The Inter High is a yearly race where the cycling clubs of many high schools from around Japan compete to prove themselves the best. You can read more general information about the Inter High event on the Inter High page.
The 42nd Summer Inter High, also known as the Tochigi Inter-High is being celebrated in Utsunomiya, Tochigi Prefecture during Japan Summer.
Team Sohoku arrives at the event in Ride 295, though the race does not actually begin until Ride 300. In the anime, the new course is described as more difficult than the last, known as "Sprinter Killer" because it has many steep and long slopes through Toushougu Shrine, a World Heritage Site, with the highest point at 1840m above sea level, roughly twice as high as Hakone, as well as the fact that the last kilometer of sprint checkpoints are also mild uphill climbs. Also, it is a very hot venue, reaching temperatures of 25 degrees Celsius in the morning before the race even starts.
Known Participants[]
Ace • Ace Assistant • Sprinter • Climber • All-Rounder • Unknown
First Stage[]
The Sohoku bus arrives at the local of the Inter High with all the participants and its supporting members. While the bus is driving to the parking lot, Aya Tachibana notices the journalists around and then a bus bigger than theirs. She reads and everyone notices it is Hakone's bus. The Hakone regulars then leaves the bus, getting the attention of the spectators and the journalists around. Sohoku's second year Shoukichi Naruko gets angry at how the reporters are not paying attention to them, even though they were last year champions. They noticed them that everyone thinks their victory last year was a fluke, as Hakone is constantly winning all its editions, and they get more determined to achieve their consecutive victory.
While the other Sohoku members are going towards the staff stand to get their tag numbers, the first year Issa Kaburagi starts to feel a stomachache due to his anxiety and runs towards the toilet. He then sees the toilet occupied and begins to desperately knock the door. The second year from Hakone Masakiyo Doubashi angrily opens the door and begins to scream about Issa's disturbing actions, but the first year asked to first go to the toilet so they could talk. After doing his necessities and leave it, Masakiyo begins to scream with Issa about his attitude, which the first year apologized. As Masakiyo is explaining that he locks himself in a calm place to concentrate to the race, he notices Issa wearing Sohoku's shorts and begins to mock him about their victory being a fluke. Issa gets annoyed at Masakiyo and grabs him by his jersey, which the Hakone cyclist does aswell and at a fast reaction that amazed Issa. Masakiyo gets surprised at Issa's speed and the fact that he did not step back at any moment and the Sohoku cyclist asked him to take back what he said, which he did not. He then explains his viewpoint at how Sakamichi was not really strong and ended up putting a doubt in Issa's mind, leaving right after and stating that Hakone is the strongest team.
After getting their tags, the Sohoku players go to the tent and they begin distributing to the regulars. Sakamichi gets surprised that he was given the #1 tag and thinks Shunsuke Imaizumi should wear it instead, but the others assure him that he is qualified to wear it because he was the overall winner last year. After getting his tag, Shoukichi goes to Kyoto Fushimi's tent and challenges their ace Akira Midousuji to a race, prior to his loss in Osaka's track course. Akira accepts his challenge and Shoukichi reveals that he turned into an all-rounder, making his opponent thoughtful. Later, Akira announces that he is replacing their sixth member Sakudai Hironishi by their first reserve Komari Kishigami as a part of his strategy to hide his secret weapon. Sakudai protests, stating he invited his parents and friends to watch him since he was going to participate and Akira mocks him stating he did that to himself and it was also part of his strategy. Akira also tells him he how poor his abilities are and that he could not keep up with them in the practices. Sakudai tells him he thought he had any kind of special talent which was seem by Akira and the second year implies that is the reason he will be always at such level. Sakudai goes to the corner of the tent and sits, depressed with his retirement of the race.
Elsewhere, Komari wash his hands and gets on his bicycle, going to the closed track used by the other cyclists to warm up for the race. There, he meets Sohoku's Shunsuke Imaizumi and the second-year Terufumi Sugimoto who was invited by his teammate to practice with him. As they were chatting, Komari approaches Shunsuke and grabs his legs, feeling his opponents muscles. Komari then gets away from his opponent and apologizes for getting carried away. He also asks if Shunsuke if he was in bad condition, given that his leg was rough. Before he gets a proper answer, Komari leaves them and states he will meet him at the starting line later.
At Sohoku's tent, the third-year Higashido arrives at the event and meets his friend Junta. He states his club was eliminated in the qualifiers and could not go to the national and came all the way from Chiba to cheer for him. As they kept talking, the staff announces the race will start soon and Junta gets ready to go to the event, but both him and Higashido are surprised by Hakone's ace Takuto Ashikiba. Higashido wonders who he is and after finding out he is their childhood friend from middle school he goes after the Hakone cyclist. Despite being remembered by a wrong name, Takuto still recognized Higashido and was glad to see him. Higashido offers to take a picture of the three of them reunited after three years, but Takuto denies stating that him and Junta are now opponents. Takuto reveals that he went after Junta to announce they will win. Junta accepts his challenge and tries to make a friendly approach of him but is denied by the Hakone cyclist that ultimately leaves and states this year they have another first-year as a regular, the second one in Hakone's history after Sangaku Manami.
At Hakone's tent, the sixth member and first-year Yuto Shinkai is practicing at the rollers. He is called by the second-year Rei Takadajou who states that the third-year Yukinari Kuroda is already furious for him being so late. Yuto then leaves the rollers and picks his bicycle, going after the other regular members. Yuto calmly apologizes for being late and asks how his older brother Hayato Shinkai performed in last year, being replied by Hakone's captain that he was fast and that there was not any other person more suited for wearing Hakone's #4 than him. Yuto then says that he really does not get it since he is a climber instead of a sprinter like his brother, being that the reason they never did ride together.
At Sohoku tent's, Sakamichi begins to get anxious with the Inter High that was about to start, worried if he will ride properly. With the help of his friends he manages to get himself prepared and go to the starting line along with his teammates, despite being clumsy. Being at the front of the Inter High starting line, Sakamichi is shaking and is comforted by the third-year Hajime Aoyagi, who manages to calm him down. Sakamichi then extends his closed hand towards his team, making the other five members to the same and the six of them bump their fists, symbolizing Sohoku's teamwork.
The race starts and the cyclists start to move, lined up in a row for the parade that will last for the first two kilometers. Shunsuke notices how Sakamichi is tense for the pressure of the cyclists and calms him down, showing how Shoukichi is calmly reacting and interacting with the spectators. Behind them, Junta talks with his third-year friend Hajime about they finally managing to ride in the Inter High together. As Junta shakes his teammate's hands, he reveals how he is trembling due to the nervousness and Hajime tries to comfort him by saying he will stop the trembling for him. The other cyclists behind are cautious about Hakone and their intensity of reclaiming their title as kings after last year's defeat to Sohoku. They then get surprised after seeing Sohoku's Sakamichi approaching Hakone and getting close to their ace climber Sangaku. Both climbers keep talking with each other and Sangaku then challenges Sakamichi to a race on the mountain, which he agrees and then leaves. Yuto then talks to Sangaku if it is okay to make such a promise since he was ordered to stop Sakamichi and Sangaku replies that he only says it because he never did ride with Sakamichi yet and that he is the type of guy who always keep his promises, surprising Yuto. The parade then comes to an end after the staff member waves the white flag in the car and the cyclists start to prepare for the first stage of the first day, the sprinter checkpoint.
Sprinters Checkpoint[]
The sprinters begin to leave their teams and accelerate towards their goal, the green colored tag. Hakone's captain Touichirou calls Masakiyo and orders him aswell to defeat the other teams who got ahead and win the sprinter checkpoint, which the second-year agrees. Later, Sohoku's captain Junta sends Issa and Hajime to battle for the sprinter checkpoint. At first Issa protests stating he is an all-rounder and that he should battle for the goal, but Hajime grabs the first-year by his ear and pulls him out of the pack.
They begin to pass the many cyclists who got ahead and out of the forty three who got ahead, they passed thirteen and reached another eight. Both Hajime and Issa then begin to use their techniques to overcome the cyclists until they reach the leading group, defeating even the ones who challenged them.
In the meantime, Shoukichi is frustrated for not going to battle for the first checkpoint as he did in he previous year. Shunsuke thanks him for enduring his desire to go and turning into an all rounder, which his teammate implies that it was not for him. Hakone's Touichirou approaches him and they begin to talk about not going for the sprinter checkpoint like they did in the previous Inter High and how they really wanted to. Touichirou then challenges Shoukichi to a small race until the Inter High flag, but they are stopped by Shunsuke and Yukinari who reminded them about their job. They follow their teammates words and stop and Touichirou shows how he developed his muscles in order to reclaim their title as the kings, surprising Shoukichi despite him being aware of it from looking at him. Touichirou lastly warns to them about Masakiyo and his skills, stating how strong he is and that undoubtely he will be the winner of the sprinter checkpoint.
At the leading group, Masakiyo catches up with them and they all begin to feel oppressed by his big figure, to the point of sweating and being scared of him. Shortly after, both Sohoku cyclists catches up with them and stay behind Masakiyo. Hajime is amazed at how intimidating his oppponent's presence is and thinks his junior will have the same feeling, but he gets surprised by how Issa is talking with him without being afraid. After all Issa's mocks towards Masakiyo, the Hakone cyclist decides to shut him up by showing his skills and performs an attack by himself towards the goal. Hajime and the cyclists from the other teams attempt to ride along with his opponent, but they are quickly left behind. As Sohoku's third year was shocked by Masakiyo's powerful riding, Issa offers to go after him and then both cyclists begin to go after the cyclist ahead, with the first-year pulling Hajime.
After Issa's strong acceleration, they manage to catch up with Masakiyo, who attempts to get ahead again but is easily caught up by the two cyclists. At the mark of one kilometer remaining, Issa sends Hajime after the sprinter checkpoint and he uses his Human Bullet technique, absorbing a high amount of oxygen until his torso and lungs inflate and going to the goal by himself. As Issa tries to mock his opponent, he notices how determined he is to chase after his opponent ahead and after seeing Masakiyo's attack he goes after him. At the front, Hajime wanted to thanks Issa for his hardwork and things his legs can endure until the goal, beginning to focus solely on his attack. He is quickly surprised by Masakiyo's presence who caught up to him. Masakiyo begins to give in to his impulses and breaks the zipper of his jersey, torning it apart.
Afraid, Hajime activates his variation of the Human Bullet technique which he named as Bambi-style, in which he concentrates the oxygen inhaled on his legs and make them more powerful and challenging. Hajime then breaks away from Masakiyo and got ahead for a while, but the Hakone cyclist lately catches up with him and keeps mocking his opponent. Despite being ahead, Hajime begins to feel frustrated for not being capable of leave his opponent behind and eventually they get neck and neck. However, Issa surprised both cyclists by revealing himself and being among both cyclists, revealing he had a bad feeling about Masakiyo and decided to follow him. Issa then gets ahead of Hajime and states he will once again put his senior in a good position as his launch pad, but Hajime decides to entrust the goal to him and sends the first year to race against Masakiyo. Despite denying since he thinks he is an all rounder, Hajime decides to get ahead of his teammate and block the wind for him to recover from before. Issa insists he can not go for a sprinter battle and Hajime reveals a letter with orders from an Orange Beena entity he performed to convince Issa of sharpening his skills prior to the Inter High. Issa is surprised at seeing the letter from the Orange Beena great spirit and after reading it with the advice to win the sprinter checkpoint, he decides to go after it. Masakiyo then accelerates and Hajime sends Issa after him.
At the mark of 200m remaining the Sohoku cyclist catches up with his opponent and they begin to ride neck and neck. Issa gets ahead of Masakiyo momentarily and the Hakone cyclist catches up and follows him from behind, stating he will not lose. Masakiyo notices Issa saying orders to "keep going" and he thinks he is facing mechanical troubles, but it is revealed later that Issa has a trick of imagining gears and when they attach to each other he gets even more stronger. As his mental gears finally got together, he accelerates even more and Masakiyo notices it, also accelerating and keeping up with his opponent by using his full power. They begin to see the result line and ride neck and neck while with all their power towards the line. Both cyclists then crosses the sprinter checkpoint's line and they both celebrate their victory, confusing the spectators who were not aware of the winner. Both cyclists begin to argue, stated their victory towards the other which confused the spectators even more. After the staff checks the results based on the device attached to the participants' bicycles, they announce Masakiyo's victory in the sprinter checkpoint, followed by Issa and Hajime who placed second and third respectively.
Known Results[]
Dejected, Aoyagi is lost as to how to console Kaburagi, but Danichiku managed to get their attention from the side of the road. Danichiku offers to high-five Kaburagi and Aoyagi, despite Kaburagi not wanting to talk to him because he let him down. Sugimoto Terufumi, Koga, Kanzaki Miki also offer their support instead of scolding him for losing, something Hakogaku, and Team SS would had done. Aoyagi explained to Kaburagi that it is because Sugimoto and Koga know a lot about losing as they are experiencing it by not riding. Kaburagi resolves to beat Doubashi when they race each other again.
As the winning school of the Sprinter's Checkpoint, Izumida orders Teshima to give way, and let Hakogaku members to lead the peloton, but Izumida soon decided to break away because he conserved enough energy to pull the team in the flats. Teshima, who already predicted this, lead Sohoku pack to chase them. However, given that Teshima is poor on the flat, he sent Naruko to keep up with Izumida, and they decided to go for the Sprinter's Checkpoint, with Kuroda and Imaizumi both giving the green light to battle until they catch up to the sprinters.
Naruko and Imaizumi scold Kaburagi because they don't like him, and Teshima comforts Aoyagi for losing, but Teshima gave an order to Onoda to stay close to the front, as Teshima realises Hakogaku has deliberately slowed down to draw them closer to the peloton as a bait to try and eliminate Onoda as a threat seeing he is wearing the number 1 zekken and is a climber, something Kaburagi still doesn't realise.
Climbers Checkpoint[]
The Climber's Checkpoint is on National Route 119, Nikkou Kaidou, a mountain road lined with tall cedar trees leading to Nikkou-Toushou Shrine. The winding road starts the ascend to 1173m above sea level. A short distance away from the hairpin turn outside Akechidaira Restaurant.
As soon as the pack caught up with Sohoku and Hakogaku, as they head towards Nikkou City, Onoda gets swallowed by the pack again and pinned by two rider riding close to him, blocking his path to the front as Hakogaku planned, leaving Sohoku with no choice but to send Teshima to try for first day King the mountain against Manami, as Izumida also decides not to send Shinkai Yuto to go for the Checkpoint as Sohoku cannot enter a two-on-two battle.
However, Onoda can't stay pinned because riders are more worried about individually getting through the climb the peloton will stretch into a line instead, and Onoda managed to use his metal pedal to clip Yamagata Mogami's Inashiro Bunya, a second year climber as assistant for the climb stages. The early favourite is Bunya's teammate, Kawahara Gunpei. However, somewhere during the climb, Onoda ended up in last place.
Teshima tried hard to keep pace with Manami, but he pushed so hard that he had a lapse in concentration and almost fell out of the race with a little more than 4km to go, but managed to regather and continue. After the actual race started at the 3km remaining mark. By the time they are just less than 2km to go, they caught and passed Gunpei, who seemed to set an impossible pace when he broke away early. By the time they passed the 1.25km remaining mark, the crowd acknowledges Teshima's determination to keep up with Manami and cheered him on.
Manami experiences some mechanical trouble with his chain coming off due to the stress of his high gear climb, just as he moves to the second-to-highest gear. Teshima waits for him with 300m to go. Despite going beyond his 'ordinary' abilities, Teshima loses to Manami. Teshima nearly collapse after the checkpoint but Onoda has broken free of the pack set to block him by utilizing a two-step acceleration combined with his high-cadence riding so he can create his own passing lane on the further left side of the road, then he sang a new Love Hime theme song to get ahead, he also received help from the rest of the pack to abandon blocking and give him free passes as a sign of respect, but Onoda snuck behind Kyoto Fushimi, but he must beat Yamaguchi, a sprinter, in order for Kyofushimi to abandon pursuit. He arrives just in time to give Teshima assist, even when both Sohoku and Hakogaku are over 4.5 minutes behind Teshima and Manami. He caught with Teshima and saved him
Known Results[]
After the results are shown, Sohoku is elated by the result because Teshima only lost by milliseconds, rather than minutes as many predicted.
Day 1 Checkpoint[]
The checkpoint is less than 10km from the Climber's Checkpoint. But with the roads closed, it also affected support vehicles, which cannot get to the bottom of the hill to the feed zone. Given this Koga and Sugimoto Terufumi carried the food and drink bags and set off on the team's spare bikes. While the rest of Hakogaku beat Sohoku to the checkpoint. Kaburagi thought about gunning for the Day 1 Checkpoint by himself, but was pulled back by Aoyagi. Meanwhile, Kuroda and Ashikiba set off on a two-man breakaway. While many thought he was a climber, Kuroda worked over the winter to improve his pulling skills on the flats because of his great teamwork with Ashikiba in the third year sendoff race.
Kuroda is able to pull Ashikiba to a 4-second lead into the tunnel, thinking most competitors would have trouble judging distances and gaps in he tunnel. Imaizumi and Naruko sends Naruko to pull instead of Kaburagi to catch up on the downhill section. They did rather comfortably while riding dangerously close while cornering.
Kuroda was happy that they caught up, but Hakogaku attacked again and pulled a two-second gap after a sharp left turn at the beginning of the flats past the Futaransan Shrine gate towards the coast surrounding Lake Chuzenji. Kuroda enters his best terrain - variable bumpy terrain that suits his flexible and squishy leg muscles and legs. He has shed muscles due to long training, making his a better allrounder, puncheur and time trialist. It also quashed Izumida and public notion that hard muscles equals strength. He boasts his muscles is as flexible as leather whip, which still deals a lot of damage. In their pursuit, they catches up and drops the climbers.
What Hakogaku and Sohoku didn't realize is that Kishigami and Midousuji also joined the attack. They attacked the climbers just before the feed zone. By the time Koga and Sugimoto got to the feed zone with seconds to spare to get to Imaizumi and Naruko, Kyotofushi has already made up so much ground that their support crew are already on standby. Although Naruko unleased his Tip-Toe Advance, an evolution of Armstrong Climb, Naruko and Imaizumi's constant bickering over who the true Ace is, allowed Kyotofushi to catch them and Hakogaku just after the feed zone, 3.5km to the end of Day 1.
By that point, Komari grabs Kuroda's thighs and causes a confusion. The decoy allows Midousuji to launch a solo attack, but it also leaves Sohoku at a seemingly 2-1 disadvantage over Hakogaku as Imaizumi lost Naruko, but he actually dropped Imaizumi and Hakogaku to chase Midousuji by himself with 3km to go, where they will pass Lake Chuzenji and rapidly climb up the winding mountainous roads before the flat road leading to the base of Mt. Nantaisan.
Naruko was able to keep up with Midousuji's attacks on the climb not just by his new climbing techniques, but he has abandoned his carbon wheels built for sprinting, but Midousuji left his seat and leans far forward with his hands on the upper bars to pull ahead, but was quickly drew level by Naruko's Tip-Toe Advanced Armstrong Climb 2.0. It impresses Midosuji so much that he finally called Naruko "Naruko-kun" instead of "Chicken-head", then try to convince him to work co-operatively as they are far ahead of anyone else. Naruko saw through his bluff and starts chasing Midousuji. Kuroda, on the other side, offers to work with Imaizumi until they catch up to Naruko and Midousuji. Imaizumi accepts and got between Kuroda and Ashikiba. Kuroda accelerates after pulling a scab on the side of his head.
Meanwhile. Tadakoro went off-road on his car to beat the traffic jam so he, Makishima and Kinjo can be at the finish line before the riders.
Naruko fell behind having been unable to handle the higher gears that Midousuji can. But with 2km to go, Midousuji has another mental lapse and Naruko takes advange and declares the battle back on. Midousuji took off the bandages on his thighs to prepare for the sprint finish.
Koga and Sugimoto hitch a ride with the media car to get to the finish. Meanwhile first-year students Satadoki, Sawada and Gorizo have already secured spots at the finish line by catching the school bus. Satadoki is instructed by Koga to lead the cheer for the riders and give them supplies at the end of the race. Meanwhile, Tadokoro, Kinjou and Makishima, who is still jet-lagged and car-sick from his flight and the off-road detour, also arrives at the finish line, Sanbonmatsu Park parking gates, before the race leaders.
Midousuji and Naruko traded leads all the way through the final kilometer, with the closest pack over 350m behind. Given the large gap, Ashikiba decided to switch roles with Kuroda because he feels it would be useless to save energy if he is too far behind, so he pulled while playing The Ninth Symphony in his head, and morphed into his form of Metronome Dancing style by standing up and swinging the bike. Once they closed to 50m behind, Kuroda returned to the front to pull.
With 500m left, it becomes a five-horse race to the finish. But when Imazumi realizes that Naruko actually lost to Midousuji in Osaka, he decides to back off and let him fight for line honors if he catches up.With 400m left, with Naruko having a slim lead, Kuroda picks his scab and unleashes his true form as well. With 300m left, there is a long but sharp chicane to negotiate. Midousuji unleashes his locust mode right in the middle of the chicane.
By 200m to go, Kuroda continued pulling Ashikiba and Imaizumi to get to the leading duo, but his extremecornering style has drawn so much blood from his shoulders, he crashed out with 150m to go after launching Ashikiba. Imaizumi never gets any benefit from the co-operation as he fell behind. It has become a three-horse race between Ashikiba, Midousuji and Naruko with 70m to go. Ashikiba eventually wins after seeing Midousuji and Naruko launching themselves too early in the sprint, and only attacked once with 25m to go, and also having the long reach to lunge over the line first.
Known Results[]
After the win, Ashikiba is confirmed to be the tallest ever cyclist to win a stage. It became a gag when Naruko overheard how short he is, even if Ashikiba let Naruko stand on top of the podium. Midousuji does not accept his joint second place, and sent Funatsu to receive it instead. Given Hakogaku swept the Mountain, Sprint and Line honours, Sohoku's morale is badly shaken. It hit Issa so badly that he starts a rant, to the point that Imaizumi has to defend Naruko and stop Issa's rant. Naruko's lack of height and reach meant he would always lose to Ashikiba at the final lunge, yet he still puts on a brave face in front of the crowd, and it makes Imaizumi astounded by his mental toughness, and Naruko only broke down in resentment after hiding in the corner where nobody can see him.
After the Ceremony[]
First year Gorizo is the masseur for Sohoku, and work hard to alleviate the pain Teshima suffered from the mountain stage, where his overexertion almost caused him to retire due to heat exhaustion, which Issa proceeded to collapse later on, which is when Imaizumi realises he was only hanging on by the adrenaline in his body, and exhaustion and fatigue hits him really hard once the effects wear off. At this point, Hakogaku still holds a 5-4 advantage as Kuroda may not able to race on Day 2 as he didn't finish the stage. Teshima's extent of heat exhaustion, and Issa's collapse also leaves Sohoku is a bad shape.
Onoda has to find Naruko before Sohoku holds an emergency meeting in the hotel. Just as he is lost in his thoughts, Kinjou appears in front of him. However, Kinjou appears to be cold to the idea to visit the team because they can no longer support Sohoku as they are no longer current students, and their presence when the team is losing would actually divide the existing team because the seniors can no longer actively race to help them, instead, Kinjou, Teshima and Makishima will be spectators from afar, and only visit them when they win. Onoda, who got to see Kinjou, is happy enough knowing that Makishima is somewhere watching the race.
At the meeting, Teshima decides to revert to the No-Ace strategy and stay as close to each other as possible, while the alumni decides to stay at Tadokoro's house.
Night 1[]
Onoda's mother drops by to see Onoda and Naruko, initially to go to Toshougu Shrine, but also to drop of a bike pump that is actually only for the Mamachari bike, and also the Best Boy hats to the Sohoku members. She later sees Koga and Aoyage, and they got the hats as well, but she said that one of the hats was given to Manami when he helped her get to the annex. She then gave a few encouraging words before mistaking Aoyagi as an anime club member before going back to the hotel with the Housewives Alliance.
In the Nikkou Kihara Inn, where Kyofushi shares with 3 other bike clubs, Midousuji are nowhere to be found after coming tied second with Naruko. Komari also is missing. It turns out Midousuji is training at night, he sucks his left bicep until it is bruised. Yamaguchi Noriyuki recalls that Midousuji threatened to quit the team in the middle of last year's race, and fears that he would do it again. He spotted broken guardrails, and become fearful that he fell to the beach and badly injures or killed himself. Little that he knew, Midousuji is riding back to the dorm, next to a car, in the opposite direction, so Noriyuki couldn't have spotted him.
Meanwhile Mizuta instructs the second years to catch breakaway, but Midousuji comes back to the dorm in time to shut him down, while Komari also not offering reasons for his absence.
When Noriyuki receives the call to return to the dorm, he is relieved, but Midousuji's strategy is almost identical to the usual: Dropping anyone that cannot keep up on the flats and before the climbs.
Hakogaku, who lives in the hotel, gets reassurance that Kuroda would be back to race on Day 2.
Second Stage[]
The course for Stage 2, as drawn by Kyofushi, starts of with a small climb, then has a gradual and long drop in altitude before a flat section, another flatter downhill section will continue throughout the third quarter, before the climb at the final 15% of the course, before finishing just 100m lower than the highest point. The more precise version, according to Teshima, the stage starts where Stage 1 fished, going back the chicane, riding noth using all of National Route 120, cutting through Senjōgahara at 1400m above sea level, then the winding 10km climb will get them to 1800m. After passing Konei Pass and Konsei Tunnel, the long descent begins past the ski slopes and lake. They go past Fukiware Falls, through Numata City. It is the longest stage of the Inter High.
Before the start of Stage 2, The starting point is the same as the finish line of Day 1, and after Hakogaku's photo op, Shinkai Yuto spots Onoda after he drops his lucky anime models. Yuto tells Onoda that he wasn't able to do his job to stop Onoda because he was too far behind to require his service. Despite this, Yuto still calls him Mountain King in deference. Onoda was unaware of his status, but he still wanted an bug-type naickname,while Yuto hastily introduced himself a Peak Hornet before the cameras focus on them.
Issa hyperventilates before the starting gun, to the point that he starts becoming defensive over his nervousness. Aoyagi decides to be 'God of Orangina's messenger' and orders Issa to slow his breathing and follow him closely, and will deliver the messages from God 'when the time is appropriate'. Kaburagi finally calms down, but he forgets that Teshima, Aoyagi, Onoda and him, as well as the rest of Hakogaku (except Kuroda, who must start at the back as he finished Stage 1 nearly at the back of the field) starts three minutes and fifteen seconds later as that was the margin to the leader the day before, so Aoyagi still had to hold him back. Manami is pleased to see Teshima, who has grown respect for him, given they never talked to each other before the battle yesterday.
As for Sohoku's strategy, Onoda must help the team catch up to Imaizumi and Naruko, while they rotate as the leading rider to keep the competitors in check while conserving energy. However, they must immediately respond to Hakogaku's attack. Little that Onoda knew, Doubashi, a sprinter, is also a decent puncheur, so he can still attack on small climbs without much effort. After Onoda launches an attack, Hakogaku promptly gave up chasing because they want to give Kuroda every chance to catch up, but they go on a drop all the way back to the peloton. When they picked Kuroda up, they can attack as five again, and giving them a 5-4 advantage in the pack race.
The pace Onoda set is too tough for Issa to maintain, and he spaced out twice and fell off the pack. Although he manages to catch up, Aoyagi already senses his problems. Issa spaced out for hte thrid time, and is dropped by both Sohoku and Hakogaku packs. He drafts behind Doubashi after regathering his thoughts, but Doubashi finds his reasonings petty and told the Hakogaku pack to drop him. Issa was later forced to retire due to left leg fatigue. By the time Teshima notices he was gone, it is already too late, because if it was a mechanical problem, Issa would had screamed or signalled for help like they practiced. Teshima, however, was philosophical because he was the only first-year in the race, being further and further away from , so the burden of him catching up to the seniors and taking on the responsibilities are too much, the same problems Koga faced when he was the only first-year student in the Inter High team, problems that Onoda didn't have as he had Imaizumi and Naruko to help him. Onoda thought about dropping back to pick Kaburagi up, but as he is the defending champion, it would be nearly impossible to carry the role as effectively as he did last year on picking up Tadokoro. Onoda also have new responsibilities. He is like a king in a chess set, he's supposed to be protected, rather than being in the open to protect others. It means Teshima has to order the team to drop him behind for good, but Aoyagi has taken on the role to drop back and try to bring Issa back instead.
Sprinters Checkpoint[]
Known Results[]
First Stage Sprinter Checkpoint Winner First Stage Climber Checkpoint Winner First Stage Goal Winner
Climbers Checkpoint[]
Known Results[]
Day 2 Checkpoint[]
Known Results[]
Third Stage[]
Sprinters Checkpoint[]
Known Results[]
Day 2 Sprinter Checkpoint Winner Day 2 Climber Checkpoint Winner Day 2 Goal Line Winner
Climbers Checkpoint[]
Known Results[]
Day 2 Sprinter Checkpoint Winner Day 2 Climber Checkpoint Winner Day 2 Goal Line Winner
Day 3 Goal[]
Known Results[]
Day 2 Sprinter Checkpoint Winner Day 2 Climber Checkpoint Winner Day 2 Goal Line Winner