for the story, check out Tom's blog: http://vlaamsewielrenner.blogspot.com/2008/08/well-done-on-roast-mountain.html
04 August 2008
The 2nd Enzan-Odarumi Slowrun Classic in pictures
for the story, check out Tom's blog: http://vlaamsewielrenner.blogspot.com/2008/08/well-done-on-roast-mountain.html
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
6 comments:
Hi Michael,
Hope you have recovered from the heat by now! Just wanted to tell you that Nishibe-san has paid me the 7,500 yen for the jersey. I'll pay you when we next meet (Aug. 17 Tokyo HC?).
Cheers,
Tom
I was just glad that I could do something for Belgian unity by snapping the photo at the top of Wada that shows Flemish and Walloon representatives shaking hands (with the German threat encroaching from off camera).
Best, David
It was a good snap indeed. Tom is bringing it to Belgium later this week, together with a peace sign (but without the hand-knit "Save the whales" pullover) to show them back home that there are many ways to get along. He'll speak in Parliament and recommend that politicians on both sides go for a ride and sort themselves out on mountain tops. Those have proven very efficient in the past, even before bicycles were invented (remember the guy who went up a hill and came down with stone tablets?). But I digress...
Many thanks to Tom and Michael for making this second edition happen. This motivates me again!
...what happened...I can't remember anything. Finally after many days in agony, I can move my hands and feet again and the fog is moving out of my brain and I start to think clearly again.
I just recall that Tom asked me to join a leisurely and slow ride somewhere in the countryside. The next thing I remember was trying to get up to Wada Toge in the torching heat, David getting first jason'ed and later jettisoned. But this was not the end of this brutal nightmare....golf club hills, two of them in bloody Uenohara, followed by Tawa and Tsuru Toge, places which will be remembered in history just as My Lai, Kursk and the killing fields of Cambodia .... a feverish nightmare right out of the feather of Joseph Conrad leading me into the heart of darkness: Imagawa Toge. Was there really a road? It seems like I have climbed zigzaging a vertical piece of flat rock. I remember Laurent desperately holding to a lamp post, trying to avoid to get sucked into the abyss. And Tom's devilish laughing voice: "It's just around the next bend" But what was thre? Just another bend leading to another impervious obstable.
Impossible to continued to Yanagizawa, so I call it a day and make it somehow home from Okutama on the train.
In a Freudian slip I throw my cap and gloves into the wastebin instead of the laundry basket. I feel ready to retire from cycling.
Did all of this really happen?
So today I took the morning off from work and made a leisurely tour to Jerome's hill. 110 km, some 500 meters of climbing, the perfect ride for the start or the end of the season, nothing too demanding. However, there is this heat again.The first one or two hours are somehow to bear, but it gets harder with time. I made the first rest already on the road between Tamagawa and Itsukaichi. I have done this loop without making any rest at all in a little bit more than 4 hours: 2 hours to the top of Jerome hill, two hours back.
I come to the Sakamoto crossing and start to sprint up Jerome hill, the time is not bad, a little bit less than 9 minutes, but also not really good. On the top of Jerome's hill I collapse and take a longer break to recover. Then I fly down the hill hitting 70 km/hr.
After that everything is downhill. I mean first I go down the hills to the Tamagawa, then I cannot ride fast for longer stretches. I am so exhausted by the heat. I take another break at Y-Park and buy some unnecessary things just to escape the heat outside. My cycle thermometer shows 43 degrees. Is this possible? Somehow I make it home, the whole trip consists of 6 hours, thereof 4 plus something of riding.
Really, normally this is just a piece of cake for me. So happy to be back in the cool office afterwards.
So, what is the plan for this weekend? I have plans with my family for Saturday, but I would be available on Sunday. But nothing extreme please.
Post a Comment