From ballet to breaking: B-Boy Shade yearns for Paris from a Japanese prefecture far, far away
With his roots in classical ballet, veteran Okada Shuhei is on a mission to reach Paris 2024 to help proliferate the new Olympic sport, namely in his home prefecture Gunma which he wants to turn into a breaking hotbed.
Breaking
Okada Shuhei dreams of Paris 2024 where breaking will make its Olympic debut next summer - all the way from his hometown in the quietly kept Japanese prefecture of Gunma.
And that means a lot to the B-Boy better known as Shade.
“Winning or getting better in a place like Tokyo where there’s a lot of people and tons of information available always seemed like a given to me,” Shade told public broadcaster NHK earlier this year.
“I thought it’d be much cooler if I stuck it out in my hometown and tried to make it out in the world from here. Thinking about the bigger picture of the sport, you have to build it up from the regionals at the grassroots.”
Maybe in another life, Shade, 33, would have been a ballet dancer, which he took up seriously when he was nine years old, becoming good enough to join a local company.
Or gone into professional gaming, his other passion as a youth, slugging it out with his younger brother on Street Fighter.
But when Shade came across break dancing for the first time in his life when he was 15, he knew. That was the moment when Okada was destined to become Shade.
“I couldn’t believe a human being was capable of moving like that,” he said. “It’s like nothing I’d ever seen before. The impact it had on me was nothing short of shocking.”
Shade is committed to trying to qualify for Paris 2024 for his home prefecture Gunma.
Fast forward 18 years and Shade is one of Japan’s top breakers legitimately eyeing Paris 2024 qualification.
He was runner-up to Shigekix at the All-Japan Breaking Championships in February and this weekend, is throwing his hat into the ring of the Asian Championship in Hangzhou, China, where the Asian Games will also be held in the autumn.
The path to Paris will not be easy for Shade, however.
He is currently 89th in the Olympic rankings, sixth among Japanese males (a maximum of two are allowed from any single country). A total of 16 men will qualify for Paris, with one place already reserved for France as host.
From Japan, the ever-consistent and potential gold medallist Shigekix - ranked second in the world at the moment - will almost certainly snatch one berth, leaving just one for all others.
Shade has yet to fare better than 17th this season when Olympic points have been on the line (Breaking for Gold International Series Madrid), and will need to a bankable result in Hangzhou starting tomorrow.
“I’ve always wanted to compete on the world stage, and to stand a chance you need to have the physical, be articulate and have originality,” Shade said in an interview with one of his sponsors. “So I never found the rules to be difficult. I approach it like I always do.
“To qualify for the Paris Olympics, it all comes down to the points you earn in competitions so that’s where my focus is for this year. I believe positive results will lead to good things in the future. Not just around me but there’s a buzz all around the dance community.”
Shade understands what it would do for breaking in Gunma if he were to qualify for Paris, let alone win a medal there.
With an acumen like a scholar, he regularly teaches breaking to kids at his base in the city of Maebashi, hoping to spawn and inspire the next generation of Shades.
And his message to them remains clear and unwavering: be yourself.
“With breaking having become an Olympic sport, I do hear people say it’s become more recognizable. Me personally, I’ve had more and more opportunities to speak to the public sector and different corporations, which I owe to the Games.
“The events I’ve competed in are well known among us dancers but when it comes to being a part of the Paris Olympics, the reach goes far beyond the dance community. To think that more and more people are becoming familiar with breaking makes me happy and I want to come through with all the support and expectations we have.
“I’d been thinking about calling it a career after Paris but now I want to keep going as long as I have sponsors and there are people willing to support me.”