World Record - Highest Weekly Mileage (HWMR) Ride Report Ingolf Micklisc…
World Record - Highest Weekly Mileage (HWMR) Ride Report Ingolf Micklisch
The race Season for ultra distance racing 2024 was officially over for me and checking some of the existing records I was hooked to try at least one attempt for another record. Coming across the highest Weekly Milage Records I noticed it might be doable to break the record for my age group 60-69. However, since I had the idea in October and did not train for the record attempt nor did I get a chance to setup a support crew. So, the wild idea came up using Thanksgiving holiday week for an attempt. Local riding friends as well as non-riding friends mentioned that would be cool and that they would monitor my progress and be available in case something happened. My goal was not detailed, and I had no specific plan. Mentioning it to my coach I mentioned I would like to use this attempt to test myself potentially to learn for such 7-day attempt and maybe doing it again in 2025 with crew support and proper training for it. Picked two main loops 4 and 5 miles mainly riding clockwise and the combination of both about 8 miles. That way I would be able to stay close to home as base for refilling water, changing lights and other batteries as well as getting nutrition and sleep. In addition, it helped for friends to keep an eye on me when on the road and be available in case something unexpected happened.
Day 1 I started about 5 minutes after 11am local time. Picked the 4-mile loop first and kept going a bit harder than I should but I felt good. During daytime I stayed on the 4-mile loop and planned to have a stop at my house latest every 6 hours. Not having a crew, I was hoping I get along ok with 6 hours on the bike. First stop showed me that I am desperately missing crew support. Even I had food prepared it took a while to get it ready, eat, refill the 3 bottles and getting back on the road. After the first 6 hours I went back out for a few more laps on the 4-mile loop and once getting dark switched to the 5-mile loop which was busier during daylight. I stretched the second session a bit more to get close to 7 hours since I wanted to save my rides every day around midnight. It worked out very well and did good progress on first 13 hours. Actually, more than I thought I could do in such 7 day attempt.
Day 2 After refilling bottles and swapping all lights and batteries I went back out to the 5-miler loop. Used mostly position on aerobars. Traffic at night was very low so it was easy riding. Kept pushing harder than initially planned. As planned, I set stops at home for food, bottle replacements and fresh lights and batteries every 6 hours. That kind of worked out ok but noticed the stop time was longer than I expected. Tried to compensate it with speed. Every stop I left with fresh bottles of to drink as well as at least two jelly sandwiches that I could use to eat while riding. Overall distance was interesting to me. The cool thing was that (counting the first 24 hours) I could have easy made it into RAAM Solo qualification. No need for it since I finished RAAM Solo but was a good feeling and surprise to me. So, I kept the pace up and kept my 6-hour schedule. For bathroom stops I start using a city park that was next to the two loops. During daytime I stayed mostly on the 4-mile loop and nighttime on the 5-mile loop. That worked out very well.
