Golden Cat Cup – Kinneko Cup

Enoshima, Japan, December 6, 2025. The Snipe racing season for the Kanto Fleet concluded with the traditional and fun year-end event, the Kinneko Cup, held in Enoshima. Despite uncertain weather conditions and extremely unstable winds, which forced the Race Committee to deem only one race valid for the entire competition, the event still drew a large turnout.

A total of 71 teams participated in this prestigious club-level regatta.

Victory went to Takuto Iwakoshi and Yamato Haga from the Tokyo Institute of Science.

The winners received the iconic trophy, a gold Maneki-neko (the Japanese ‘beckoning cat,’ a symbol of good luck), and with it, the honor of taking on the role of Race Officer for the next edition of the Kinneko Cup.

Final results after 1 race:

1. Iwakoshi Takuto & Yamato Haga
2. Fuma Takashima & Hanto Hotta
3. Shinichiro Yano 6 Kaho Matsubara
4. Itaru Hirohara & Ryotaro Udagawa
5. Yutaro Fujimori & Honoka Miura

The History of the Kinneko Cup

The Kinneko Cup is a Snipe Class club race founded in 1995 by volunteers from the Enoshima Snipe Study Group. Conceived as a year-end social event, the race began with the light-hearted goal of determining “who was the fastest when they really tried” that season.

The famous cat statuette was purchased by Mr. Jiro Yamamoto at an Enoshima souvenir shop during the first edition when no suitable trophy could be sourced, and it has remained the distinctive symbol of the regatta ever since.

Photos: Bulkhead Magazine/M. Hada and Yuka Nishimura