The Speed Star of Naniwa Appears!

What They Say:
With the rear gate slope race over, the distance between Imaizumi and Sakamichi closes a little. When Sakamichi goes to Akiba on his mommy bike to buy anime goods, he encounters Naruko Shoukichi, a boy with a Kansai accent riding a bike. Naruko becomes enraged when a car throws a cigarette butt at Sakamichi’s mommy bike, and the two begin chasing after the car on their bicycles!

The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
There’s a lot to be said about learning things in stages. You never just start knowing how to race a rally car. First you gotta learn how to actually drive the car, then you have to learn how to handle the card in rough, uneven, and dangerous terrain, and the list goes on and on and on. For things that require skill and practice, nobody just wakes up one day and says “I can perform at a top level at this – hurray osmosis!”

That, to me, is what this episode of Yowapeda really highlighted. As has been stated before, Onoda has very good pedaling rhythm, but the rest of his mechanics are not very good – from a racers point of the view. But there’s so much more that goes into racing bicycles, and just riding one in general, that Onoda is being introduced to a lot of these concepts slowly.

Enter Naruko Shoukichi – a firey young student who sees Onoda’s mommy bike, and recognizes that Onoda has had the bike for a long time, and the wear shows what Naruko sees as a strong bond between machine and rider. He and Onoda spend the afternoon in Akihabara (where he bums money off Onoda for the equivalent of Gundam models) before a rude dude in a hot spots cars flicks a cigarette butt on Onoda’s bike.

And then Naruko proceeds to go berserk. Demanding that Onoda gives the jerk back his cigarette and tell him that nobody disrespects a bike like Onoda’s, they both race off after the driver. And the learning session for Onoda today, even though neither ne or Naruko are aware of it – is the negative impact wind can have on a bicycle rider and his ability to maintain speed. This, as well as the modifications that Miki’s brother has made to Onoda’s bike (effectively double his gears from 1 to 2) are explained as Miki and Imaizumi have a conversation about Onoda and his bike, and conveniently, how wind impacts a rider.

But Naruko, being the seasoned rider he is, and a sprinter at that, is a “friend of the wind” and teaches Onoda another interesting part of biking – what we would commonly refer to as drafting. For those of you who don’t know quite what I’m talking about, drafting is where you use the car (or bicycle in this case) in front of you to break the wind against your vehicle, and therefore they are taking the full impact of the wind while you’re able to fly behind them at full speed. Onoda feels like he’s being pulled along as Naruko breaks the wind resistance for them, and they’re able to catch up to the jerk in the sports car…when Onoda completely forgets what he was there to do to begin with, exhilarated and thrilled by what he’s learned and the speed at which he rides his bicycle.

Naruko and Onoda end the episode by parting ways, hopeful to hang out again soon.

In Summary:
This episode, like the others of Yowapeda so far does a number of things very well, and they all serve a purpose. If were to break it down, it would go as follows:

1. A new character is introduced (Naruko)
2. The new character and Onoda bond (over Akiba and racing to catch the car)
3. Onoda (and the audience) learn a significant amount about the mechanics and physics of bicycle riding
4. Onoda, and Naruko, grow as characters, all against the backdrop of kickass music and visuals.

It may seem like a simple thing to do, but the beauty of this series, that so many other series seem to fall short on, is that it manages to teach the main character and the audience, introduce new characters, and give the characters honest, organic things to do that grow them as individuals while also driving towards a central plot. And none of it gets lost, gets dull, or feels like a waste of time.

This episode continues to highlight how excited Onoda is when he goes fast on his bicycle, and he wonders if he can go faster, and is amazed at the subtleties of biking that have eluded him for so long. All of these things make the character interesting to the audience while also giving us something to root for – we want Onoda to succeed, and to grow. He’s not being hailed as “the best” but unlike so many other shows where “the kid has no talent but he’s got the guts and that’s all that matters” – here it is almost the opposite. Onoda has a reasonable understanding of the baseline mechanics, and has some very good habits – but he has to learn these things as he goes. And that’s really enjoyable to watch and is what is bringing me back to this show week after week.

Still a high mark for the season thus far, and still a show I would urge you to check out if you haven’t already.

Grade: B+

Streamed By: Crunchyroll

Review Equipment:
Intel Alienware laptop, Windows 7, 25” HP2509m screen at 1920×1080 resolution