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Shogun Bicycles

The Shogun bicycle brand was created by Rio Marui in 1977, who also owned the Tioga brand of components and tires, was the sole distributor of Shimano components to the US ¹⁾, distributed Mitsuboshi tires ²⁾ and supplied complete bikes to other brands, such as American Eagle. Since 2004, the Shogun brand has been owned by Kent International of New Jersey, where it continues to sell over 42 different models of Shogun, most of which are mountain bikes.

Info from: classicjapanesebicycles, proteanpaper, bikepro, dropbox, kent.bike.

Rio Marui (3rd from left,) with the CEOs of Shimano and other manufacturers looking at a future export to the US. 1972. proteanpaper
An American Eagle bike, exported by Marui/Shogun to WCC/Howie Cohen³⁾

1984 MTB-I

AKA MTB-1. Shimano RD-AL11 (1984-5), slingshot stem

1984 MTB-I facebook

1985 Prairie Breaker 1

RD-AL11 (1984-86), bullmoose bars, biplane forks.

The name ultimately comes from a type of long plow - but it happens that in 1983-84 there was a very successful American race horse, also named Prairie Breaker. At that time Rio Marui's son Shinji was living in Glendale, CA, helping with importing various Marui brands and apparently hedging Marui Ltd.'s investment bets.

1985 Prairie Breaker 1 bikeforums

1986 Prairie Breaker 1

Shimano Light Action RD-L525 (1986), bullmoose bars, biplane forks

1986 PB1 bikeforums

1987 Prairie Breaker PRO

The “economical version of our top-of-the-line Team Issue ATB.” A triple triangle, which coincidentally appears at the same time GT also adopts the new style craze. Catalog pic, Shimano Deore MT-60 (1987-88)

1987 Prairie Breaker PRO mtbr

1988 Trail Breaker 1

The Edsel of mountain bikes. High rise stem, oval “chain disc” crankset cover. These are still available. Shimano Light Action L532 (1987-88), “made in Taiwan” sticker

1988 Trail Breaker 1 facebook

1989 Ground Breaker

Shimano Mountain LX (1989) groupo, “black/marigold duotone colors.”

1989 Ground Breaker yahoo.co.jp

1990 Prairie Breaker Team

Shimano XT M732 (1989), 26.5 pounds.

1990 Prairie Breaker Team dropbox

1991 Prairie Breaker Expert

Deore LX (1990-92)

1991 Prairie Breaker Expert bicycles.net.au

1992 Prairie Breaker XTR

Full XTR group, Marzocchi XC-100 forks. Pic from the 1992 Shogun catalog.

1992 Prairie Breaker XTR dropbox

1993 Prairie Breaker Expert

Unknown components.

1993 Prairie Breaker Expert bicycles.net.au

¹⁾

Marui remains the top Shimano US distributor today: datamyne.

²⁾

Marui supplied Specialized with Mitsuboshi tires branded as Specialized.

³⁾

Howie had his fingers in many brands, such as Cycle Pro, Nishiki, Kuwahara and others. See also: proteanpaper.

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