2021 "Festive 500"

The Pelso prays for world peace at the shrine just outside Haneda airport.

After the 300/400/300km brevets I joined in late October through mid-November, I have taken a short vacation from longer rides, with only a few ~50km coffee rides with the Tokyo Cranks from November 20 and December 23. I will rejoin Audax events from next March, but hope to focus on swimming in January and February. 

So I was not sure if I would be able to get in enough short rides to clear the Festive 500 (500kms during Dec 24 to Dec 31). I did so, finishing with a short spin this morning, the 31st. I ended up doing more than 60% of the distance on the Pelso recumbent.

The first ride was a flat trip to Soka City, Saitama to pick up a bicycle component and meet Sashikata-san, the only recumbent dealer in Kanto (who is very much on a part-time basis, his main business involving supply of classroom desks to schools).  The next ride of significance was a trip to and from Mitaka for an appointment -- I headed down to Haneda, then up the Tamagawa, and on the way back went to Mitaka. Then on the 29th I took a short ride on the Parlee with Jerome and Peter, also the Tamagawa with "hospital hill" and "I-ro-ha-zaka". The last long ride, the longest of the week at 107kms, was again to Mitaka via Haneda and the Tamagawa ... with a return also via the extended, indirect route.

As always, when I ride the Pelso, I hear plenty of exclamations as I pass by groups of people. "Sugoi. Are nani?" (Wow. What is THAT?)  

The Tamagawa looked as if it is ready for the New Year. I often feel like riding along the river is just the boring, same old route that one needs to get through in order to enjoy the "good stuff" once into the mountains further out of town. But on December 30, on the Pelso, the Tamagawa, and the sky with its changing colors as the day went on then faded away, was enough of a reward in and of itself. 

The water skiier I saw near Kawasaki was the icing on the cake.

Festive 500 2017 - End of Year Rides

This year I missed the first two days of the Strava / Rapha Festive 500 for a trip to Nagano (by car) with visiting family on December 24th and 25th, but was hell bent on completing the Festive 500 challenge in the remaining six days to get in some long, slow distance and to begin training for the new year.

I think it worked. On January 1, my legs are stiff and muscles tired.

But over the course of the week I felt as if I was slowly creeping back into the cycling shape I had a year and more ago. The last half of 2017 was a bit of a bust from a cycling perspective. My last big, big rides were the Isabella Byrd series over Golden Week, and not enough training, or focus, since: A failed half-effort at SR600 Nihon Alps on the only plausible weekend to try during the fall -- doomed from before the start by an approaching typhoon. No brevets.

Leaving aside some short unrecorded in-town rides to work and nearby locations on the first two days, the last week of the year I managed:

12/26  57.7kms
12/27  67.6kms
12/28  92.3 + 6.3 kms (98.6 kms)
12/29  98.7 + 3.4 + 37.3 kms (139.4 kms)
12/30  68.4 + 2.5 + 2.4 kms (73.3 kms)
12/31  103.9 + 15.0 kms (118.9 kms)
(and another 14.4 back home from the New Year party at Jerome's sister's place that did not "count" since after midnight).

So 556 kms of "official" mileage and another probably 25 kms of "unofficial".  This is good enough for 5,330th place out of over 80,000 participants in the Festive 500. Just doing 501 kms would be only good enough for something like 17,000th place. Another 100+kms and I would be in the top 1,000 globally. That gives a good idea how many people are just focused on getting to 500!

I think doing all of these shorter rides, at moderate pace, stretched out over the week, was much better for conditioning than 2 years ago when I did nearly half the mileage on one long final day. I could also use the opportunity to explore "exit routes" by bicycle from my new home in Takanawa, and I found one good one that gets me a good part of the way south from here toward the Tamagawa, Haneda Airport, and the border with Kawasaki, while avoiding the main roads. Also, I re-learned the lower stretch of paths along the Tamagawa, from Haneda to Marukobashi, and realized that much of it can be a good training route.

Lower Tamagawa stretch

Now two days off the bike, then the 2018 campaign begins!

"I'll have a pizza and an IPA."

Enjoying my "just right" Q36.5 winter wear.