On Friday I had a chat with Fearless Leader Joe about how we’re not getting any younger, and it’s time to make those bike trips we’ve been talking about for ages. (For reference, it’s now seven years since we did Land’s End to John o’ Groats, and we had a similar conversation prior to that endeavor.) And I said I don’t even remember the last time I did 100km in one go — a metric century.

One thing that’s been holding me back is getting late starts. If I set out at 10, I wouldn’t be getting home until after 5. But the stars aligned yesterday: I was up before 5, and Nana even woke before 6. When she asked, I said I’d leave at 7:30.

(Almost — I got on the road at 7:48.)

I’d told Nana I was going to the Tamagawa without mentioning 100km, and for a change she didn’t ask when I expected to get back. I had dinner planned with José at 6, so lots of time to reach my goal, or not. I took an easy-going pace and was looking forward to the ride with anticipation.

I had a cross-wind dogging my heals a bit on the way upstream. It wasn’t strong enough to be obnoxious, but I was riding about a gear lower than usual. I made roughly double the number of breaks I’ve done on previous occasions, giving my hands and butt a rest and stretching my neck and shoulders.

There’s an unnamed park about halfway from where I join the river and where the path ends at Hamura. It’s so small it hasn’t even got a name, but I call it Kaki Koen [Persimmon Park] because there’s a vending machine that sometimes has fresh persimmons. Anyway, I was disappointed to find it’s been largely paved over. The addition of some picnic tables was nice, but I’m not convinced about the trade-off.

I’d had one of Nana’s world-famous onigiri at the first stop on the river, and got through two more at Persimmon Park. It was just after 10 when I set out on the final push upstream. (Well, I did stop for another rest along the way.)

I often stop at Hamura when riding upstream on the Tamagawa, but I had a different goal in mind. Another couple of kilometers upstream from the weir is Aso Shrine, which has omamori for bicycle safety.

I’d last been here before the Ohio ride in the heat to get omamori for my cycling companions. This time I got one for Hornsby. I’d thought I had one to spare when I was building that bike, but who knows? I’ve got one now. And with that tucked safely in a bag, I stopped next at a convenience store for something more to supplement the last onigiri, and returned to Hamura Weir.

There was a surprise waiting for me at Hamura — two cats resting lazily on the Tamagawa Brothers statue. I got a selfie without scaring them off. Then as I was relaxing and eating in the shade, someone came along, picked up the cats and cycled away with them.

Painful return

It was not yet noon when I messaged Nana I was on the way home. I wondered if I’d be able to get home by 3. The wind was helping me along, or at least not hindering, so I was going a bit faster than I had upstream. But I was also starting to feel the fatigue, and once again was not shy about taking frequent breaks — every 8-10km instead of 15-16km as is usual for me on this run.

Sometime around 60km into the ride (meaning about 40km remaining), my neck got tired of holding up my fat head. I made an effort to keep my shoulders square and my neck straight, and I would sit up straight from time to time to stretch my neck against the sore muscles. At the same time, I was fighting increasing numbness in my fingers and soreness in my butt. I took an additional break with just 4km remaining on the river course, knowing the goal was in sight but desperately needing a stretch and rest.

It was still before 2 when I reached the park that is my last rest stop before returning to city traffic, so I knew I had a good shot at getting home by 3. I filled one of the water bottles and let Nana know I’d be home between 3 and 3:30.

I’d been shifting my butt in the saddle before that last stop and suddenly experienced a sharp pain in my left knee. This continued on my way home through traffic, although I did my best to avoid it. All I could do was to shift down and be even more spinny-spinny than usual, and so long as I could avoid putting any real force through the knee I was OK. It was difficult starting from each stoplight though, as the first few pedal strokes were unavoidable.

I made it through a very crowded train crossing just 6km from home and from there I knew I had it made. I’d drunk the last of my water and just had to keep spinning until the end. I checked my progress at some point and saw I’d have no trouble clearing 100km for the day, so I just pointed Kuroko for home. We got there, safe and sound, at 2:57.

With my 100km in the bag, I was very curious to see the last time I’d made this milestone. The answer was longer ago than I expected: April 2025. The previous metric century had been just a week prior, so FLJ’s remonstrance about advancing age is well-taken.