

Silver EG6 Civic running a pair of canards, a pair of TE37 wheels, and a pair of SSR Type-X…

The EK9 that we all once knew as the Car Make ACROSS Civic now in the hands of a new owner. The car remains relatively unchanged minus the wheels…

One of the best-looking NGR builds is this EK9 CTR wearing a full Red Bull-inspired livery and a Mugen SS front lip…

This Civic wore a Petronas livery with spaced-out front fenders for added width and a JBlood front…

The B-series set-up from the white EF8 CR-X I showed you earlier…

T. Ryuji’s “Blue Shark” NGR EG6 looking great as always…

Kakeru’s red EG6 with the aggressive front stagger…

Everyone lined-up and ready to go out for a few laps…

This EG Civic with a B18C-swap looked like it had some pretty extensive work done to it throughout. The front end remained unpainted so I suspect it must have been a recent addition since the rest of the car was painted in an iridescent blue hue…

The B18Cl set-up featured a wrapped header and J’s Racing carbon intake…

From the rear angle you can really see the paint and how it color-shifts under the sun…

The last time we encounted a Team Gachapin Racing decal was when we hung out with the guys from RANDAM in Osaka….

Ryuji throwing up the signature “gun” hand for a photo…

Hopefully the carbon fiber Tactical Art front lip survived the track day…

Another of the silver EG6 from earlier…

Banzai Attack on the move…

Speaking of RANDAM, here’s the widebody EF9 Civic that we encountered years back when Yasu introduced them to us along with their FC RX-7 and white EK. Good to see this car still intact and in full working order…

The Tactical Art front lip on this EK has seen better days. Still a great looking Civic though. I like the tie-in of red accents…

Here are some more photos of the Petronas-inspired Civic…

Switch panel inside the Civic with an additional screen mounted in the center. The factory cluster has also been swapped-out in favor of a digital display so I wonder what the second screen is for…

The gutted interior featuring a bolt-in cage and an ATL fuel cell in the spare tire area. Here you can also see that the rear hatch is made of FRP…

Friends and crew helped swap a new set of Advan rubber onto the Civic…

A couple more of Kakeru’s EG6 with the vibrant Milano Red paint. I can only assume Yasu took a lot of photos of the car because he was proud of his labor, haha…

Another shot of the white EK with the carbon canards and what looks like red Billion air ducts in the front bumper…

Civic Ferio on the track ripping down the straight with a Lightning McQueen livery…

I dig the yellow tint on the headlights of the red NO GOOD EG…

T. Ryuji heading back into the pit area in the Blue Shark…

Incredibly aggressive Integra that has been widened front and rear which I encountered once at ASLAN when we visited…

A look at the rear of the WHARP RACING CR-X on bronze Volk TE37V…

Yet another rare sight at a circuit in Japan is this Civic CR-X del Sol. You hardly ever see these in Japan anymore so I’m sure Yasu was just as fascinated as I was when he captured this. He also has an unhealthy obsession with del Sols so I can imagine his excitement to see this…

With that said, that’s all I got from this event. Thanks for looking everyone and I hope you enjoy seeing regular photo coverage back on the site!…

I can see light at the end of the tunnel…FINALLY. We are in June now and things are starting to open back up out here in California. By next week I hear EVERYTHING will resume as it did before the pandemic happened and that will be interesting. It already feels a bit weird being out and about lately but I think we all experienced a pretty strange time in our lives and there will need to be an adjustment period before we all feel “normal” again. Car shows are also on their way back now with the Wekfest tour announcing several dates to close out the rest of 2021 so I’m excited for that. I’m so used to being on the road all the time that I do miss traveling a lot even though it can get quite taxing on the body. I think the next step in our return to normalcy will be when the international borders open-up and I can finally go back to Japan. Last I checked things weren’t going too well out there however, and with the Olympics looming, I don’t have any idea when the border will open back-up for tourism Until then, I thankfully have Yasu staying active in Osaka and regularly attending events. He recently shot these photos from a track day at Central Circuit and unloaded them on me so I could process them for the site. Like the other track day we covered, there’s no real back story to it. The guys just wanted to go have some fun and drive their Civics around Central Circuit so Yasu tagged along. It sounds like he’s been pretty bored at the shop lately so having events like this help to get him outside. Give these photos a look and come back for the rest later this week!…

Kakeru’s Milano Red EG6 Civic with Rays Gram Lights wheels, Tactical Art front lip, some canards, and a vented hood…

Black EK4 Civic from NGR sitting on front-staggered Enkei RPF1 wheels and sporting a Mugen front grille…

T. Ryuji’s No Good Racing ‘Blue Shark’ EG6 Civic on some Enkei PF01 wheels…

Takahiro Ikegami’s EG2 CR-X del Sol wearing a full JACCS-inspired WHARP RACING livery…

This silver EG Civic looked pretty good with its full cage, TEs up front, Type-X in the back, and a traditional B-series powerplant under the FRP hood…

Idemitsu Motion-themed Civic on SSR Professor wheels…

Starting to see a lot more of these Petronas liveries pop-up everywhere…

WHARP RACING EF9 Civic SiR themed in yellow, blue, and white…

Mild scrub damage on the Idemitsu-styled EG6…

Some of the Kansai’s finest represented on the back window of Kakeru’s Civic…

For these types of track days you’re likely to see a majority of Civics on the track with support vehicles that are much newer, and well, a bit pricier…

From what Yasu told me, it was pretty packed that day, more so than usual since there actually were other vehicles driving that weren’t a part of the Civic grouping…

Red Bull-styled EK9 from NO GOOD on black TEs…

Zero Fighter EG wearing a vibrant orange chrome wrap with neon yellow accents…

The new Car Make ACROSS EG6 project…

If you love your FF Hondas, Central Circuit looked like the place to be that weekend…

Your first look at one of the non-Hondas at Central Circuit with this Suzuki Kei car on 14-inch TEs…

Really aggressive front aero set-up on this INGS+1 DC5 Integra…

Some Endless big brakes lurking behind the spokes of the Enkei RPF1 wheels…

A much milder set-up in the rear with just a carbon wing and the lower half of the rear bumper cut-out on the DC5…

Some USDM vibes with this EG rocking a old school STP red/white/blue livery…

This hatchback from PROTO-TYPE had a really intricate custom roll cage inside but you’d like not notice it because of its bright blue camo livery…

S2000 from Raft Racing running the new K1 Lab front bumper with an additional front splitter…

A couple guys looking under the valve cover to check the valvetrain of the YellowFlags EG9 Ferio…

Takuya from NGR’s EK9 that you all know as the former ACROSS Civic…

Inatsugu Engineering EG in matte olive drab…

Not sure where this EK came from but it was pretty intense with the massive rear wing, wide flares, and rear bumper eliminated…

A custom exhaust is routed into the vehicle and actually exits out of the center of the chassis of the spare tire area…

Technical Auto’s EG Civic running a TRA Kyoto Pandem kit with a modified front bumper and full carbon aero set-up…

Center-exit straight-piped exhaust on the Technical Auto Civic…

EK hatchback from JOKER running the ever-popular C-West front…

This S2000 on Advan GT wheels looked solid with an Amuse front, J’s front/rear fenders and double-vented hood…

Here’s some more of that wild EK from a few photos up. Check out that front aero with the huge canards and front splitter. The fender flares make the car look a little too aggressive but it definitely runs the right size tire to necessitate all that track width…

Wrapped around the red Advan TC4 wheels are 295/30-18 Yokohama Advan rubber…

Here you can see just how wide the car is now with the front/rear flares in place with the wheels pushed-out…

A more traditional-looking Civic with this EF9 that’s caged with just a carbon hood and no additional exterior mods…

YELLOW DRAGON FD2 Civic Type R with front wide fenders and rear fkares…

Zenki DC5 Integra wearing INGS+1 aero with Volk RE30 wheels up front…

Helmet and HANS device resting on the roof of the DC5. Looks like the owner is from JOKER…

You’ll start to see some photos of R35 GTRs scattered throughout this set of photos because this was a shared track day with a big group of them…

AP1 S2000 with an integrated carbon duct in the front bumper and a set of red Volk TE37…

There was also a Subaru out there that day for some laps representing Full Stage…

Some more detailed photos of the Pandem EG from Technical Auto…

Headlight on the passenger-side has been cut-out so it can be used as an intake duct for the K-series under the hood…

K-swaps are pretty common these days in Japan, as it has been for a while now, but this one was interesting because it retained the factory power steering…

Some more aggressive front aero for you guys with four canards and a bulky splitter that’s also braced in the center for added rigidity…

This Civic is also K-powered with power steering…

Custom rear diffuser set-up integrated into the rear bumper which also features some cut-outs on each end…

As mentioned, there was a pretty big group of R35 GTRs sharing the track that day…

This particular R35 was running Auto Select carbon front over fenders which provide that added width for the TEs wrapped in Hoosier tires…

Zenki EK9 CTR in black and yellow with bronze 15-inch Volk CEs…

FD2 Civic Type R with a carbon hood, Mugen front lip, and front staggered orange SSR Type-F…

The interior of the FD2 featured a diverse colorway with bright green Recaro SR7 seats, red Sabelt harnesses, and a blue cage…

Nice combination of WEDS TC005 and Enkei NT03 wheels on this DC5…

A random Mercedes A45 AMG on bronze TEs appears in the mix…

Not sure if this Liberty Walk widebody R35 made it onto the track that day but it looked good just planted to the floor in the paddock area…

Really wish Yasu would have taken more photos of this red A80 Supra so we could get a better look at the crazy aero on it…

It wouldn’t be a circuit event in the Kansai area if you don’t see at least one FD RX-7 make an appearance. This one was running aero from both RE Amemiya and TCP Magic…

White R35 GTR utilizing the full Top Secret aero kit and popular Advan GT wheels…

If anything, the wide wing of the Liberty Walk GTR made for a nice place to hang out…

Starting to see a lot more of these Rays 57FXZ wheels throughout Japan. Yasu seems to have taken a liking to them and even has a few sets on some of his own cars at the shop…

Interesting to see Signal Auto still active in the Honda community. They had a huge presence back in the day with a couple of demo cars that they built but I didn’t know that they still had Hondas to drive on the circuit in 2021. This one might be a shop worker’s car or something that may have been built years back because it has a bit of wear and tear, but the color is signature to their brand and its good to see…

The driver even had a full Signal Auto race suit on. The front of the EK looks like it has been replaced since the paint doesn’t matches but maybe they’ll eventually get this car all one color again, especially since Signal Auto has a paint shop built into their facility…

A B-series engine still resides inside the Signal Auto EK, with a custom intake pipe with GReddy Airinx filter and a full-size Koyorad radiator…

There’s still another set of photos from this event coming but I’ll cut it off here for today. Surprised Yasu actually took so many photos since he’s usually just hanging out and chatting with friends whenever we are together at these types of things. I always appreciate him picking up the slack though since I can’t be there so a huge thanks to him for the content and to you guys for giving it a look. Stay tuned for Part 2 coming this week!!…