Racing around the Christmas and New Years holidays is always very difficult for me since I tend to lose control of myself and stuff myself with lots of delicious food rather than train and maintain a proper diet.

I still had one last race of this Tokai CX cyclocross season, which just so happened to be my local race at Aichi Bokujo　(愛知牧場), which is a farm that is only about a 20 minute bike ride from my house. Aichi means my prefecture, and bokujo means farm.

As the name suggests, this race was held around the Aichi Bokujo farm. It turned out to be a great venue since it is family friendly, and so many people brought their entire families, resulting in a large number of spectators.

Since this was only my second race in the C1 category and I flatted and DNF’d out of my last race, I was stuck with a last row start.

The course had numerous sections that were single file only, especially on the loose sandy / dusty switchback descents.

Luckily, this also meant that there was a significant amount of climbing each lap, which was nice and wide for passing.

The first few laps, I tried to rest in the technical parts and sprint up the hills as hard as I could. I ended up passing quite a few people, and by the halfway point I made my way to a top 5 position group.

Overall, the atmosphere of this race was fantastic! Every lap, countless people were cheering me on, and I kept hearing my name from the race announcer as they blasted techno music, so I kept getting pumped up and pushing myself harder to try and catch the leaders.

Although I had the 2nd and 3rd place riders in my field of vision, I was burned from my previous efforts of sprinting all out on the hills, and I wasn’t able to close the gap by the end, so I rolled in at 4th.

I’m happy to say I accomplished my goal of returning to cyclocross, and that was to get my upgrade to cat-1 and get a top 5 finish. Hopefully next year I can continue to get stronger and get back on the podium and get some new Tokai CX glasses to add to my collection.

Speaking of adding to my collection… They had these awesome Aichi Bokujo (愛知牧場) cyclocross t-shirts!

So of course I bought one. I went with the safe choice of black, while Zac went with the flashy red. As expected of Mr. BMC Japan.

Race day video

Up until now, I had been relying on my good friend Bradley to make the race day VLOG videos, which I always looked forward to. Unfortunately, he recently left Japan, and this led me to try and attempt to make my very own race day VLOG.

I still have a lot to learn about video editing, but it was a fun first attempt. Check out the race day vlog for Aichi Bokujo here!

The post 2017 Tokai CX #6 Aichi Bokujo C1 4th appeared first on Two Wheel Cruise.

At last, after finally getting my upgrade from my win in the last Tokai CX race, I have my C1 (cat-1) debut race here in Japan! My broken thumb was starting to heal, and I have been able to train more lately, so I was feeling good about my chances today.

Today’s race was at Kakamigahara Outdoor Field (各務ヶ原アウトドアフィールド), which was a nice big park near the Kiso river.

The course itself was pretty nice, including a good mix of long power straight sections as well as some more technical twisty sections. One area of concern was the large number of rocks on the course, which made a risk of crashing or puncturing pretty high.

Since this was my first C1 level race, I was stuck at the back row, but luckily the field today wasn’t too large, so it wasn’t too big of a problem.

I stuck to my usual strategy of taking it easy in the start and relaxing in the technical areas since they were backed up with traffic anyway, and then would attack and sprint in each of the long straightaway sections.

My strategy worked pretty well, and I found myself attacking the group for 3rd place. Unfortunately, by the time I got there, the first two position riders were already out of sight.

About halfway through the race, I felt my rear tire go flat and that was the end of the race for me since I didn’t have a pit bike or spare wheel to use.

At first, I assumed that I had pinch flatted due to the rocks, but after I inspected my tire, I found that it was a thorn that punctured the tire. Oh well..

In any case, I’m happy that I was able to accomplish my goal of fighting for a top 5 position. Hopefully next time I can stick around until the end though.

Race day Tokai CX VLOG

Bradley was also out at today’s race and made a video for the day’s events. Check it out here.

Photos were taken by
https://www.flickr.com/photos/maekawa0717/
and
https://www.flickr.com/photos/132570324@N04/

The post 2016 Tokai CX #4 Kakamigahara C1 Debut appeared first on Two Wheel Cruise.

A couple of weeks ago I had a really bad crash while training, and that really set me back both physically and mentally. My biggest injury was a broken thumb, which didn’t mean I couldn’t train, but I simply lost all of my motivation to train and ride for a while. The second race of the Tokai CX series was coming up, and although I had already pre-registered, I had already given up on going to the race. That was, until the night before when I went out for a Birthday dinner with some cycling friends. They convinced me that I should still at least come out to the race to watch, so I messaged my other friend last minute to see if he had space in his car, which he luckily did.

The course was located at a park called wild nature plaza (ワイルドネイチャープラザ), and it was at least 50% deep sand like the above picture.

Once I arrived at the environment of the race, my negative mood lifted and I decided that I still wanted to try and see what I could do in the race.

Thanks to my 2nd place finish in the first Tokai CX race, I had the number one tag and a front row start.

I had a pretty good start and was the first person to enter the deep sand section.

I tried to maintain my position, but each lap I was gradually losing ground due to my recent drop in endurance from not riding.

Some riders who passed me where also on mountain bikes, and it looked like they were able to ride parts of the course easier than I could with my CX bike.

In any case, I struggled on and still managed to keep myself in a top 5 position and keep most of the people in front of me within sight.

About halfway through the race, I started to get a rhythm down, and decided to try and push myself to my absolute limit and try and catch as many people as I could by the end.

By the last lap, I worked my way up to 4th, with 3 people still ahead of me, 2 of which were still within my field of vision, so I continued to dig deep..

During the last lap, I caught and passed 3rd, and going into the very last corner, I caught and passed 2nd, edging him out in a sprint.

1st place was still about a minute ahead, so not even close. Although normally I’d be pretty upset with getting two 2nd places in a row, considering the circumstances, I’m very happy to be able to get back on the podium. Especially with racing after two weeks of no riding and with a broken thumb.

Today’s result and being surrounded by the environment of Tokai CX helped to lift my spirits again and motivate me to look forward to the next race!

I was pretty cooked by the end of the race, my average heart rate was 190 BPM! …. Ouch…

Nothing that a chocolate banana protein smoothie can’t fix. Thanks Bucyo Coffee!

Bradley also came out to film the race events, so be sure to watch his video on the day!

The photos used in this post were taken by
– Kikuzo Photo
– Muto Photo

The post 2016 Tokai CX #2 Wild Nature Plaza appeared first on Two Wheel Cruise.

At last, cross season is here! A few weeks ago, I committed to racing CX this season by buying a new cyclocross bike from Planet X.

My region of Japan is known as the Tokai region, which mainly includes Aichi, Gifu, Shizuoka, and Mie prefectures. We have a cyclocross series called Tokai CX, and today was the first race of that series. Luckily, because of my past experience, I was able to start at Cat-2, rather than starting from the very lowest category and working my way up like everyone else.

I entered this race after a solid block of training, having just started to race semi-seriously again, so I came hoping for a win. Especially since I wanted to quickly upgrade to cat-1, and the only way to do that is to win a Cat-2 race.

Although I had a last row start, I was able to quickly move up by powering through the heavy mud on the course.

Definitely helps to be a power rider on a muddy course.

I quickly worked my way through the field and then attacked off the front by the end of the first lap.

After about halfway through, one rider managed to bridge up to me.

We mostly stayed together for the rest of the race, but I got gapped a little bit as he attacked through the last muddy section before the finish line on the last lap.

Looking at this picture, it’s clear I didn’t have the best tire choice for today. I’ll have to stock up on some mud tires for the next mud race..

Although I didn’t get the win I wanted, it was a great race and it felt great to race CX again. I’ll just have to train harder so that I can get my upgrade next time!

All in all, I very impressed by the Tokai CX community and vibe. It felt great to have so many people who I didn’t even know cheering for me. I forgot how much I loved CX, and I can’t wait to race some more in the rest of the Tokai CX series.

Thanks to Kikuzo Photo for the great photos
https://www.flickr.com/photos/maekawa0717/

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