Craft-Bamboo Racing announces new collaboration with Yani Neko anime

• Craft-Bamboo Racing and Yani Neko anime (Chainsmoker Cat) have begun a new collaboration to bring one of Japan's fastest rising anime characters into the world of motorsport.

• Fans will get their first taste of the collaboration at the GT World Challenge Asia powered by AWS season finale next weekend

• Further details around fan experiences and limited collaboration merchandise will be revealed over the coming weeks, with announcements around larger activations to follow.

Craft-Bamboo Racing is proud to announce a new collaboration with Yani Neko anime (© Nyan Nyan Factory, KODANSHA/ Yanineko partners), which will bring the worlds of motorsport and anime closer together.The collaboration will launch at this weekend’s GT World Challenge Asia powered by AWS season finale at the Shanghai International Circuit (October 30-November 1).Yani Neko is loved for all her flaws. She is fiercely passionate about the things she loves, brave to the point of carelessness, and always there for her close friends. These features are what keep a race team going too, which makes her a natural fit for this collaboration.Race fans and anime fans have more in common than either might think. Both travel for the big weekend, collect what they love, and care about the smallest detail, and in Japan the two worlds already meet in Itasha culture, where cars carry the characters their owners love. This new collaboration sets out to create a bridge between anime and racing fans, making a home for people who love both, while bringing motorsport to one of the fastest-growing fan cultures in the world.The Shanghai event will be a teaser for fans to see what this new partnership looks like in action. Details of the fan experiences and limited collaboration merchandise will be revealed over the coming weeks, as will announcements around a coming larger activation event to be held in November.To learn more about Kodansha, visit www.kodansha.comFor GT World Challenge Asia powered by AWS season finale event information, visit www.gt-world-challenge-asia.com.To learn more about Craft-Bamboo Racing, please visit www.craftbamboo.com. 

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Darryl O'Young

Director I Craft-Bamboo Racing

"Dean Chen from Axon has been the main driver of this collaboration for our team. When we started talking with Kodansha about this project, the thing that struck me was how much our two worlds already have in common, and how rarely they get to sit in the same room. Yani Neko is a character people genuinely love – flaws and all – and I see that same affection in our fans every weekend at the track. So, this isn't about bolting a cartoon onto a race car. It is about giving people who love both a place to come together, and about introducing our sport to an audience that is growing faster than almost any other. We have been working on this for a while, and I am delighted we can finally start showing people what we've been building, starting at Shanghai, and with so much more to come."

Yani Neko Anime Committee

“It’s a great honor to collaborate with Craft Bamboo Racing! I imagined the race car was going to be blowing smoke in the exhaust and racing down the track, like how Yani Neko does, but someone told me exhaust smoke is actually a bad sign. Even though Yani Neko is a lazy, good for nothing, mischievous cat, with her strong momentum, passion and energy, I think she will be flying down the track.”