About Us
About Sand Sports Japan
2-8-17 Shinjuku SY Bldg. 9F, Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo
Please get in touch through our contact form.
Access Map
Subway: Tokyo Metro Marunouchi Line, Shinjuku-gyoemmae Station — one minute on foot from Exit 1.
Current Members
Christopher J. Green
Founder and President
Spins and flips wherever possible.
Paul C J Green
Founder and Manager, Head Instructor
Known for going HUGE off anything.
Promotional Events to Date
Trade shows:
Air Fly Indoor Snowboard Event 2002
Interstyle Board Sports Event 2004
Government sponsored events:
Tottori Sand Dune Sandboard Trials, July & August 2004
Tottori Sand Dune Sandboard Big Air Competition, May 2005
Tottori Sand Dune Sandboard Trials, July & August 2005
Tottori Sand Dune Sandboard Trials, May & July 2006
Tottori Sand Dune Sandboard Big Air Competition, August 2006
Magazine articles and advertising:
Free & Easy, Snow Boarder, Transworld Snowboarding Japan, POPEYE, Freerun,
LuxG, FTNex, Trendy, Gainer, Outdoor Japan, PC Fan, @Sports free paper,
Orange Page, R25, Sedan Meister and more.
See the scans on our media page.
TV spots, features and sandboard adventure chronicles:
NHK (Chiba and Tottori), TV Tokyo, Fuji TV, TV Asahi, TBS,
Cable TV (Tottori and Shimane), and a 30-minute competition special on Nihonkai TV.
Watch footage on our videos page.
History
Sand Sports Japan was established in June 2001. Its founder, Christopher John Green, had already been sandboarding throughout Japan since 1995. Chris, originally from Western Australia, ran a successful sandboarding company called "Dune Sandboards" in Australia for three years — paying his way through a Bachelor of Science with it.
Paul Green has been on board (literally and figuratively) since the beginning as a team rider, instructor, shaper and designer. Matt Van Niekerk joined the team out of sheer enthusiasm and an uncanny drive to go sandboarding, taught groups on the Tottori dunes for two years, and became our first certified instructor. Lumi Ozaki drove the promotion of Sand Sports Japan — magazine shoots, cable TV promotion and government liaison work.
Thanks largely to those promotional efforts, and to Chris' relentless hunt for the perfect sandboarding conditions, sandboarding has gone from unknown to a steadily growing sport in Japan. Find every rideable dune on our Dunes in Japan pages, and boards for rent on the rental page.
Former Members
The following members were integral to the promotion of sandboarding during their time at the company. Thank you.
Matt Van Niekerk
Manager/Accounts and Instructor, 2004–2006
First to land a kick 180 ollie on a sandboard, earning naming rights to the
"Van Kick Flip": with your feet out of the straps, slide, jump, kick the board around
180 degrees and land back on it. Takes a lot of practice — awesome to watch.
Lumi Ozaki
PR and Support Staff, 2003–2005
Tottori Sandboard Competition representative for SSJ.
Finally, two former founding members of Sand Sports Japan cannot go without mention.
Miss Takahashi (from Chiba)
1994–2000
Miss Yukizawa Emi (not her real name, from Saitama)
2001–2005