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Ryuichi Hekida, Nao Wada, Kei Munakata, XNUMXst year street hunter in Utah, USA TRIP (Part XNUMX)

12/05/2019

Five people, Ryuichi Hekida, Satoshi Wada, Kei Munakata, Kazunori Tanaka and Ryo Hiwatari, who traveled to Utah, USA for about three weeks from the beginning of January 2019.The purpose is to shoot streets overseas.We ask Hekida, who planned this TRIP, to tell this dense three-week shooting story in two serials. <First part>
Text: Ryuuichi Kabeta
Photo: Ryo Hiwatashi

Arrived in Utah, USA over 16 hours

I took a 16-hour flight from Narita Airport via Dallas and arrived at my destination, Salt Lake City Airport in Utah.I arrived at the airport on that day after 21:22.When I picked up my luggage and picked up a rental car I had reserved in advance, the time was past 30:XNUMX.We packed our car in a car and drove to this inn in about XNUMX minutes before finally arriving at the destination house.Here, I applied for AIR B & B from Japan in advance, so I was able to check in smoothly.

Due to the late arrival on this day, we had a midnight snack at the fast suede store "In-nout" near the inn at the request of everyone, and finished shopping at the nearby supermarket, which is open 24 hours a day.

The next day, shooting in the United States will finally begin.
First of all, I went to the home center to buy items such as shovels, which are important for shooting.

First of all, I would like to introduce the face of this trip to the United States.The members are me (Ryuichi Hekida), Nao Wada, Kei Munakata, Kazunori Tanaka, and a trip with cameraman Ryo Hiwatari.
I bought a shovel, a snow scoop, a file, etc. at the home center and headed to the point called "Rail Garden" after warming up.

I (Ryuichi Hekida).It was around the end of last season that I said I would go on a trip to the United States.At first, I started with a light feeling like "Would you like to go?" With me, invited Kazutoshi who played with me when I played Mini XNUMXWD in the off-season, and said "I want to go too" a few weeks before departure. For this trip with Kay who said

**Wada Naturally.A genuine street hunter born in Tokyo and living in Nagano.I'm doing BOSS for a crew called "Digi Film" myself.The difficulty is that the tongue is bad**

**Tanaka one year.Kazutoshi is written as one year.A late-blooming rookie born and raised in Chiba.During the off-season, there is a capacity at the Kanda store.**

**Kei Munakata.Born in Aomori and living in Wakayama, the so-called "Cannonball".As the nickname suggests, the guy who rushes into the momentum for the time being!The main sponsor is the bride's bar, Moong Moong !?**

**There are various things that are not sold in Japan at overseas home improvement stores, so it's fun**

**I bought all the weapons (scoops, etc.) for this trip.**

The park here has a formal name, but it's commonly known as the “Rail Garden”.There are literally a lot of rails in the park, and there are always lips made by someone on the rails everywhere.This spot is still a "sacred place for street rails" where famous riders from all over the world come and shoot.
Even when we were doing it, Spencer Schubert, who was on the REAL SNOW at the X Games, was shooting REAL SNOW almost every day.

**Even during breaks, all the stories are about snowboarding ... but if you think about it, all the stories are irrelevant.**

**Sikal skillfully attacks the rail.Everyone said that they wanted such a spot in Japan as well.**

**Take a video between riders and check the video**

**There was a lip on the bench in the park, so I just slipped like a hyena**

**The bench looks like it's not a big deal, but in fact ... it's made of stainless steel and has legs, so it's surprisingly dangerous.**

Utah with countless spots

There are many spots in Utah.You can find various things by searching for places that have moved a little or far away.
On another day, you can shoot at a spot on a manual pad in a park different from Rail Garden, or shoot at a basketball goal in another park. It is an environment where you can play.

**The girl was surprised that her height was the same as the year she returned from school in the neighborhood!**

**But when you leave it firmly, leave it!**

**One frame in the approach. (Middle-aged men watching elementary school students playing)**

Use Google Maps to find the spot you want to do, set a star, drive a car and head to that place.If you go directly to the site, there are rail locks, spots that you can not do due to difficulty in approaching and landing, and there is too much or too little snow.It's not so easy to find the best section.That's why when we find a good spot, we all rejoice with "YEAH !!" and raise our feelings with "Let's do it right away!".Finding such a spot is one of the pleasures of the street.

With that feeling, for the first few days, I moved from the morning to look for spots and continued to shoot until the sun went down.

At the place where the spots were starred to some extent, we set up a schedule to go to the spots we wanted to do while watching the weather forecast so that we could move efficiently while discussing with everyone.By the way, when I'm at an inn other than the shooting site, I enjoy living in the United States by checking the footage I shot and drinking alcohol while watching a movie.Sometimes I enjoyed playing pranks on the sleeping guy (laughs).

**Come back from shooting and relax in the room**

As the shooting schedule for the future is settled, everyone will put more effort into shooting.On this day, I headed to a spot where the flat rails were jerky and there was a section that looked like a lightning bolt.However, the condition on this day was quite bad, and due to the rain that started the night before, the snow absorbed water and the radiative cooling in the morning caused the ice hell and lack of snow.

Although it is in such a condition, it takes about 2 hours to collect snow and make an approach lip landing.Finally, I was ready to shoot and started shooting.Everyone struggled to leave a video in this section ... but here I and Sikal's board broke (bitter smile).