The girls ask Mori-sensei to be their club's advisor. The swim team captain Hiroko challenges Hiromi over Natsumi's membership.
Episode 4 - "I Won't Let You Take Natsumi-chan!"
Heh.
I'll just spoil you right now because this is cute girls doing cute things slice of life anime: nobody is a bad guy and there is no real drama bad enough to cause hurt feelings and grudges. Everybody will become friends but hard edges to personalities are just fodder for jokes and plot set-up for those jokes. So relax. Natsumi was never going anywhere and the swim team is not the mean girls club.
Club Recruitment.
Man, these girls go for the hard sell! They should be selling gym memberships...
The first thing the girls decided to do was get Mori as their cycling club advisor. Makes sense. But wow, they were gung-ho. Balloons, confetti, a huge sign just for Mori-sensei and Natsumi's Okinawa gourmet cooking. How could she say no?
I've watched two all girl cycling anime so far and each of them have turned into Koufuku Graffiti for a little bit each episode.
Teachers are required to advise a club too, just like the students are required to join a club.
Hiromi is the typical genki girl who eats rice so fast she leaves some all over her face.
So, now they have a cycling club, what kind of cycling club do they want? Racing, touring or "pottering?" To potter is how the Brits say putter as in putter around. It will always be fascinating to me which English words the Japanese will appropriate for their hobbies.
Competitive Hiroko.
What I found funny about this hill climbing contest (which was just like Yowamushi Pedal's 3rd episode) was that there ended up being no stakes involved. Hiroko just said that she wasn't going to make it easy for the cycling club to take Natsumi. Going up a hill without ever having ridden a road bike is definitely not easy. So, that was it. It was just a little mischievous revenge on the swim team captain's part.
I liked how the low bike seat on Hiromi's mamachari (mommy bike) turned into a key plot point. Even better was how Hiroko countered it by sitting on the rear rack to get fuller leg extension and power. She really is competitive.
Hiroko knew she had to give all these handicaps to Hiromi because she saw her practicing riding a bike in the parking lot on the first day of school. Embarrassing!
And then they were all friends by taking in the beautiful ocean view at the top of the hill. That was probably the real goal for Hiroko, anyway.
Hiromi's leggings can't hide those beautiful legs of hers. Nicely toned without even being some kind of an athlete. Well, genki girls use up a lot of energy bouncing around and eating too fast...
Official Cycling Club...?
Yay! Tomoe's little sister formally introduced herself to Hiromi. I'm looking forward to Grandma showing up now too.
Look at those uniforms. Pink! Hearts! Angel wings! They're like an official club now.
Except not. At least according to the epilogue cliffhanger. I can guess that they need 5 members to start a new club and this is how blond foreigner girl will finally join the show. I always get a kick at how mangled English-speaking accents sound in anime, so I'd like to be surprised at real sounding English. It's only happened once in all my anime watching that I heard an actual American accent saying English words. It was in Shugo Chara, of all shows, with its English language prologue. Let's see what Minakama gives us.
Cycling Porn.
This week we saw lots of Natsumi's Cannondale and Hiromi's Bridgestone cruiser, the index shifter and brake lever, Shimano clipless pedals versus flat, how proper seat height maximizes leg power and jersey designs.
They showed Mori-sensei finish installing flat pedals on Natsumi's cranks while holding an allen-wrench set, but she would have needed a crank arm wrench which can be pretty big. Maybe she was finishing up adjusting the seat post on that Cannondale, which would only need an allen wrench.
Shifting and pedaling and diagrams. This is totally feminine Yowamushi Pedal! I'm really impressed with Hiroko: climbing a hill in Crocs. That's someone strong and without a sense of shame.
The omake had the voice actresses getting way more excited than I've seen them before choosing "must-buy" accessories like a smartphone case and a cycle "computer." That rearview mirror thing is pretty kitschy, though.
Next time, Tomoe and Fuyune buy bikes from a cat-eared girl. The alpaca character was already used up with one of the cycle bros. Oh, and they need to get that blondie to fill up the club roster.
These guest artists really like including the train with the cycling girls. Whoa, Natsumi!