"Because I Can Go to Akiba for Free" is the first episode of the Yowamushi Pedal anime series.
Summary[]
The series opens with a brief flash-forward, showing six cyclists wearing yellow colored jerseys practicing in a road with their bicycles while an unknown party narrates: “Bicycles… The fastest speed achieved by mankind through blood, muscle and bone… This is the story of a group of men who bet everything on their bicycles.”
In the present day, Sakamichi Onoda overhears other students discussing their after-school plans as he rides his mommy bike towards Chiba Prefectural Sohoku High School. He decides his own after-school plans: traveling to Akiba to purchase a DVD and partake in the many other otaku activities he loves. He is startled out of his thoughts when a martial arts club loudly rushes by; he resigns that he would not definetly join an athletic club and would go to the anime club instead. Sakamichi states that he did not have any friends he could talk about anime during his middle school but at high school he would finally have the experience to do it.
On his first morning as a high school student, Sakamichi rides his bike up the sparsely-traveled back gate slope that leads up to school. While singing along to the opening theme from Love Hime, a car appears behind Sakamichi and starts honking, causing him to lose his balance and fall off his bike into a cliff. Takahashi, the driver, immediately stops his car to check on him; though a little frazzled, Sakamichi appears to be in distress despite the stains over his clothes and face. After apologizing and making sure Sakamichi is okay, Takahashi is called back to the car by his passenger, Shunsuke Imaizumi, and continues driving him to school. Takahashi notes that he was not expecting anyone to be riding a bike up this road, but Shunsuke claims he must have been seeing things, as the boy only had a mommy bike and the back entrance to school is at the top of an extreme slope with over a 20% gradient.
The scene shifts to the Sohoku High Bicycle Racing Club, where the members are beginning a new year and receiving new applications from students who wants to join the club. One of the senior members ask Shingo Kinjou what he thinks about the new members and he replies that one of them is okay but he wished they had another card. Later, Sakamichi finds a notice pinned to the door stating that the anime club was dissolved due to a lack of club members and cries after seeing the shocking news.
Two girls walk by the hall where the clubroom was located and talked about it being disbanded, caughting Sakamichi attention that assumed they were also interesting in joining. He rushed after them and laments to them about it, asking if they were instered about recreating the club. He then founds out that one of the girls has interest in the cycling club, while the more aggressive girl is interested in tennis. Out of sympathy for Sakamichi’s plight, the kinder girl offers him information about the bus schedule’s next departure so that he could see about generating interest for the club in Akiba from fellow otakus. Though Sakamichi is flustered by her unexpected concern, he manages to assure her that he can make it there on his bike instead. With newfound determination, he commits to finding new members and plans to make his way to Akiba.
In another part of the school, Shunsuke makes plans to attend the cycling club once the people who joined for fun quit after realizing how hard practice will be, already having made the necessary arrangements with the team’s captain. His thoughts are interrupted when a girl from Ichiba Third Middle School, where he previously attended, approaches him and greets him by name. After failed attempts to introduce herself and give him her email address, she excitedly recalls that she had watched him win second place in a cycling race during the prior year. Shunsuke responds coldly, wondering who cares about “winning” second place before walking away.
He resumes planning, picking out a time to turn in his club application so that he can compete at nationals to face off against the cyclist he lost to. In order to achieve this goal, Shunsuke changes into his cycling gear, retrieves his bike, and prepares to practice individually. While doing so, he spots Sakamichi, who is preparing to make the trek to Akiba on his mommy bike.
Both cyclists set off down the rear gate slope at the same time, much to Shunsuke’s annoyance. Sakamichi introduces himself and tries being friendly towards Shunsuke, but receives only harsh words in return. Shunsuke suggests that Sakamichi instead takes the more gradual main gate slope, which is closer to the bus stop, but Sakamichi waves it off, stating that he plans on biking all the way to Akiba; Shunsuke is baffled by this.
Despite Shunsuke’s warning, Sakamichi continues to follow Shunsuke down the slope, causing Shunsuke to more aggressively tell him to stop due to how dangerous it could be for someone unequipped to handle it. Sakamichi persists, veering all over the road and eventually crashes after mistakenly lifting his body weight off the saddle of his bike. Shunsuke immediately stops his bike and runs over to check on him, his irritation tapering off into something resembling concern. Following the crash, Sakamichi admits that he goes to Akiba by bike so that he can save money for more capsule toys, which causes Shunsuke’s annoyance to resurface.
Sakamichi realizes that he left his wallet in his desk and rushes off to retrieve it, leaving Shunsuke to continue his training alone. After focusing hard on climbing techniques, he spots another cyclist in the distance and aims to pass him. As he closes the gap, he is thrown off by the fact that the other cyclist is humming; he’s even more shocked to see the cyclist is in fact Sakamichi, who has been singing happily while climbing on his mommy bike. Once they’re riding together again, Sakamichi gets embarrassed about his singing and apologizes to a confused Shunsuke.
Elsewhere, the two girls who ran into Sakamichi earlier are spectating as members of the Sohoku High Bicycle Club practice. The kind girl recounts to her friend that her brother has said that some people are just born better at biking than others. She states that while many athletes train for their sports from a young age, the fastest cyclists may not share the same experiences and can suddenly go from being completely ordinary one day to something incredible the next.
In the end, Shunsuke gets off his bike and stares Sakamichi leaving with his bike embarassed for singing and being heard by him. He wonders who is him. Later at night, Shunsuke is at his home doing his excessive practice regimen in order to get closer to his goal of being able to beat the cyclist he had lost to. Upon completing his practice for the night, he falls off his bike in exhaustion. While cleaning up, Shunsuke briefly recalls the memory of Sakamichi climbing the rear gate slope on his mommy bike before brushing it off as a distraction. Instead, he vows to achieve victory in every race until the day he can have a rematch with Akira, aiming to become the fastest man in the world.
At the following morning in Sohoku, Sakamichi stealthily attempts to hang up flyers he had made for the anime club, but instead makes a scene when he accidentally stabs himself with pushpins. The same two girls he met the day before witness it and he makes an attempt to leave for class out of embarrassment. After entering his classroom and closing the door, one of the girls opens the door and calls him by his surname.
When Sakamichi asks how she knew who he was, Miki Kanzaki admits to following him in order to learn who he was and introduces herself, hoping to ask him a question. Due to Sakamichi’s poor facial recognition skills, it takes him a moment to remember who she is, but when he does he bows and expresses his thanks for giving him the courage to continue. Aya, Miki’s friend, teases Sakamichi for his awkwardness, reinforcing Sakamichi’s wariness around jocks. Miki inquires if Sakamichi really went to Akiba after school the day prior; Sakamichi once again misunderstands, excitedly asking if she likes anime, which causes Aya to punch him in disgust.
After briefly chastising Aya for her outburst, Miki resumes her line of questioning, causing Sakamichi to realize she was referring to the biking portion of his trip, not the destination. Sakamichi recounts that he had crashed a few times and his chain had snapped, but it only makes Aya frustrated that he’s skirting around the point and accuses him of not going after all.
When the class bell rings, Aya attempts to get Miki to leave; before they can, Sakamichi says that his bike chain broke once he got back from his 90km round trip to Akiba. Both girls are shocked by this for different reasons, but can't learn more since classes have begun.
Later that day, the two girls continue to assess Sakamichi’s story while they eat lunch outside. Aya’s mind has already been made up on the matter, claiming Sakamichi had lied in order to get Miki’s attention because he thought she was cute. Miki has trouble believing that Sakamichi would make something like that up, but admits that it would be amazing if he really did tell the truth. However, Aya is still doubtful, noting that riding to Akiba and back would take more than four hours. Inside, Sakamichi happily eats his own lunch, being glad for the Manyu-Manyu capsule toy and the Torakon special edition blu-ray he obtained thanks to his frugal transportation methods.
At the Sohoku's road racing bicycle club, Miki presents herself to the seniors of the club stating she wanted to be the club's manager. Shingo stated to the others that she was Toji's little sister, indicating she presented herself to him beforehand. She thanks them for taking care of her brother, but one of the members, Yusuke Makishima, tells her it was the opposite and he was the one who helped them. Miki confirms his brother was the captain of the club when they were first years and another member, Jin Tadokoro, states that even after graduating he still helps them in many different ways, by handing bicycle parts and other important tools. Shingo attemps to present her the name of the third years, but she replies before that it was not needed as she heard about them from his brother and starts to tell their names aswell as their alas and functions inside the club. She tells them it was a pleasure to meet them and leaves the clubroom, surprising the third years who were not aware of her yet.
Elsewhere, Shunsuke inspects the school’s bike rack and realizes that Sakamichi’s distinct-looking bike is missing. Mildly curious about its whereabouts, he wonders if it is getting fixed somewhere. Once the school day ends, Sakamichi resumes putting up flyers for the anime club, imagining how nice it would be to make friends he could go to Akiba with. After successfully hanging one flier, Shunsuke finds Sakamichi and challenges him to a race. They end up moving to the school building's roof and Sakamichi asks Shunsuke what kind of race and he replies that it is one with bicycles, requesting him to ride again in the back gate slope with him.
Characters in Order of Appearance[]
Recurring • First Appearance • Cameo • Flashback • Mention
| Episode 1 Character Appearances | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
Manga and Anime Differences[]
- On the Chapter 1, Sakamichi was shown along with Shunsuke wearing the Japan jersey on the series introduction, implying that they were participating of a world competition. On the anime, this scene was replaced with the regular members of the Sohoku's road racing bicycle club prior to the story's incoming events.
- The moment he states he is going to the anime club and that he had not any friends during the middle school is an anime-only scene. On the manga he just stated he would never join an athletic club, even if he was invited to do so and the scenes shifts to him going up the ladder with his bicycle while picking anime songs to listen.
- On the scene Sakamichi falls off his bike after hearing the car honking, it is implied that on the manga instead he was hit by the car. Part of his interaction with Takahashi was also cut on the anime.
- On the anime, the scene shown of the the Sohoku's bicycle club members talking about the new members is an anime-only scene. On the manga instead it shows Sakamichi searching about the anime club existence and going after the club location as soon as classes end.
- On the manga, Shunsuke is seem descending some stairs with his bicycle and his jersey kit. This scene was cut on the anime and he is only seem walking close to the school's back gate slope. Also on the anime Shunsuke's bicycle brand name Scott was changed to "Scolt" in order to avoid copyright problems. His training jersey, also with many real life brands such as Shimano had their names replaced with the same name of his bike on the anime.
- On the anime, Shunsuke is seem practicing on his house wearing the same jersey he was wearing in Sohoku's back gate slope. On the manga he was wearing a different cloth to practice.
- The scene that Sakamichi attempts to hang up flyers he had made for the anime club, instead of getting inside his classroom and being called by Miki inside of it, on the manga she calls him before he enters the room and closes the door.
- On the manga, after punching Sakamichi, Aya cleans her hand on a tissue demonstrating her disgust to otakus. This scene was cut on the anime.
- The Torakon Special Edition Blu-ray is an anime-only object. On the manga, Sakamichi only be glad for obtaining the Manyu-Manyu capsule toy.
- The scene where Miki meets and talks with the third years of the Sohoku's bicycle club is an anime-only scene.
- On the manga, when Sakamichi manages to put the flier on the board one of the teachers shows up and removes the flier, stating it is only for the school announcements. The teacher also has some interaction with Sakamichi about his attempt to invite members with the flyers and tears it up, telling him to recruit them by himself. Sakamichi gets frustrated with it and states how he hate the sports type.
Trivia[]
- This episode was named after the Chapter 1.
- Because of the change on the first chapter's introduction, Shoukichi Naruko did a cameo on this episode.
- The anime-only scene from the Sohoku's bicycle club team also served as Hajime Aoyagi and Junta Teshima's cameos.
- On the same way Akira Midousuzi had his name mentioned, Toji Kanzaki was also mentioned in the anime and it worked as his cameo aswell.