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Greetings from Mt. Akagi!

tarepanda

Speeding Up
Sep 23, 2011
56
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I've never owned a road bike and never considered it -- it's for pros and people who work out five hours a day, right?

One of my friends in Philadelphia recently got into road biking and when I was talking to him about it, I learned that I was completely wrong! He explained a bunch of things about road bikes and I got bitten by the bug.

I'm working out cash/payment issues to import a bike via Wiggle and I hope to be riding soon. I'm in (I think) great cycling territory since I'm near the Kan-Etsu Highway AND on the slopes of Mt. Akagi. There are plenty of highways with nice, wide, unused sidewalks that I can stretch my legs on.

A few weekends ago we had the Akagi Hill Climb race, so I saw tons of Japanese cyclists blow through town on their Louis Garneaus and La Pierres, but no foreigners. Hopefully someday I'll be up to joining them, or you guys!

Best,
Scott
 
Hi. I'm just down the road in takasaki. If you want I can introduce you to my lbs. They build a lot Of bikes for keilin riders and you can get some good deals from them on occasion. My friend paid 10man yen and gave the instruction that he wanted a carbon bike. He ended up with a Scott carbon frame but a marginally used 105 that someone had on a bike they ordered but changed to campy. You can get some pretty good deals there on occasion. Anyway you're right there are some great roads in this area. Around akagi I recommend the 'Karakaze kaido'. The view is great. Also haruna is nIce. As is the watarase canyon and the agatsuma canyon. Up tOwards minakami is good too. Tone gawa cycling road is nice easy flat riding if you want it. You can ride around to the back of akagi and up towards oze.

Sorry I was just so happy that there is another cyclist in my area. Please enjoy it!
 
Wow, I'm amazed! I didn't have any hopes that there would be someone in the area.

Is your LBS Yoshida Cycle in Tonya-machi, by any chance? I wanted to buy a Felt Z85 from them and they ran out, which set me on a long, long chase for an affordable bike. They weren't very good about corresponding with me via e-mail and still haven't gotten back to me from a question from a month ago...

I've also been to Takizawa Cycle in Maebashi and they've been disappointing customer-service-wise too, since the guy has (several times) just walked out on me in the middle of discussions.

There's a place called Gravity Labs up here on Akagi that's pretty much exclusively La Pierre; I was thinking about getting an Audacio, but it would have been 11 man for the Tiagra plus pedals, so it seemed better to just go with Wiggle and get everything in one go there.

The Tone biking path was actually one of the first places I wanted to try! I used to live near the very end of it in Kamishinden-machi in Maebashi and I used it to go for quick night snacks at Sukiya. I also wanted to try taking 17 north toward Shibukawa. I ALSO want to go down 17, take 151 over that huge bridge crossing the Tone, then stop for a bite at the bagel cafe before heading north on 15 to explore. They all seem to have nice, wide sidewalks for me to get used to the road bike on!

I'm really happy there's someone in the area, hopefully we can meet up after I get my bike!
 
Hey, I took part in that race! It was a really nice (long and consistent) climb.
Living close by the Tokyo bay, I must say I really envy your location.
Eugen
 
Wow, small country!

What route did they have you take? Did you go up the road leading to the giant torii and the shrine/lake?
 
Maybe I'll have to try it, then! I've gone from the bypass up to the torii by bike, but on a 55-pound steel chari. It's not fun at all like that.

How difficult was it?
 
The bike shop is called yoneda racing. It's a small shop in soujamachi.

They don't have a lot in stock, but they do order stuff for you. The spend a lot of time trawling the Internet for the best deals and tend to pass on savings. It's run by an ex-keilin guy who retired due to injury.

Wow, I'm amazed! I didn't have any hopes that there would be someone in the area.

Is your LBS Yoshida Cycle in Tonya-machi, by any chance? I wanted to buy a Felt Z85 from them and they ran out, which set me on a long, long chase for an affordable bike. They weren't very good about corresponding with me via e-mail and still haven't gotten back to me from a question from a month ago...

I've also been to Takizawa Cycle in Maebashi and they've been disappointing customer-service-wise too, since the guy has (several times) just walked out on me in the middle of discussions.

There's a place called Gravity Labs up here on Akagi that's pretty much exclusively La Pierre; I was thinking about getting an Audacio, but it would have been 11 man for the Tiagra plus pedals, so it seemed better to just go with Wiggle and get everything in one go there.

The Tone biking path was actually one of the first places I wanted to try! I used to live near the very end of it in Kamishinden-machi in Maebashi and I used it to go for quick night snacks at Sukiya. I also wanted to try taking 17 north toward Shibukawa. I ALSO want to go down 17, take 151 over that huge bridge crossing the Tone, then stop for a bite at the bagel cafe before heading north on 15 to explore. They all seem to have nice, wide sidewalks for me to get used to the road bike on!

I'm really happy there's someone in the area, hopefully we can meet up after I get my bike!
 
Souja-machi in Maebashi? That's not too far at all! I'll have to go take a look sometime.

Couldn't find a homepage, but googling took me to ANOTHER cycling shop in Souja-machi called Tsuchida Racing. I wish these shops had better publicity...
 
Souja-machi in Maebashi? That's not too far at all! I'll have to go take a look sometime.

Couldn't find a homepage, but googling took me to ANOTHER cycling shop in Souja-machi called Tsuchida Racing. I wish these shops had better publicity...


That's the place. I forgot that they changed their name.
 
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