Bad Luck Comes In Threes
(Or More, In Our Case)

Yoshida-kun and I went for a mid-day ride up the back of Hageyama today in the scorching sun. It felt really good to be out in the heat, getting a bit of a sunburn. Lately, due to the hot summer we have been saving our rides for night time and doing night runs so we don't see the sun very often these days while riding together. Today when I called him I was surprised to hear that he was willing to come for a ride during the day. I was expecting to either have to go at night with him or by myself during the day. I am always glad when a friend rides with me as the time passes much more quickly and the experience is exponential.

Due to the recent heavy rains, which are very unusual for August, the road has become especially rough and very technical. There are deep ruts running the length of some parts; the gravel is all washed away, showing the hard yellow rock beneath. Usually August is extremely hot and very sunny. But the rainy season didn't seem to end until just the beginning of this week (August 18th). In fact, there has been so much rain that the Kuzuryu River nearly jumped its banks. The little river in front of our house actually did flood and caused some damage to the houses in my neighborhood. You can see this by visiting the News Flash: Sanno Floods! page.

The ride up was hot, intense but very satisfying. It is always enjoyable to find some shaded spots where the temperature is slightly lower, or to cross a valley with a stream running down the side of the mountain which usually carries with it a fresh, cool breeze. Those are the kind of places we like to break at. Several times we had to explain to the construction workers that were passing by in trucks, dumps, tractors, etc. that we were not trying to go all the way through; that we knew the road ended and were not going to go to the end because construction was under progress and it would be dangerous to do so. Just to the "flag" (the spot where new construction was underway) we would say. Slowly we worked our way to the top, to the end of our ride.

We arrived at the flag and took a much-needed break. Yoshida-kun decided to soak his head in one of the streams in order to cool off a bit. When we were getting ready to go again, he put on his $200 goggles and snapped the frame clean through! Who would have thought they would be so brittle? I could understand it happening in the winter (it happened to me last winter when it was cold) but in the heat of summer when everything is warm and soft? We were surprised. That was bad luck event number one.

About one-third of the way down this crevasse-infested, sharp rock-strewn access road the rear end of my bike went all mushy and slid around wildly. Flat! As I stopped and got out of the way, Yoshida-kun came around the corner and yelled, "I just got a flat!" That was our second unlucky event of the day. Imagine two people both getting a flat together at the same time. Since I began riding with him two seasons ago I have not once had a flat. This was a very unusual incident.

We took our rear wheels off and the tubes out of the tire. My tire was unusable again, and could not be repaired. I had a spare tube with me as I always carry one for these kind of situations but Yoshida-kun had changed bags earlier in the day and had forgotten to transfer his spare tube to the new bag!! Bad luck incident number three. W had over 15km or so of road to traverse before arriving at home and wondered how we were going to accomplish this in due time. So Yoshida-kun came up with this "emergency-situation" idea to stuff weeds in his tire in place of the tube and crawl slowly home. Some, great idea! I didn't have another tube for him but when I looked through my bag I found that I still had some glueless patches left over that had not rotted. A lucky occurrence indeed; rare in today's sequence of events. I lent him two to patch the two holes we found and he decided to forego the "weed idea" for my more practical one.

How the heck do you fix this thing again?

Ha ha ha! It happened to me too!

We both had pumps so got to work on digging them out. When Yoshida-kun tried to fill up his tire the pump broke in mid-stroke! Can you believe the look on his face when he showed it to me? "How much worse can it get?", I thought to myself. I lent him my pump and we finished up.

Then my brake pad popped out of its socket and I had to put that back in. Next the tiny spring that holds tension on the rear skewer (small rod that runs through the hub of the rims and fastens the wheel to the frame of the bike) broke. We just looked at each other and laughed. This had become a joke to us. Because the weather was so fine, we didn't really mind; had it been raining and cold our feelings would have been much different. The ride had already made up for the events that were happening to us.

After getting through all of this we rode back down to the end of the rough road and cooled off in the river that runs from down the valley into the Kuzuryu River, jumping in with all of our clothes on. It felt sooooo nice to have the cold mountain water coursing over our sweat-streaked bodies. We contemplated staying there for a while yet, but as a fair bit of time had passed due to various "events" on our ride, we were getting hungry and thought it might be nice to get back to some fresh watermelon and custard-creme-filled pastries.

This river feels so good in the summer heat.

Relaxing after a long, hot ride.

The ride down was uneventful, thank goodness but when we took a detour so I could show Yoshida-kun where I planned on having a barbecue next weekend, bad luck struck again! I thought I would jump into the Kuzuryu River for a quick swim. This river is much deeper and faster than the other stream we had stopped at earlier. I dove into my regular spot and when I came up, my $20 Pearl Izumi cycling headband was gone! Oh no!!!!

We came home and ate that watermelon and those darn pastries, enjoying every last crumb and seed of them and hoping they would help us to forget. It was a very enjoyable ride, albeit a bit expensive. Sometimes even forethought takes a backseat to Lady Luck.

Cam Switzer

This material belongs to me.
Contact me for more details.