Yowamushi Pedal: Special Ride

In this "Episode" you will be watching a small portion of the schools training, (mainly focused on Sohoku) a little while before Inter High at Hakone occur. Should you waste time to watch this? Well why not, you get to know a bit more about Onoda's anime merchandise and relationship with his "Climber Senpai"!
Also if you still did not watch the anime, this episode might be a bit spoiler so check the first 20 episodes, before you come watch this!

Good points of this special episode is that you get to see a little morel development between a Senpai and Kohai's Friendship, I'm referring to Makishima ... and Onoda the Team Climbers of course! Is something that got me curious about, since both characters are way to different one from another and they must tag along for almost half a day.

For a moment I though, maybe I should not waste time watching this, but half way I though opposite, glad I did.

Regardless my score give to this episode, I must say, I did not get hooked up for another anime so much has this one in the past couple of months. If you don't know if its worthy or not, just give it a try! And if I may add, I'm not much of a Anime Sport's Fan myself and nor I like to watch "ongoing" anime.

tldr; A wholesome episode mainly revolving around how Onoda and Makishima got to be closer through Onoda's weeb activities during a training session that takes place prior to the Hakone race

This episode made me simp for Makishima tbh - he's so sweeet aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

In the main anime, we only got maybe a single episode of the team preparing for the race as a whole, so it was nice of them to make a special episode of nothing major happening, just some extras for fans of the series.

Since Onoda is the main character of the anime, obviously he's still gonna get hung up on something stupid (which ... makes me frustrated whenever it happens tbh), but good ol' 'Peak Spider' Makishima-senpai is here to save the day, carrying the episode.

Yowamushi Pedal: Special Ride is one of those OVAs where you expect it to be pure ridiculous boring filler for the OVA - and, to a degree, this would be correct. It's a filler of Onoda and Makishima bonding - on Makishima’s decision. It leads to Onoda’s otaku ways almost turning Makishima off of him entirely and wanting to leave, only for the OVA to take us on a new journey across the bike training path.

For an OVA, there isn’t really anything special about it - it’s the same basic premise. Some filler, some laughs, nothing that really aids the plot - it’s essentially ... fanservice of more screen time for the anime. However, Special Ride does so in a way that does not really let the fans down. It’s funny, it’s true to our characters, it’s a giggle, and it’s enjoyable. It’s nice little tidbits to add on to what the characters are like.

I really enjoyed this OVA. It was refreshing in the anime world where it focuses on churning out more and more content for money grabs. This works in the world of YowaPeda and gives so much more depth to some of the characters with nothing more than including some out of plot add ons. It’s funny, I laughed a bit too much, (and, as a Makishima fan, it was great to see more of him, as a main character in this OVA than a side character to the rest of the team).

If you aren’t a fan, there may not be much here for you - there isn’t much introduction to the main theme of Yowa nor the characters but it could be a good place to start and introduce yourself to the universe. If you are a fan and debating watching Special Ride, I would say go for it. It’s got a bit of charm, it’s funny, and it has a decent premise and it’s super sweet to see the way things go out of tournaments and training.