Tohoku Cycling Challenge and 1st Annual Tohoku Cycling Festival

Lowell Sheppard, Mark McBennett and Tony Torres, the three Amigos of Japan Coast to Coast (JapanC2C) are calling for participants to cycle with them from Niigata City to Matsushima City in Miyagi Prefecture from Sept 19-22 to help raise money earmarked for needy communities in the devastated Tohoku region, as well as for clean water projects in the Horn of Africa.

In addition to the Tohoku Cycling Challenge, JapanC2C is also hosting the 1st Annual Tohoku Cycling Festival on Ojika Peninsula in Miyagi Prefecture from Sept 23-24. Ojika was one of many fishing communities devastated by the March tsunami. Though rebuilding efforts continue on the peninsula, local residents are eager to welcome outsiders to their beautiful shores and beaches.

“I think the festival is good for the local young people” said Mr Abe, a long time resident and dairy farmer on Ojika. "Young people need to interact with outsiders and foreigners.”

JapanC2C is organizing the Tohoku Challenge and Festival in partnership with HOPE International Development Agency, Japan (HOPE-JP).

“Our goal with the Cycling Challenge is to raise funds that can help Tohoku communities as well as overseas communities become self-sufficient,” said Lowell Sheppard, a founding member of JapanC2C. “With the festival, we aim to highlight Ojika and the surrounding areas as perfect cycling tourism destinations. Bringing back tourists will help the communities become self-sufficient again.”

Anyone interested in participating in the Tohoku Cycling Challenge and Cycling Festival can register online at the JapanC2C website. Registrations will be accepted until Sept 9.

Japan Coast to Coast is a Not-For-Profit enterprise with an underlying commitment to social and charitable projects. Japan Coast to Coast aims to promote cycling in Japan and various regions as tourist destinations, with a particular focus on the Tohoku region in order to alert the world to the beauty that lies there and the need to help the region recover from the deadly quake and disaster that occurred in March 2011.

HOPE International Development Agency is a confederation of nine independent organizations working closely together along with local partners throughout the world to make poverty history. Since 1975, HOPE International Development Agency has been extending compassion to the world's poorest in a continued effort to create a sustainable solution to poverty and create a world where people have healthy lives and futures.

To register for the Tohoku Coast to Coast Cycling Challenge, visit http://www.japanc2c.com/current-events/tohoku-coast-to-coast-challenge/

To register for the 1st Annual Tohoku Cycling festival, visit http://www.japanc2c.com/current-events/1st-annual-tohoku-cycling-festival/