I didn’t go far today, just the usual run down to Haneda and back. The weather was really nice, with bright, hazy skies and not much wind. With such nice weather on a weekend, though, there were a lot of careless people out on the Tamagawa cycling course. I had to stay alert.

I made the effort today to keep my mask on for most of the ride. This was more for the UV blocking than Covid protection. (It’s not really necessary to mask for that while riding as I don’t ride near other people.) I only had to lower it on occasion when my sunglasses would fog up, usually at a stop. On the other hand, it was only about 17C at most today. It will be a different proposition when it’s 30C this summer.

I was making good time today and felt strong — certainly better than I have since coming down with pneumonia last month. Even the few short climbs on the way home didn’t phase me. I did have to come to a screeching halt when passing through a small shopping area and a young boy biking in the opposite direction wasn’t watching where he was going. I shouted out to him and he looked round at the last second. He braked hard and just bumped into my front tire. I tried to smile and said, “Eyes front, fellah.” His father (who had already passed me safely) called out an apology. No harm done, I’m glad to report.

I didn’t have any mechanical trouble during the ride. I’ve been fighting with the front tire since returning from Shimanami Kaido. I’ve replaced the valve but it continued to leak, so I added more rim tape around the valve, and now I can’t get the tire to reseat. Rather than fiddle with it further today, I just pumped up the tire on my spare front wheel — the one with the dynamo hub that I used for Lejog. I recently put a new tire on this, the same make as my usual tires but with a bit of a knobby tread. So with that on the front on the usual slick on the rear, I had a semi-mullet set-up.

The tire with the tread makes a bit more road noise than the slick. I’m sure it is fractionally less efficient, and ditto the dynamo hub, which is also a bit heavier (but wasn’t under load today). But apart from the additional noise — just scarcely enough to be noticeable, honestly — I didn’t notice much difference. The slick tends to hunt over lines in the pavement (particularly ones parallel to the direction of travel), while the tire with tread doesn’t. I think my strength and well-being today overshadowed any minute loss of performance this set-up entails.