Oh, boy, an episode title that shares the name of the series! What a classic move for a series finale. One last time with Team Fortuna!
(Spoilers in this episode)
Saeki ends up buying a bike of her own. And that’s all we see of her for 21 minutes! No OP, by the way – it just plays during the episode over a montage and that’s fine by me!
The episode then jumps to Ami and the others who are on a 2-day cycling trip to Shimanami Kaido. Ami recounts how Hinako told her that most of the stuff she brought was not needed. The girls also ride through a path that’s built under a bridge! Once they arrive at Innoshima, they stuff their faces with daifuku and continue on their journey.
Team Fortuna finally managed to reach an inn. Ami is impressed with Saki, who hasn’t used public transportation a single time during this trip. Saki admits that she has a goal: to ride in the Paris-Brest-Paris, the biggest brevet in the world. Participants have to ride 1200 kilometers under 90 hours! Hinako and Yayoi are also aiming to participate in this festive event that happens every four years.
Unfortunately, the next day is raining. However, Ami and Aoi are still gearing to go, which impresses Yayoi, Hinako, and Saki. They all don ponchos and ride through the ride – after Ami ends up slipping on one of those rain drains commonly found in the street. Ami’s handlebars end up a little crooked, but Yayoi fixes it right up for her.
After getting some advice in regards to riding bikes in the rain, Ami comes to really enjoy cycling against nature.
Ami gets a little emotional and thanks everyone for riding with her. She’s so happy that she met them all and started cycling, after all! She then says that she hopes they continue to teach her new things.
The last bit of the episode…really hit the spot for me. Long Riders! wasn’t exactly the best slice-of-life / cute-girls-does-cute-things show, but the ending was so satisfying. Ami runs into Saeki, who is struggling to inflate her tires just like Ami was back in an earlier episode. So Ami helps her out and invites her to join them during their next cycling trip. And it looks like she ends up joining Team Fortuna, yay!
Well, that was one heck of a ride, folks (no pun intended). It was also a bit of a nice rush to revert back to my old episode-review-style for this, phew. I’ll try to rush out a series review later this week. Anyways, thanks for reading!
The Lily Garden 