RACING REPORT : TSUKUBA EIGHT HOURS ENDURANCE RACE

Japanese cheerleaders trying to spell "TOKYO" in alphabet letters.

It is Monday morning and after a hard weekend of racing I find the time to write about the race on Saturday.

From the start on we had difficulties to form a team. Alain and Olivier were on board almost immediately when the proposal came up to race in Tsukuba this year, but with only three riders and eight hours racing time we would have not stood a chance. And be very exhausted in the end. Alain and me tried to contact as many other riders as possible, sending personal e-mails, calling, resorting to blackmail and even offering money (well, 500 Yen of sweets to my son), and finally Jerome and his two sons Leonard (13) and Augustin (10) came to our rescue. I was very happy, as I had planned to attend another JCRC race in Gunma CSC the following day and I don't want to race 2 - 3 hours on the day before in Tsukuba. As we didn't know how many riders we were, I registered only Alain, Olivier and me as a three rider team.

So when we arrived at the race, we got only three team numbers and we need to change them secretly between the riders. This is not exactly the way it should be done, but as we had no ambitions to make the podium no harm was done [Note: Please delete all traces of e-mails discussing race strategy and podium ambitions send before the race from your PCs. It is just embarrassing.]

We were nevertheless probably the only six rider strong three rider team in Tsukuba ever and I still believe we deserve a special price for most skilled cheating and one more for radiating appropriate image of foreigners in Japan. I arrived early at 7:30 AM at the race track to reserve a good place close to the pit. (note: This is the image of us Germans, that we go to the beach at 4 AM in the morning, place a towel at a good place and come back at 10 AM to demand our rightfully reserved place). At least I thought so. But at least 298 of the 300 other teams seemed to be there as well. I found a nice place close to our pit nevertheless and erected our sunshade. After I fixed everything I was approached by two officials who told me that tents can only be erected at the yellow line and that I had to remove my stuff immediately. Yes, this is unfortunately Tsukuba. A lot of rules which are not necessarily logical but there since the race started. Tradition since 2003. More conflicts with the officials would follow in the course of the day.

Nevertheless I like Tsukuba. First of all, it has been the first race I have ever attended, at the tender age of 40. I was there with Juliane and the Veloz team [now: Tamagawa Cyclists] and we were doing pretty bad. But I was much impressed with racing. In 2006 we went there again with David, david and cycling Jane, targeting a podium place in the "racing mixed" category and in fact we ended up 56th overall and 10th in our class. Also there are always a lot of good looking female riders attending and many similar good looking family support staff. It brings tears to my eyes when I see how some of the riders are pampered by their wives and girlfriends. They prepare barbecue for them, hold umbrellas to provide shade on the start grid and they do many other chores I can only dream about asking my wife.

So I took our tent to the top of the pits where there was just some space free and then Jerome and his kids and Alain and Olivier came already.

There are some important traditions at Tsukuba (since 2003) and one of them is the cheerleaders performance from nearby Toyo Highschool before the race. I took a lot of photos this year. Actually I didn't bother to take much more photos after the cheerleaders performance. Of the race or so, for example. Cheerleading is very important in Japan. The main purpose is to cheer up the audience to survive baseball and shogi games. Often cheerleaders are supported by dynamic music bands to even enhance the cheerful atmosphere.

Then it was already time to start racing.

Alain taking position in his new NFCC team uniform in blue and white at the start grid

As Alain is extremely skillful of using his extended elbows (I still believe that he has some steel rivets attached to his bones below the skin) to push and shovel his way through large group of riders, he was the rider to start. And as usual, despite starting from position 174, so almost in the middle of the field, he managed his way to 7th place after the first lap and stayed with the fast group. After some more laps he was even in 2nd position which made us, and especially the kids very excited. Our best standing ever!

Alain in second place after the 10th lap (4th from the right)

Actually the kids should not have been that excited, as we decided before the race, that they would not ride in case we show a good performance. But of course we couldn't kept the pace. We cheered up Alain as good as we could, I even used what remained of my French language knowledge ("Allez Alain - only 140 laps to go!") and hoped that he stays out forever, so that I could enjoy the relative comfort of my camping chair and the good food brought by Jerome. But then it was Jeromes turn and then mine and then Olivier and we dropped to 20th place. So we decided to let the kids do some laps, whereas we dropped to 30th place. But that was ok.

In the meantime one of the race officials kept picking on us. First he was not satisfied how our team entered the pit area. Then he gave us a warning because we were standing outside the yellow line in the pit (as everybody else did) and then he asked me to fix our sun shade better. He was clearly looking at us and trying to apply some ijime at every occasion that was offered to him. I didn't want to claim, as our rather unique six rider three rider team was anyway constantly in danger of getting disqualified. It was getting really hot. Later the CICLO speedmeter on my bike showed 47 degrees Celsius. I don't believe that, but it was really, really hot.

The key to success in Tsukuba is to stay with a good and fast group and hold out as long as you can.

Key to success : Stay in a fast group, cooperate.

The track is very flat, so there is no much variation of speed, although you need to accelerate some times. Basically one can run all the time in a 35 - 45 km/hr range if you are riding with a group. If you are alone on the track it is rather hard to keep a good speed. In the afternoon it also gets windy, so in some places your speed might drop to 30 km/hr or even less. So the best strategy is to go out, take it easy at 30 - 40 km/hr and wait and preserve energy for a fast group to overtake you, then hang on to their tail as long as possible. My first round of laps was not very good, as I was on my own almost all the time and I couldn't find a good group, neither restricting myself to go slow. But the second and third time were much better and I hang on to some fast guys, even leading these groups some time. We all did a good job, but with the kids doing slower laps and more frequent changes we dropped down to the 50th position.

Jerome had his bag of wonder dried plums with him. This, he explained to me, is his secret recipe for reviving his energy levels and showing good and strong performances during long races. Well, I am not sure what exact performance enhancing impact it has on his metabolism, but in my case the only performance enhancing impact I could notice was a more physical one, similar to jet propulsion. This was becoming more pronounced during the races and it has the interesting side effect that other riders drafted behind me only for very short periods before dropping from their bikes. Leaves were turning brown, insects stopped chirping, beavers started suddenly to prepare for the winter despite 47 degrees of heat and flocks of birds migrated in direction Siberia. Why is there no big yellow warning label on the packing?

In any case we had now stabilized our 50th place. Actually unknown to me, we were called by the race officials and told that after 4 hours or so we were in 3rd position as a 3 rider racing team, so Jerome collected some (useless) prices, which we nevertheless will put on display someplace.

Stabilize the pace at 50th place midterm during the race.

After some more warnings from the race officials (Jerome had to remove his speed bars of his bike, one of his kids was not wearing gloves when he rode) Jerome and his kids went home and our six rider three rider team was reduced to three riders, Alain, Olivier and me. We all felt that this was somehow unfair after all this unfair discrimination we had to endure during the past 6 hours. Jerome has told his wife that he would be home at 7 PM, assuming that an eight hours endurance race would include 4 hours of transportation to and from the race track. An understandable thought when one considers the patience and endurance one need to navigate a car through the traffic in Tokyo.

As the pit closes 30 minutes before the finish of the race, we fixed again our strategy. We were down to 55th place and we wanted to recover as much as possible. So we asked Alain to do some laps, and then Olivier and me would alternative until shortly before the pit closing whereas Alain would do the last 30 minutes. Alain hold out very long, so I did additional 6 laps after him which were fast and done with a strong group of riders. At the very end I accelerated to more than50 km/hr and sprinted away even from this fast group. Some guys tried to follow me and they were left dumbfolded when I entered into the pitlane at the very last moment.

This left only a few laps for Olivier to go and then Alain hat to come out again to do the last thirty minutes in one go. He was doing well in a fast group and we cheered him up ("Go Alain, only 20 laps to go to the top!") from the comfort of our pits. Also we flirted with the women teams to the left and the right, as there was nothing else to do. Then the last lap was called and as it was getting dark the race came to an end.

Fast and furious final sprint.

As I found out later, we ended overall in 49th position. My best Tsukuba result so far, a good start for Jerome's kids and Olivier who did his first race. And also a nice goodbye to Alain who is leaving for France soon. After the last lap all riders assemble on the track and then they ride together one more ceremonial lap to the start. There is some music (I guess it was Titanic or so) and some fireworks, really nice, festive atmosphere. This is also a good old Tsukuba tradition and we were all very happy that we survived to see the fireworks and made a good show.

We were a good team and we had a lot of fun. And that is all we ask for.

Good teamwork by us.

Race analysis will follow later, once I have the lap chart from the organizers.

Best team name newly discovered : UGA ("Ultra Genki Athletes").

Tsukuba Eight Hours Endurance Race Analysis

Just this week I received the lap charts from the Tsukuba race organizers and I sat down with xls and scrutinized them. Well, first of all, our Positivo NFCC team achieved a good 49th place overall out of 305 teams and we finished 29th in the Road-Men category. At some point in time we were also the third team in the 3 rider strong team classification and all six of us were very proud of this result. We did 137 laps, only 14 less than the winning team. Considering that we had two minors on board, our average speed of 34.85 km/hr over the whole race is also pretty good considering the heat as well. So, the first question I asked myself was, where would be have ended in the race, if only one of us would have gone all eight hours and shown the same performance. Here is the answer: If the rider had been

• Alain, we would have finished 28th with 140 laps
• Me, we would have finished 25th with 141 laps
• Jerome, 41st with 138 laps
• Olivier, 92nd with 132 laps
• Leonard, 211st with 117 laps and
• Augustin, 228th with 115 laps

Of course this comparison is somewhat unfair, because Alain and Jerome did much more laps than Olivier and me which dragged down their average speed. But I think it shows that Alain, Jerome and me did a good job and Olivier did well considering that this was his first race. Jeromes kid also had a good show and would have finished more than 100 laps.

Then I checked our average speed by ride or turn. The definition of a ride is a series of laps than one rider did consecutively before handing over to the next rider. Jerome, Olivier and me had four rides, whereas Alain had 5 (he had to do the long last 30 minutes when no rider change was allowed) and the kids had 3. The number of laps within these rides where completely different for each rider. Alains first ride consisted of 11 laps, whereas Olivier and me basically made 5 to 7 laps every ride.
This of course has an impact on the average speed: The more laps you do, the lower becomes your speed average. Another crucial point in endurance racing is, if you find a good group to draft with or not. But basically your average speed goes down, as we can see nicely on the above chart. Alain managed a comeback with his 5th ride, when he hang out long with the leading guys in one group. I always had in my rides good groups to go with and furthermore I always went the same number of laps, that's why my performance is very much consistent.
Jerome is Jerome. Suddenly he gets a boost and nobody can explain why.
The same is also true for the fastest average speed in one lap during one ride. Finally I listed all average speeds per lap in chronological order.
Alain is green, Jerome is violet, me is of course orange and Olivier is blue. Now let's see the same data in order of average speed on each lap:
Now we see a lot of green on the left side, so Alain made a lot of fast laps during the race. Jerome, Olivier and me are pretty much everywhere on the whole width. It is interesting to note that Alain is on the very left and on the very right of the chart, I guess that his forth ride consisted of a lot of slow laps, as he was not able to find a good drafting group.

Please use this data to make your own speculations and come to your own conclusions.

Despite the fact that we will probably never have a good team ready to make the podium in Tsukuba,unless we start in the RX class (Road - Mixed), I like the race there very much. It is always fun to compete there and it is also fun to talk about.

Mama told me not to come

Last week by poor coincidence, I was able to make a registration for the Fuji Speedway race on this Sunday. Alain asked me if I wanted to go and with my son being in Germany, my daughter on a figure skating trip to Nagano, I quickly calculated my chances: One nice Spanish dinner for my wife on Saturday evening, asking her over a glass of redwine, if it would be possible to get family free on Sunday? It was worth the risk. Registered, got a haircut, made a reservation at Cicada.

I never had to got up so many times so early as this year. First I attended a lot of JCRC races in places far away from Tokyo (Gunma CSC) so I needed to get up early. Then, the German soccer team proceeded to the final of the European Championship. Unfortunately the games started at 3:45 in the morning so I need to drive my son to the German School to watch them until the bitter end.

Alain picked me up at 5 AM on Sunday, as we need to register by 7:30 AM and the race started at 8 AM. He is a fast driver (just as me he oversped 52 km/hr when he was finally caught by the ever vigilant Japanese police) and as such he has now installed many technical gadgets in his car which should warn him of speed traps. That's why we were at the Fuji Speedway already at 6:30 hr and both of us wished we would have slept half an hour longer.

It became clear that it will be a very hot day. But I didn't mind, we were registered for the 2 riders 210 minutes race, so we could take turns and I had my comfortable camping chair with me for the relaxing parts between the stretches. As Alain is the better rider, my secret strategy was to convince him to do much more laps than I would do, thus extending the relaxing part on the camping chair.

Unfortunately then we found out some things which put both of us in a very bad mood: First, just by chance, when I checked the race results of last year in the booklet, I noticed that the winning team in the 2 riders category did 56 laps, in the 3 riders category 78 laps and in the four rider category more than 100 laps. This seemed strange, so I asked one of the officials and he told me that all riders need to be on the track all the time and that the combined lap numbers of all riders decides the wining team. Goodbye camping chair. Also it became hot. And I only brought a small water bottle the event. And when we checked the track we found out to our dismay, that it is very hilly. A long straight at the start is followed by a nice descent where one can reach easily 60 km/hr and more and over sprint the next hill, but then the climb starts in three stretches for a total of 40 meter elevation difference until one is at the final straight again.

So what I thought would be a nice and relaxing race, turned out to become a long, hellish and warm nightmare without water and not too much chances to win anything.

Anyway, we didn't complain further and Alain gave me some good training how to touch other riders while riding fast and get them out of the way. I immediately applied that at the start but as I am only a beginner at becoming rough around the edges, I could not follow Alain who ellbowed his way to the top. The race was started with a pace making bike and as there were about 500 riders on the track the first crashed already occured. I was OK so far, but then the climb began and I couldn't kept the fast space of the first group and fell back. A lot of faster rider overtook me then.

But I settled for my own pace and after 4 laps I overtook other riders and rode a steady pace. I was missing the warm-up though. The fast group overtook me already after 45 minutes for the first time - they were really fast. Also Alain overtook me after one hour as he was still riding with a good and fast group.

The climbs at 30 degrees plus were really the hard part. All in all I did more than 1.000 meter of climbing at this race. I really hated myself for being that fat; I must try harder to shed about 10 kg, as otherwise my climbing life is miserable. On the straights and on the descents I could easily go the same pace as the faster groups, even overtaking a lot of guys. But at the climbs I fall back and then I ended up again on the straights behind some slow guys creeping towards the finish line at 33 km/hr where I could go easily 40 km/hr without being drafted.

That kept on and on for the first 2 hours or 16 laps. I had steady lap times of less or around 8 minutes (4.56 km track) and I calculated that I could make 26 laps within the 210 minutes limit if I could keep that speed. But after the two hours I got really tired. I was running out of water and I had two normal 0.5 liter PET bottles in addition with me which took hours to open and close. My left hand was completely numb and I couldn't unscrew the cap any longer - simply no power left in my hand, everything drained by the legs. I opened one gel to get some more energy, miscalculated my hand pressure, the gel was all over my hands and handle bar, everything got sticky .... And it was so hot. My feets were getting extremely hot in my SIDI shoes.

Probably I would have made a break, retired or go slower if I would have been solo, but I knew that Alain was somewhere out there fighting so I kept going. One can see my dropping performance where nice on the average lap speed chart here.
After 2:30 hrs I really started to count the laps and the minutes. I didn't got overtaken by Alain again, which meant that he was experiencing the same problems as I did. I noticed than that my speed has dropped in such way, that I would do only 25 and not 26 laps anyway, so I took it a little bit slower. Actually my climbing became a little bit better compared to the other guys in the field: A saw a lot of riders standing on the trackside, massaging their legs or making a rest or really at the edge of their abilities and going up at 6 km/hr. I definitely didn't want to end up there, so I made some efforts at the climbs.

The last climb before the straights comprises of three climbs, interrupted by two flat curves. The first one is hard, but the other two ones I cut on the inside where the distance is shorter but the inclination higher and I regularly overtook some of the better guys there.

Hey, this is a genuine formula one track, why is it not flat ???? Formula one cars are fast enough, they do not need additional acceleration by going downhill!

In the end I was not thinking any longer, riding more or less on automatic. I made my 25th lap before the time limit of 210 minutes, then started another one at an easier pace. I asked another rider on the track when the race is over and he said the last lap before 210 minutes counts. So I took it even easier. I could not judge from the other riders, as the 5 hour team race and some of the 150 km distanc race was still ongoing.

So when arriving at the final straight before the finish line at my 26th lap, I opted for the pit lane, then I noticed that there was no time measurement there but didn't care as this lap was supposedly not to be counted. A mistake of course, I should have crossed the finish line one more time and then moved to the pit, so I missed one lap.

When coming to the pit Alain was already there. He overlapped me only one time and moreover I was happy to note that also he gave everything as well so we could expect a good result. I would have been really angry if he decided to quit the race or took a longer break in my caming chair.

Stephane and Kenichi from NFCC arrived as Kenichi was attending a BR-2 race in the afternoon.
We were really tired, then packed our stuff. I also briefly spoke to David Marx who had an Assos tent at the pit and sold his stuff. He made a good business, in particular selling water bottles.

Ok, then the results were posted, we made 4th place in our category, even if I would have done one more lap that wouldn't have made any difference. Excellent result, but really achieved by hard work and both of us fighting to the end.

Then we were called on stage and got our commendation and the prices. Hm, a nice big bag with the words SONY printed in big letters ... A play station portable perhaps? Maybe not, the first places got only a box of sport drinks. So I opened the bag. Inside : 2 bottles of sport drinks. Unbelievable ketchi prices !!! I got two bottles for free even before the race when I asked for them. Bloody capitalist oppressors, the wrath of the working riders will hit you some day !
Anyway, Alain drove me home, we had a good time, we were satisfied with our result and very, very tired. I slept for some hours at home. Before I woke up, showered and went to bed.
Really, I shouldn't do these things.

Hitachi Naka Race Review

Another weekend which needed to be spoiled to attend another JCRC race .... I skipped a perfect rideable Saturday to recover for the D class race in Hitachi Naka. When I woke up at 5 AM in the morning it was already raining hard. I thought to myself that the rain might move in from the South and that Hitachi-Naka in the North would still be unaffected. Human beings have this illogical commotions I guess.
Hitachi Naka is my favourite race track in Japan and probably the only one where I have a chance to achieve a decent finish. Last year I finished 6th in E class and got my prices handed over by P cup idol Fuko. Do not even think about opening this link at your workplace. It was one of the most beautiful moments in my life, I have to admit. Proudly I was standing for the first time ever in my life on a podium in my trendy German Democratic Republic training jersey and the sun darkened when two massive things moved towards me.

Hitachi Naka is my favourite track because there are no climbs and virtually no curves. It is very similar to a NASCAR track. Onion network reveals some good insights concerning the winning strategy on these kind of tracks. I follow them word by word. The track fully emphasize my strengths ("going straight") and has none of my weaknesses (taking corners, going up hills, thinking too much, need to concentrate, take care of left and right, orientation and so on).

So even in the rain, this race could not possibly missed. I arrived at 7:30 and registered. The usual American girl from Nikkan Sports was there as this was also the 3. race of the Tour du Japon this year. We recognised each other. I thought about doing some warm-up training but it was pouring so hard that I got in the car and slept for half an hour instead.

Then Alain and Jacques from NFCC arrived. Alain has won the E class race last year and used to be French university champion in the eighties according to common rumours. Jacques is more into triathlon so he came perfectly fitted out in his triathlon race suit. He used to be triathlon champion of the French Foreign Legion and is serving now as a terrorist countermeasure officer at the French embassy in Tokyo. One can still see the many tattoos from his assignments in Africa, Arabia, Montmartre and other locations I am not allowed to disclose and he may look a little bit scary to the average Japanese amateur rider. I think he should add a pirate-like eye patch and mount a diving knife to his lower leg to complete his looks.

But he is a nice guy. Some time ago we went up together with a group of NFCC mountain cracks the Shomaru Toge. We were the last two riders and we overtook two Japanese riders, a man a slightly overweight girl (about half of my weight perhaps). He was riding alongside the girl, looked at her and shouted very loudly: "DAIIIIJOOOOBUUUU ?????". The girl almost collapsed from her bike in fear and terror. Later I crashed on the descent and he helped me to scratch my body from the guide rail and asked: "DAIIIIJOOOOBUUUU ?????".

We did some warm-up laps and then it was already time to start.

It was cold and raining, similar to the Tokyo Tour of Japan race on May 25th. The difference is, that Hitachi Naka is a very simple course with no metal manhole covers, goodroad surface and no other surprises. However, there are 56 nervous guys just about to start.

Met Peter and Truck at the start, also another guy from the Miyake race and Ishii from the Space team. It is always a good bet to stay on Alains wheel the last kilometer.

Start. Completely soaked within seconds as could be expected. I tried to stay in the front group on the outside in order to avoid crashes. The pace is fast but varying, the track is pretty crowded. But I can keep easily the pace of 40+ in the peloton, preferring to stay on the outside even if there is no wheel in front of me.
After the 2. lap I come in in first place over the finishline. Then I let it go a little bit slower (checking my lap times later almost all are very similar, with the exception of the first and the last one). I fell back in the peloton but don't care so much as long as I stay clear of crashes and I am still in the main field. Despite the high speed all riders still stay together.

Jacques is making strange moves in the front. Sometimes he moves from the very left to the very right and everybody is following him, expecting to find some obstacles on the road, but there is nothing. This continues for the first 5 laps, then a bell rings for the last one, still 5 km to go. I feel no exhaustion at all. Just like with the Positivo Espresso team on the Tamagawa except for the old ladies with dogs.

Now the field is becoming nervous. Shouting and yelling. More and more riders overtake from behind because they are afraid to be dropped. The whole width of the wide road is now taken by the peloton. Still three km to the goal, but it seems like the sprint will start any minute. Then I hear the sound of a crash in front of mean. It starts on the very left but more and more riders are dropping also on the right and they come closer and closer. I can make a move to the right and ride on the grass, loosing speed, but at least I stay on the bike. The main field is gone but I start to accelerate and can close the gap. For some reason the speed is now a little bit slower and even have time to recover a little bit. I see Alain in front and think it is a good idea to move to his rear wheel which works out fine. I see another crazy guy from Hot Cross team who crashed at the NATS race early this month.

The speed is picking up now. I can easily follow and overtake some guys but Alain is moving in the middle of the road and it is getting very crowded there. In the end I even have to brake.

Later, when I printed out the results at the JCRC booth, I find out that Alain finished in 29th, me in 32nd, Peter in 38th and Jacques in 49th position. 47 of the 56 riders started finished within 10 seconds of the winner. It seems that about 7 riders crashed, but some of them were able to finish the race. Ishii from SPACE did not finish, hope he will make it to the next one.

I was happy to arrive without crashing under the circumstances. Again, just like in Tokyo somebody crashed right in front of me and I lost contact to the peloton for a while. A little bit disappointing after 6th place in E class last year, but anyway.

I decide not to test my luck and skipped the two hours endurance event at 12. Went home, reflected on what I am doing: Skipping a perfect Saturday for riding out in the mountains of Okutama because I wanted to stay fit for a 30 km rain race on a NASCAR track. I really should stop to this kind of stupid stuff.

Tsukuba Eight Hours Endurance Race Photos

Allsports has released today 20549 photos from the Tsukuba endurance race. Who has the time to look through approximately 400 web pages and check all the photos. Well, I checked the first 31 web pages (I admit, during work) and could find some photos of Alain and me. Then I gave up. No wonder that the Japanese economy is in a down spiral. The amount of time checking Allsport photos during work will take a heavy impact on office labour productivity. This is potentially more dangerous than Minesweeper and Solitaire in the Nineties. The clever folks from Allsports have disabled PrintScreen copy, so now you can not just copy and paste the pics as you see them on the web page. The even more clever folks from TCC have advised the usage of Quick Screen Capture to come around this nasty problem. So here we have two examples from Allsports. First we see Alain in his chic AG2R shirt as he is battling it out for the top position during the early phases of the race. Then you see me, taking it easy after we have fallen back to 50th position during the later stages of the race. As usual I look awful fat on the bike. I thought that I could dampen the impact of this by buying a Cervelo frame with large members, but to no avail. Also, as we know now, we made a big mistake when designing the Positivo Espresso jerseys. For some reason, our design is enhancing potential body problem areas so all of us look double fatty in the jerseys as we normally are. Even Marek will look like Bud Spencer (right, not middle). For some mysterious reason this effect does not work on Tom's daughter.

Here are some more photos from Tsukuba taken by Alain. This one shows four members of our three rider strong team; Alain is taking position at the start. Then I gave him a big push so that he gains momentum at the start. Actually I pushed him so hard, that three seconds later he has completed the first lap and appears on the left side of the photo. I like my super-dynamic pushing style. Actually I look much more dynamic than riding on a bike. Perhaps here is where the future lies.
Some small buggers try to use the big draft I am creating. Of course I flew away before they could hang on.
See, I am basically gone.
But the shape of my body really gives me to think. See, I stopped smoking in May 2007 and as usual after stopping I rapidly gained weight, in particular during the Christmas season. I am now down again to 98 kg, which is still much to high to survive the forthcoming races in Shuzenji, Gunma and Shiobara. My leg power and heart is OK, but there is just too much weight to be shifted upwards. With this power and 15kg less, I should have no problems.
So I will try to loose some more weight for the Shuzenji race on 9/14 and later for the 72 km of CSC Gunma. So by the end of the year I will keep up with Tom and compete for the Toge baka records in earnest. Be warned, Tom!

A day at the races : Tour of Japan Tokyo Stage

When does a race start? Only after the bikes are lined up on the start line and the starter sounds the bell? Or even earlier, yet perhaps the hour we were born? Well in case of the Tour of Japan Tokyo stage my definition of a the race start would be: When I started to drank glass after glass of good red wine and smoked some cigars at a friend home the evening before. A good start indeed, for a nice evening that ended at half past one in the morning. Yet the next morning I was supposed to attend this race at the Tokyo Oifuto harbor.

When I opened my eyes (please note that I did not write: "when I woke up") and looked out of the window it was raining. I was tired, not completely sober and there were many reasons popping up to stay in bed; but I decided to dress up in my white NFCC racing gear, pack my things, jump into the car and head for the Tokyo Oifuto. I made a stop to buy something for breakfast and then I was lucky that I could still find a parking place at the race. I don't know about you guys, but drinking a lot of alcohol definitely influences my bowels and the next morning I am usually glued to the toilet seat. Insofar the choice of the pure white NFCC bib shorts proved to be a source of constant potential embarrassment.

I had the chance to do two training rounds on the track and already I was almost soaked (I thought).
The race is on a public road, one lap 7 km long, 3 laps. There is one U-turn immediately after the start and about three more sharp turns, otherwise it is pretty flat and easy to maneuver.

I noticed further that a city of Tokyo standard issue 45 liter transparent garbage bag can we tailored into a very effective rain protection gear for the average 55 kg / 45 liter upper body Japanese amateur rider. I would be probably be in need of a 90 liter bag, not yet available here.

Last year there had been many crashes and I was even more afraid of crashes under these conditions. Then it was time to line up at the start - some other NFCC riders were also there: Alain, Eric, David and Dean. We looked great in our white team jerseys and bib shorts (I found also a toilet just before the race). Some of the NFCC riders have not come to the race, Stephane was there but choose not to race.

Start. The race was very fast as usual, despite the rain we reached an average speed of 42 km/hr. Within seconds I was more than wet from the rain and the water coming from the wheels in front of me.

I was double careful in the corners and try to maneuver them as careful as possible, definitely slower than the rest of the riders. So I was in the rear of the peloton and then I had to speed up not to loose contact, but this harmonica principle worked very well. I was in good shape and I had enough power to overtake some riders on the straights.

With about 3 km to go I tried to get into position in front for the last series of three turns. I managed to come to the front and on the outside of the curve I started to corner. Suddenly the guy riding parallel to me on the inside said something to the effect of "Ups"; when I looked he was already on the ground and his bike came sliding in my direction, I damn near shit a brick. I managed to avoid to crash in the first instance but instead of taking the corner I had to go straight and I was heading for the guiderails. Deja vu; Just like the crash on the Chichibu trip. I managed to get my feet out from the cleat and somehow to get the bike more or less parallel to the guiderails without crashing into them.

But I lost a lot of time and speed - unfortunately just at the very beginning of the only upward slope on the track. I then gave everything to get in contact with the peloton again. I somehow managed to end in the rear of the peolton with about 1 km to go, but then the sprint started and I had exhausted all my energy to close up. Tough shit.

So in the front the NFCC guys were fighting for the win while I had no chance at make a good result and I continued to go at 40 km/hr to the finish, ending up in 35th place. Ok, after the disaster last year when I avoided a crash in front of me and lost contact to the peoloton, this was a much better result but it could have been even better, if not for this ass-wipe who crashed.
I hope the limp dick wore a 45 liter rain protection and was mistakenly disposed off after the race.

Anyway, the NFCC team had a good result with Alain winning the race an R.C.H. in front of another Japanese rider (as usual) and Dean in third position. Kurata from the Veloz team ended up in 4th position as well, so I knew half of the people on the podium.

I was soaking wet, quickly changed my clothes and drove home. In the afternoon we got a new car. In the evening we had family dinner at Kappa-Sushi - our favourite hang out. I was finally sober again and with growing enthusiasm I read a new book called "English as Second f**king language". A must have for all of us who are still lacking familiarity with the finer details of the English language. I tried to upgrade this blog with many of the new expressions I have learned - in italic.

I don't think I will use it very often from now on. On Monday I had to travel to lake Biwa and Hikone to visit a factory there. A very scenic area, I found myself constantly thinking of how to ride with the bike on one of the nice roads I seen. Someday.

Championship Reflections

Someday in December, when JCRC will send me the champion jersey for 2008 and I will be the official recognized winner of the "2008 Road serise", I will definitely invite for a party, possibly at the Positivo shop and then close by. Until then, some reflections on the 2008 JCRC racing season:
For sure I had a lot of luck. Also persistence and power, but most of all luck. Out of the 14 JCRC races I have attended this year (counting the actual races, not the events), 10 have been hill climbs or similar elevation intensive races. And I am not a fast hill climber at all. But luckily some of the strongest contenders this year have given up in the midst of the season, or where promoted to C class. Like fourteen year old Nishimura - who continues to beat me at every single race.
And I was also lucky that the JCRC rules were in my favour. 60 points for attendance of a race and arriving at the goal without getting lapped. And in addition a maximum of 30 points depending on the race result. One could virtually secure championship by just attending. At one point I was at risk to be relegated to E class. That happens if one finishes three times in a row with a time 10% slower than the 10th place rider in a race. But miraculously after finishing 10% lower in the races at Gunma and Shuzenji, the next race (hill climb at Shiobara) was exempted from this rule and the race afterwards (again Gunma) as well. Finally I made the cut in Yokkaichi. But the most luck I had with the weather and that I didn't encountered any crash or mechanical problems. Weather conditions were good at almost all races, except for Hitachi-Naka and somewhat for Yokkaichi. My competitor and later friend Ishii crashed at Hitachi-Naka almost in front of me and I had to ride over the grass in order to get out of the danger zone. At the Tokyo race (not part of the JCRC series) also in the rain, a guy riding next to me on the inner side of a curve slipped and started to slide in my direction. Instead of cornering I rode straight and straight into the guiderails, barely managing to escape the crash as well as the rails. Is Saiko, at the last race, a rider crashed 30 meters in front of me during the finish sprint and again I was lucky that he felt on the left side and I could pass on the right. At the hill climb in Shiobara, I rode over a chestnut which punctured my back wheel tire. Luckily that happened only 200 meters away from the finish, so I was able to walk to the goal.

And I was lucky that I had no injuries, no colds, nothing. If anything, the JCRC series has told me something about the meaning of luck and that a tiny mishap can ruin the hard work of a complete season. This is not a single race where one can have a good result or not and then again try next year. This was my once in a lifetime chance to achieve something extraordinary in the field of sport and if I would make only one small mistake, I would have wasted my chance and never get a new one.

And this is actually the dark flip side of riding for championship series: I was very worried all the time. Worried that I will crash, get a cold, don't know the JCRC rules or simply do not race very well and that killed a lot of the fun associated with racing. At Saiko I thought that it might be too risky to ride along with the main group, and just cruise behind them at 30 km/hr in order just to finish and not to get lapped. Because this would have been enough to clinch the title. Just because I was worried, I would have given up to enjoy the race and sprint for victory. I did not in the end, but again I was lucky that I did not crash.

It is less fun to race when one has to race, in the rain or in races where one finished in last place, just because one needs to gather the points. This has been what I have learned this year and I have now much more respect for sportsmen and women who achieve their goals over a long season, be it bicycle riders, soccer teams or figure skaters. I will not try to repeat this again, one season of worries have been enough.
From a point of performance I am a miserable champion I guess. How where my results over the season?

1. Kawagoe : 30th place out of 38 riders in the goal. Got dropped in a flat course race. Early in the season I was in miserable shape.
   
   
2. Shuzenji : 25/25 Last place, of course at Shuzenji. Couldn't even keep the pace of the pacemaking motorcycle at the start.
   
   
3. Gunma : 37/37 Last place again. Was lucky that I didn't got lapped and disqualified.
   
   
4. NATS: 15/22 That was OK, however I also got dropped by the main group in this flat course race.
   
   
5. Miyakejima : 8/9 A lot of points for me because there were only 9 riders in D class. The 9th place was Stephen who I forced into this race. So basically last place again. The solo race the next day was cancelled due to a high poisonous gas concentrations.
   
   
6. Hitachi - Naka : 32/53. A little bit unlucky. First I needed to avoid a crash and temporarily lost contact with the main field, than I choose the wrong wheel to hang on (Alain), although that wheel normally finishes strong.
   
   
7. Gunma : 28/28 Last place again. But I was getting stronger; would have been lapped with my earlier Gunma performance.
   
   
8. Shuzenji : 47/48 Second last place. First indication of performance improvement!
   
   
9. Shiobara : 32/33 on the first day hill climb, 36/37 on the second day hill climb. Apart from the result, this was one of the best races this year.
   
   
10. Gunma : Disqualified. Got lapped shortly before the end of the 8th lap, despite being pulled by Tom.
    
    
11. Yokkaichi : 15/20. Could stay with the main field one lap on this hilly course, but not a second one. Was happy not to end in last place.
    
    
12. Saiko : 14/34. Best performance this year.

In summary, out of 13 races, I finished 8 times in last or second last place or got disqualified.I am not sure how others would judge this, but I think this is not a very champion like performance. My best finish was an 8th place in Miyakejima. Counting from the front, because I left only one ride behind me. Counting from the back, I was good in Saiko (20 riders behind me) and Hitachi Naka (21).
On the other hand I felt that I became stronger and stronger through the season, thanks to a lot of racing and long training rides. In Saiko I felt at the peak and I still had much power let at the finish.

I am really happy, relieved and whatever that everything is over. I am so tired as well. So what is in for next year?

If time allows, I would like to attend some of the races which are either fun to do or where I have at least a chance to make the podium:

• JCRC / ToJ Kawagoe in March, a 15 km point race
  
• Tokyo Tomin race in Oi Futo, a 21 km solo race
• JCRC / ToJ Hitachi Naka in June, a 30 km solo race
• JCRC / ToJ Saiko in November, a 20 km solo race

Then I would like to so some of the really challenging races in terms or elevation or distance:

• Fuji Hill Climb - 1.200 meters up with 5.000 riders
  
• Itoigawa Fast Run - 290 km, if we are allowed to start.
• Tour de Okinawa - 200 km solo race
  

I also enjoyed the endurance races, such as Tsukuba, Motegi, Fuji Speedway, Yokohama and Tokyo. Preferable in a team. And finally I would like to try some track racing. I hope that a lot of PE guys will join me next year as well.Much of the fun this season and much of the next season as well depends on the good composition and mutual support within the Positivo Espresso team. I am very proud that we have built up a team with very few constraints and rules on the one hand, but a lot of support from and to all riders. I always hated clubs, because one has to go drinking with club mates after the training and there is always this "Are you a member?" feeling which distinguish the good riders (team members) from the rest (not team members). There is so much time spend on club-activities and less time on the real purpose, the sport itself.

But Positivo Espresso is different, we have of course some hard core riders, some hard core bloggers and maybe some hard core drinkers, but in general we are open and inviting to new team members and try to integrate them. Sometimes I feel that this and that could improve and some things disappoint me, but all in all this is probably the best set-up I have ever been in. We recognize that all our members have their weak points: Juliane? Always late, or not there at all. David: Starts at 210% of his performance level when riding out, finishes at 21%. Tom? Demands too much from us non-hill climbers. Me? always too competitive, cannot loose. Jerome? Sleeps too long. And so on. But again, as a group compared with other groups we are doing very well.
This year was hard in particular, because many good riders left us. david went back to England; Marek moved on, first to Southeast Asia, later to Australia. Juliane will leave in December. Alain from NFCC who was a fabulous sportsman moved back to France. James and Ian from the Irish rovers went to Hong Kong and Singapore respectively. To loose such good riders and friends was hard. On the other hand, some new guys were joining us as well. James did a good job to encourage his friends to make even smaller trips out with us together, so did David. Laurent and Stephen joined us again. Jacques was another funny addition. Ludwig succumbed to the bike bug within record time. And Tom's daughter should be ready every day after conquering Wada.

So, in a way I guess we are all champions on our own and Positivo Espresso is therefore the team of the champs. I hope that I could make myself somehow understandable without being too melodramatic. I also do not want to write funny posts all the time.

Team Time Trial Performance at Saiko

Tokyo Endurance Race December 14th

One of the more popular races in Tokyo, the Tokyo Endurance race is held on Dec. 14th at the Tachikawa Showa Kinen Koen. It is a four hour team endurance race on a 5 km flat round course
and TCC (Tokyo Ccyle Club) is now assembling teams for the event. I think Tom, Jerome and Alain raced in Tachikawa some time ago at the Duothlon event.

In previous years the wining team made app. 30 laps = 150 km = 37.5 km/hr in four hours, so after splendid performances in Tsukuba and hopefully next week in Yokohama, victory is almost ours.

You can check the TCC thread here.

As we always seen to have problems to get a team of four riders together from Positivo Espresso only, I suggest that we join one of the TCC teams. Please let me know if you would be interested to race there, so I can make sure that we are in the same team and register in time.

The registration starts on October 1st, however based on the experience in the last years, it will be sold out rather quick, so I suggest to come to a decision early.

More information [in Japanese].

Tsukuba Eight Hours Endurance Race Spring Edition

I received an invitation today for the Spring Endurance Race in Tsukuba. The race is held on the Tsukuba car racing track, basically a flat 2.045 km round course, on May 3rd (public holiday) between 10.00 and 18.00 hr. I have attended the race three times; actually it has been the first race ever I attended in 2003 with Veloz, then in 2006 with David, david and Cycling Jane and last year with Alain, Jerome, Olivier, Augustine and Leonard (the two kids of Jerome) as the legendary six rider strong three rider team. This is a nice "training race", good atmosphere, cheerleaders, camping-like atmosphere but still a lot of excitement. Normally the weather is good and it is possible to go there in the morning and return home the same day. So little effort is required. It would be really nice if we can get a strong Positivo Espresso Team together for this event. Or, if there are not too much riders interested, we can also try to get a combined team with Tokyo Cycling Club who also have some strong riders (I heard).

Teams of 3 to 6 riders are possible, however I personally find that a four rider team gives the best balance of riding and resting. It would be optimal if we could form a mixed team, this would give us some chances for a podium place although it is not easy by any means.

The fee for this race is between 10.000 and 15.000 Yen, depending on the number of riders.

I am writing this post already today because the application starts on February 14th and is limited to 300 teams. It will be sold out very fast and if possible we should have a tentative team ready before this date.

Please let me know if you are interested. we may also want to form two teams, depending on the performance levels of the riders.