Must Watch! James White: In Control

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It’s hard to put into words what I want to say regarding James White’s new, incredible “In Control” edit. I feel there is so much to cover, of course, I am compelled to give it my best shot!

Whilst many are only posting clips to Instagram and concentrating on contest riding, James — at the age of 55 — is arguably one of the most active flatland riders on the planet outside of the contest arena over the past several years. When you consider his regular Instagram posts, the quality of his creative, no compromised riding style, and the standard of his filming and editing, it’s truly a whole package.

Back in the summer, at Bob Haro’s iKonix launch, I said to James — tongue in cheek — “You’ve been quiet on socials in recent months, what’s going on?”

He replied, “I’m working on a big edit, around 13 minutes. It’ll be coming out in November.”

James is one of the most influential riders on the flatland scene, and I hope that by going the extra mile on filming this video part, it inspires others to do the same on their own journey.

I’ve just returned from my trip to Japan today, so I realise I’m a little late posting this — but it’s really good to see a video over four minutes being shared and watched over and over. Is this the start of a shift in social media trends? People do have attention spans after all judging by the view count already!

Top marks to Whiteski, one of the best edits of the year!

Yu Katagiri wins Fise World Sakai, Japan / UCI Freestyle World Cup 2025

Congratulations to Yu Katagiri, winner of the last stop of the UCI Freestyle World Cup out here in Sakai, Japan.

Yu was followed on the podium by his brother, Ryo Katagiri and young buck Ren Oshima in the third place podium spot. What a level in the final as you would expect in Japan.

Yu Shoji won the year end ranking followed by Yu Katagiri and Julien Baran.

Men’s Elite final result:

Carin Hommura wins Fise World Sakai, Japan. UCI Freestyle World Cup

Congratulations to Carin Hommura winner of the Womens Elite class at Fise World, last stop of the UCI freestyle World Cup here in Sakai, Japan. Carin was followed by Ayuna Miyashima in the second place, and Nina Suzuki on the third place podium spot.

The surprise being the 2025 UCI World Champion, Chiaki Todaka off the podium spots in fourth place. Great riding from all the women, level is going up each event.

17 YEARS OF FLATMATTERSONLINE

27th November 2008, it all began as a blogspot for Flatmattersonline!

It’s quite fitting, that I celebrate 17 years of Flatmattersonline today here in Japan, widely known as the most progressive country in the flatland world.

What do I celebrate about 17 years of running FM? I celebrate the flatland community, everyone who’s made a video, and in turn shared it the community, the original ethos of the website hasn’t changed in the last 17 years, and it’s something I still use in my own riding day to day.

“To document, share and progress! “.

For personally, I think the biggest celebration is the fact I’m still going all these years on, you can’t really realistically wish for anymore than that, more recently faced a big challenge with the website keep going down. Thankfully my good friend, Martin Northern was able to save the website and all that content.

Thank you Martin! 

Who’s been here since the beginning? Would love to hear people’s first memory.

Happy 17 years to Flatmattersonline, long may it continue. 

  • Effraim. 
  • It’s also almost time for the 2025 Flatmattersonline year end awards, again this is something I wanted to do to give back to the flatland culture, and celebrate much more than rider of the year (although that’s of course an important award!). Stay tuned for that announcement around mid December! 

Naoto Tamaru & Carin Hommura win 2025 Flatark + Full results

The annual Flatark contest just went down this past weekend at the Yokohama Urban Sports Festival! 

Congrats to Naoto Tamaru taking the win in the Open class hitting all his signature stuff with style and flow he is infamous for, followed by Ren Oshima (see photo below) and Takato Moriya in the third place spot mixing bangers front and back wheel!

In the women’s class, Carin Hommura took the win, just ahead of Nanue Takahashi and Nina Suzuki in third (see photos below in order of placing), the level is getting better each event as cliche’ as that is to say, it’s true!

Great to watch this event using a similar style to street league in skateboarding, each combo pulled was scored live. 

Podium Results:

Open Class.

1st Naoto Tamaru 

2nd Ren Oshima 

3rd Takato Moriya

Womens Class.

1st Carin Honmura 

2nd Nanae Takahashi 

3rd Nina Suzuki

Expert Class.

1st Sota Watanabe 

2nd Ginsei Kawauchi 

3rd Ryuya Kanamoto

Novice Class.

1st Jiro Kaneko 

2nd Joji Harafuji 

3rd Hiromu Ide

Photo credit: @hikarufunyu 

Olly- Hood Cast #2: Yu Katagiri Podcast

Jigen Omothehara just started a podcast, covering Japanese riders that many times I’ve said with riders globally “we don’t know much about”… Jije hits the ground running with his second episode guest being the 2025 UCI World Champion Yu Katagiri.
They discuss contest formats, the need to be aggressive in the contest environment, rather than focused on consistency, the national federation, contest surfaces, relationships, switching from front wheel to back wheel, Yohei Uchino’s inspiration and much much more.
Thank you Jije for getting this started, I’ve been waiting for something like this from the Japanese scene.
Well worth a listen with the English subtitles…