Bradley, Dave and myself rode from Nagoya to Inabe in Mie prefecture to watch the Inabe Stage (4th stage) of the 19th annual Tour of Japan stage race. One of my former teammates, Alder Martz, was participating in the race with team Gusto, and with it being only about 60km away, I definitely had to go. All I can say is what a great Wednesday! “The greatest Wednesday of my life” according to Bradley.
We met up at Nagoya Station at 6:30AM to have enough time to mingle and watch the start of the race. Once the race started, we were able to follow behind the sagwagan for a couple kilometers through the neutral start! All good things come to an end and we were kicked off the course once the race started so we made our way to the spectator area. After a couple hours of spectating, eating, and checking out the sponsor booths, we headed back home to Nagoya. All in all, about 140 km with perfect weather. Definitely going to go back next year!
We finished of the day with a stop at Cycles Bike shop and fueled up on some ramen at a nearby Chinese restaurant. Perfect end to a perfect day.
Ride Start
I rolled out from Nagakute at 5:45am to meet up with Dave and Bradley at Nagoya Station at 6:30am. We took a pretty straight and flat route West towards Inabe (in Mie prefecture) and had a lovely cross-headwind most of the way out. We managed to get to the starting area before the start of the race, so I went to find my old teammate Alder for a quick chat before the start.
Cruise and Alder (riding for Attaque Team Gusto)
Alder and I were teammates for our Division 1 college team, Lindsey Wilson College in 2009-2010. We used to clean up at all the local cyclocross races. We then moved on to different collegiate teams and became rivals on the US pro circuit as well. The last time we met was when we were both racing the Joe Martin Stage race in the US in 2013. While I retired from racing to pursue other life experiences, Alder has been getting a lot of international race experience. He spent the last year racing in Australia and this year is now racing in the Asian UCI circuit. Oh what could have been.. Anyway, we wished Alder good luck for the start and then the action began!
Inabe Stage Start!
Arashiro Yukia (the legend of Japan) at the start of the Inabe stage of the 2016 Tour of Japan
Start line – 2016 Tour of Japan Inabe Stage
Once the race started, we were able to follow along behind the sag wagan for the neutral start, which had some awesome local support!
The sides of the roads filled with cheering elementary/pre-school children
Although we were not in the race, literally hundreds of children and other people were passionately cheering for us as we rode through. It was quite the experience which I’ll never forget.
Map for the Inabe stage of Tour of Japan 2016
Once the race officially started, we were no longer able to ride on the course. Luckily, we acquired a course map from another rider who had a spare and we made our way to the finish/spectating area.
Inabe Spectating Area
Spectating area for Inabe Stage
The race finish and spectating area was on top of a mountain and had a really cool atmosphere. They had a large truck TV which was live streaming the race, along with a bunch of vendors selling food and cool products.
The popular Sakura Pork sandwich from the very popular Bucyo Coffee booth
Inabe Finish
The finish line for the Inabe Stage – 2016 Tour of Japan
The long day break of 3 riders which dropped to 2 in the last lap ended up winning the race, which was exciting to see. While those two did not sprint each other, the sprint for 3rd place was quite exciting with a Team United Healthcare rider tearing it up (no surprise there). Anyway, once the race was over, we began the journey back home.
Inabe Stage KOM – Tour of Japan (Bradley, Cruise, Dave)
All in all, it was a fantastic day!
