On the 29th of October, the 9th edtition of Spikedama was held in Rotterdam; a city in The Netherlands. During the event, the Open Dutch Championship went down and our TRIBE team member Joris Schweppe took home 1st place. Competing against the former champion, Jeffrey Italiaander, Joris was all but defeated at 0-2 in Italiaander’s favor. Despite the mounted pressure, Joris stayed focused and managed to come back and win the final round with a 3-2 win.
It was one of the biggest turnouts of SpikeDama so far. The attendants came from all over Europe, it was the most international SpikeDama to say the least.
Joris won the competition on his Craft 2.0 Ash Kendama, which was released the same day at MKO In Minnesota.
Joris’ thoughts on the new Kendama: ”Its my new favorite Kendama. I learned new tricks incredibly fast while playing it. The shape is so refined that when I picked it up, I knew I had to use it for the competition.”
The SpikeDama crew is planning to blast out another event early 2017, This will be the 10th edition so hopefully it will be a big one!
MKO is around the corner and everyone is getting prepared for the contest. Each year the freestyle contest gets more and more intense as overall skill and creativity evolves in the Kendama world. The finals is without a doubt one of the most hype moments during the contest. This year we are very excited to have our very own Jake Wiens on stage not as an MC or a competitor but as a DJ! Jake has been producing mixes catered to Kendama play and is taking his skills LIVE to the main stage to provide the beats to fuel the freestyle gladiators as they put their skills to the test.
Jake has put together a live recording of his “SESH” mixtape that features a taste of whats to come during the freestyle contest. Make sure to download the mix for free, grab some homies, and SESH!
This year marked the 30th anniversary of JapanFest Atlanta. Kendama USA had the pleasure of participating in the event for the 3rd year in a row. Going to JapanFest is always an amazing time for us to experience the culture from which our favorite toy comes originates. It also allows us to meet new people and get them excited to try out Kendama. There is so much to do at JapanFest from drum shows, sumo matches, Kabuki Shows, and even eating some amazing authentic Japanese food. It also provides the opportunity to pick up merchandise from your favorite animes while getting to know new people and trying new things. This year, Jake Kopanski and Ryan Plourd were holding it down for KUSA, putting on 2 shows and a workshop to teach Kendama to everyone who was interested. It was great teaching new people how magical Kendama is and we hope to see you there again next year!
We’d also like to give a special shout out to NANA, a company we had collaboration with during the weekend. You can check out their app by clicking here.
Thank you to all of the local players that came out and helped with the event. Damafam is strong!
We are so proud to announce that Nobu Nori is the newest member added to our Tribe team. Nobu is our first Japanese team member and has always impressed us with his incredible Kendama play, style, and positivity.
