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sicro

Warming-Up
Dec 13, 2010
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First of all I would like to greet you all! I am from Romania and I will be spending one year in Tokyo, Fuchu city to be exact.

After reading quite a few topics on this forum, I would like to congratulate the "hardcore" bikers here for their effort and their performances. I am really impressed! :beer:

This is, actually, the reason why I've started this topic. I've tried searching too, but couldn't find any similar thread.

I have seen a lot of runs that include, in my opinion, really good riders, which I would like to join, but the problem is I don't think I could keep up with the rhythm ""imposed"" and I wouldn't like the thought of slowing everybody down.

So, in this topic, I thought maybe those of us who would like to go for a relaxing ride, averaging about 16-20 km/h could post meeting arrangements and so on. This, of course, if there are others trapped in between `bicycle fan` and `professional rider`, like I am. :(

Hope there are some of you here!

Best wishes and keep cycling! :)
 
First of all I would like to greet you all! I am from Romania and I will be spending one year in Tokyo, Fuchu city to be exact.

After reading quite a few topics on this forum, I would like to congratulate the "hardcore" bikers here for their effort and their performances. I am really impressed! :beer:

This is, actually, the reason why I've started this topic. I've tried searching too, but couldn't find any similar thread.

I have seen a lot of runs that include, in my opinion, really good riders, which I would like to join, but the problem is I don't think I could keep up with the rhythm ""imposed"" and I wouldn't like the thought of slowing everybody down.

So, in this topic, I thought maybe those of us who would like to go for a relaxing ride, averaging about 16-20 km/h could post meeting arrangements and so on. This, of course, if there are others trapped in between `bicycle fan` and `professional rider`, like I am. :(

Hope there are some of you here!

Best wishes and keep cycling! :)

Welcome Sicro!

I'm new here and I too am in the same boat as you, the speed you mention I'd be able to keep up, I did a ride to Zushi where I averaged just under 19km/h.

I'd be up for rides on Sundays, my only day off, but this month is out of the question for me, as I run a liquor store and we are busy.

Keep me posted if you do a ride on a Sunday.

Cheers!
 
Sicro,

I am not too fast to run with the big guns but not too slow either.

There is TEAM OSOI (literally, Team Slow) here but it seems they are not as active as they used to be.


How far are you from the river (Tamagawa)?
It's a good place to start riding at slow speeds. By the time you "graduate" out of Tamagawa your top end speed should have already increased a bit :) It's also a good place to "bump into" some of the riders here.

Rommel
 
Send Mike from the Half Fast crew a PM those are a good way to get started.
 
Hi Sicro,

I also live in Fuchu and ride regularly. PM me your contact details, we can get out for a spin sometimes :bike:
 
Serguei--I didn't know you were able to ride under 20km/hr?!:p

But in general, I think it would be nice to organize more non-A list rides next year. I plan to! ... though, organize is a bit of a misnomer...;)
 
Hi sicro,
That's a good idea. I live in Sagamihara-shi in Kanagawa Prefecture and I'm NOT a fast cyclist. :bike: I also looking for a party like you mentioned.:)
Please let me in whenever you have a plan for ride!

Minoru
 
Serguei--I didn't know you were able to ride under 20km/hr?!:p

But in general, I think it would be nice to organize more non-A list rides next year. I plan to! ... though, organize is a bit of a misnomer...;)

Kori, the point you make about organising more non - A list rides is an interesting one. Usually most group rides posted on TCC are 'fast' thus alienating a lot of people. This has caused some controversy in the past with non A-List riders feeling left out. However I've been happy to see recently that people have started posting more slow-moderte rides, a good sign of a growing community of riders here at TCC.

Anyway, I've spoke to Thomas and James about this problem and there has been some discussion about creating a a classification system for group rides based on average speeds. It may be something as simple as Hard/Medium/Slow! I'm sure Thomas will let us know when a decision has been made.

I completely understand the frustration for some riders who aren't yet able to join 'fast' rides. But please understand that quite a few of us race here and when training we need to simulate those conditions as closely as possible. I for one have been a little hesitant to post rides here recently for fear of complaints from slower riders.

Perhaps yourself and a few other moderately paced riders should try and take turns organising rides next year. In doing so I'm sure you'll find a lot of others will join in as happened with your ride a while back. Even I was suprised with how many people did that with you and it made me feel a bit left out:confused:
 
Another thing I would like to point out is that I and several other competitive riders are now in our rest periods and then moving in to the build stage ready for the new season.

Part of this is LSD (Long Slow Distance) rides and these are ideal for beginners to join as the pace is slow with specific exertion or power levels set by myself and religiously followed.

I will post these as "LSD Rides" and I'm sure several others will do the same.
But again please understand that when a ride is posted its at the organisers pace.
 
Personally, I'd be happy to *start* on more rides and if/when I get dropped, I'd be totally ok with that. If I can hang on for 5 km or 20, it would be motivating. Regardless, meeting someone elses start time would get me out if bed earlier.:eek: If rides are classified/organized by myself or others the expectation of being dropped or not should be made clear. On the "slow :precovery ride" you organized last spring when you flew up otarumi at 35kph, my feelings would not have been hurt if you didn't wait

I plan to organize a lot more in 2011 because I know I ride harder with others than by myself. And it was fun to feel like I was filling a niche. I hope others do the same.

And mike thanks for including "yet" in your post. I am not really optomistic about ever keeping up with you:cool: but we all enjoy cycling in our own ways. Maybe you'll join a ride I organize if it's on a recovery day:rolleyes:

Keep bringing glory to the tcc name!
 
LSD rides for training - but what if you get flashbacks on an upcoming race?:eek:

Seriously though, I would be very interested in joining a couple of those "trips". Will you keep things mostly flat or include climbing efforts?

In general, I think it's a great idea to cater to different levels of riders while bringing the whole community closer together. Maybe having some kind of special routing (or stacked start), with differently strong groups, but a common goal would make for a big, unifying TCC event in 2011? Say, pick date and goal in advance and let the members work out routes and groups?
 
I'm always up for moderate paced rides especially in winter. Especially LSD mixed with short hill intervals or CX interludes.
 
Thank you all for your replies! Hope something good will come out of this topic. :D

About the slower riding rhythm: this happened to me as well in the past and although we kept insisting that the fast platoon go on and leave the slower ones behind, we couldn't convince them to do so. And the same was with us and the slower than us riders. Even if they say it's ok, you dont feel good leaving them behind. So the feeling bad part is related to both parties, not only to the slower riders. If you're slow you once feel frustrated because you know you're keeping the other person from getting the maximum fun out of the ride and secondly because you know you can't go any faster. Or you can but in that case you'll return home wetter than a lake. :D And if you're an A-rider you feel bad for letting your friends behind and you also feel bad for not being able to go faster.

The idea of a common start with later separation would be different, because it will solve this problem and not set the whole "stack" of cyclists as one team, but rather as a group of teams having one goal - to train /get somewhere etc. So the separation would be much more natural and not "forced" and, thus, I think it would be ok. Plus, if you have 4 and 2 together, the 2 will quickly move to a 4, due to the motivation and the tangible output, but if you put 2 and 20 together, 2 is going to get demoralized and will most likely give up. Also, 4 will have to sacrifice very little to wait for 2, whilst 20 will have to give up a lot. The theory of numbers. :cool:

Anyway, those LSD runs seem really interesting. I've never "participated" in something like that before, so I hope I'll have the chance to take part in in some before I leave Japan. :(

So, those of you who want to get e-mail notifications for slower / medium rides please send me your e-mail addresses via a private message and so we can keep in touch with what we individually organize. If you could also put a prefix to the run, when you open the new thread, something like "amateur run" etc, it would be really appreciated. Or do you already have such a group somewhere? (I wasn't able to find it) Because I see the existing teams as "closed" groups, so that's why I am asking.

Hope to ride with you guys soon! :) Best wishes!

kpykc - Hey, I'll send you a PM with my e-mail address. I usually go out for a ride regularly too, so I'm really glad you live in Fuchu as well. :thumb:

rommelgc - I live close to the river, about 15 minutes of riding away. I went once to Yokohama following the river and I've seen there are a lot of bikers out there, on the bank :) :bike:
 
One of the clubs in US I ride with breaks up the rides into A, B, C classifications for people to choose from and also organizes periodic rides where the groups can ride or assemble together (staggered start, different loop with common meeting points, etc...).

My suggestion is that we create something akin to following:
- We label rides A, B, C (or something similar and suggestions welcome). A's are race/prep pace or orgnized time trials and sprint training; B's are LSD and/or moderate pace (30-35 kph on flats, stops every hr or so), and C's are social (25kph ish, social, sight seeing, famous 名物 eating, beer stops, ....), etc....
- We organize a ride every other month (or every quarter), where there's a C route, B route and an A route. These can be staggered starts and or alternate routes with common meeting place. If TCC leads and HF is ok, we combine with a longer Half Fast rides - and hook up with Positivo group and also extend invite to Yokota CC/crew. More the merrier. We get these on the calendar well in advance.

Given that people come from all parts of Kanto area, meeting places for organized rides would be mid ride locations (at places like Doshi rest stop, Fujiya ramen at top of Takao/Odarumi, ramen at Okutama, a winery at Enzan, Shirokuma pan, etc...or even a start of a hill climb time trial like at Jimba), or close to end of ride (places like brewery in Fussa) and we go home - hopefully in a larger group. A winter ride meet points can also be onsen (Seto no oto at Musashi Itsukaichi, Jimba onsen, etc...), though this might put some people off.

What are your thoughts?
 
I totally agree with the notion of a ride classification system to be used as a rough guide for everyone to use in describing future rides.


I completely understand the frustration for some riders who aren't yet able to join 'fast' rides. But please understand that quite a few of us race here and when training we need to simulate those conditions as closely as possible. I for one have been a little hesitant to post rides here recently for fear of complaints from slower riders.

Joining a TCC ride has been always one of my goals this year. I joined one and I got dropped :eek: I am OK with that. It was a drop ride as mentioned in the ride details.

However, I don't know how others will feel if they got dropped in unknown territory. If the ride details are clear there shouldn't be any hard feelings on anyone.


Perhaps yourself and a few other moderately paced riders should try and take turns organising rides next year. In doing so I'm sure you'll find a lot of others will join in as happened with your ride a while back. Even I was suprised with how many people did that with you and it made me feel a bit left out:confused:

This is the best solution. It's up to the moderately paced riders to organize these kind of rides. Riders with similar skills and abilities setting up rides and riding together. If there is a too big difference in skill set (ie top end speed) there will always be people that might have complaints. No one can please everyone.


koribeyer said:
I plan to organize a lot more in 2011 because I know I ride harder with others than by myself. And it was fun to feel like I was filling a niche. I hope others do the same.

Looking forward to it! :bike: I hope I can setup some rides myself (I hope, I hope).



Regards,
Rommel
 
My suggestion is that we create something akin to following:
- We label rides A, B, C (or something similar and suggestions welcome). A's are race/prep pace or orgnized time trials and sprint training; B's are LSD and/or moderate pace (30-35 kph on flats, stops every hr or so), and C's are social (25kph ish, social, sight seeing, famous 名物 eating, beer stops, ....), etc....
- We organize a ride every other month (or every quarter), where there's a C route, B route and an A route. These can be staggered starts and or alternate routes with common meeting place. If TCC leads and HF is ok, we combine with a longer Half Fast rides - and hook up with Positivo group and also extend invite to Yokota CC/crew. More the merrier. We get these on the calendar well in advance.

Really like this is idea.

As others have hinted, the main issue I think is that the enthusiasts who are most active here and organize the most rides tend also to be the ones who prefer a faster pace/longer distance.

Team Osoi hasn't been active for a while, but it would be good if there was some way to encourage the slower/beginning riders to propose their own rides.
 
Can we get a point system if we organize a ride-- and people come?

Just hearing about other peoples rides and looking at their maps has helped me become a more confident/ambitious cyclist. Maybe it will help others?
 
Plus, if you have 4 and 2 together, the 2 will quickly move to a 4, due to the motivation and the tangible output, but if you put 2 and 20 together, 2 is going to get demoralized and will most likely give up. Also, 4 will have to sacrifice very little to wait for 2, whilst 20 will have to give up a lot. The theory of numbers. :cool:

Anyway, those LSD runs seem really interesting. I've never "participated" in something like that before

Are you quite sure you haven`t `participated` in any LSD trips before?
 
No, not really. :p Only in LSD trade. ( just kidding :D )


By the way, since I'm in college I will have some time free during the winter holiday. And I thought that a trip to Mt. Fuji would be interesting.

But, is it possible, are the roads cleared etc? The distance doesn't seem to be a problem, the problem would be finding a hotel and the state of the roads near the mountain.
 
I recommend Michael's hostel (google or hostel world) cheap and they let me bring my bike in:D
 
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