Well, here I am, slowly plugging away at that challenge. After tomorrow's ride, assuming it's not rained off, I'll be about 320km deep... requiring me to do another 500km in a week. It's Festive 500 all over again, except hot. Ugh.
After my ride on Tuesday I took a few days to recover and frankly still haven't been feeling that great. I think the heat got to me more than I would like to admit. I set off yesterday with the aim of putting in about 150km and turned back at the top of Hanase Omote, which absolutely killed me - managed about 80km total. Not what I was after, but better to play it safe than run myself into the ground.
I think the problem is that temperatures have increased about 10 Celcius in about a week, which leaves no time for acclimatisation. Came just at the wrong time for me, too. Still, it is mid-May - it should not be this hot. It doesn't seem to be cooling down much and it is muggy as hell. Pretty disgusting already. If this keeps up, the summer proper is going to be an absolute scorcher... well, more than usual...
Meanwhile I've been borrowing a friend's GoPro Hero3 Black camera, which is small and light enough to be mounted all over the place... including on my helmet. Thus I have been filming quite a bit - I have a whole ride's worth of footage to finish editing and piecing into a video, and I also filmed last Sunday's CycloFemme ride (a global ride event designed to get women into cycling, which Grecia organised here Kyoto). It's a neat bit of kit.
I took it on Friday... and managed to overheat it. This is apparently a common problem, and a pretty disappointing one. Not sure if it's down to the hardware or just the fact that it's sat on top of my helmet in direct sunlight, but still, it should be able to cope with this. I set it to record the entire descent of Hanase Omote, which is spectacular, but it overheated and crashed about 4 minutes in. I did at least manage to record and save that first section, however, which is the best - switchbacks galore - and I was absolutely ripping it down the hill (I hit 70 kmph, or 43 mph, apparently) so the video is pretty cool anyway. Check it out below (I recommend viewing in HD and full-screen).
I hope to film more descents soon (hey, I love descending... fast) so check back for those!
After my ride on Tuesday I took a few days to recover and frankly still haven't been feeling that great. I think the heat got to me more than I would like to admit. I set off yesterday with the aim of putting in about 150km and turned back at the top of Hanase Omote, which absolutely killed me - managed about 80km total. Not what I was after, but better to play it safe than run myself into the ground.
I think the problem is that temperatures have increased about 10 Celcius in about a week, which leaves no time for acclimatisation. Came just at the wrong time for me, too. Still, it is mid-May - it should not be this hot. It doesn't seem to be cooling down much and it is muggy as hell. Pretty disgusting already. If this keeps up, the summer proper is going to be an absolute scorcher... well, more than usual...
Meanwhile I've been borrowing a friend's GoPro Hero3 Black camera, which is small and light enough to be mounted all over the place... including on my helmet. Thus I have been filming quite a bit - I have a whole ride's worth of footage to finish editing and piecing into a video, and I also filmed last Sunday's CycloFemme ride (a global ride event designed to get women into cycling, which Grecia organised here Kyoto). It's a neat bit of kit.
I took it on Friday... and managed to overheat it. This is apparently a common problem, and a pretty disappointing one. Not sure if it's down to the hardware or just the fact that it's sat on top of my helmet in direct sunlight, but still, it should be able to cope with this. I set it to record the entire descent of Hanase Omote, which is spectacular, but it overheated and crashed about 4 minutes in. I did at least manage to record and save that first section, however, which is the best - switchbacks galore - and I was absolutely ripping it down the hill (I hit 70 kmph, or 43 mph, apparently) so the video is pretty cool anyway. Check it out below (I recommend viewing in HD and full-screen).
I hope to film more descents soon (hey, I love descending... fast) so check back for those!
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