Author Topic: Transcontinental 2016  (Read 62023 times)


Auntie Helen

  • 6 Wheels in Germany
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #276 on: 21 August, 2016, 06:34:25 am »
It's a great read, thanks!
My blog on cycling in Germany and eating German cake – http://www.auntiehelen.co.uk


Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #277 on: 21 August, 2016, 02:41:09 pm »
Nicely penned. . That was bed time reading to the missus last night.
 She was amused too and awaits the next chapter. :thumbsup:
often lost.

marcusjb

  • Full of bon courage.
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #278 on: 21 August, 2016, 03:02:10 pm »
Top stuff Hippy!
Right! What's next?

Ooooh. That sounds like a daft idea.  I am in!

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #279 on: 21 August, 2016, 08:03:06 pm »
This is really good - keep them coming. :)  :thumbsup:
Cheers
Duncan

Phil W

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #280 on: 21 August, 2016, 10:10:54 pm »
Enjoyed those including part 5. If you want to find out where your photos were you can geo tag them using the gpx tracks you have. Basecamp can do it, as can other software.

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #281 on: 21 August, 2016, 10:11:41 pm »
Like it Hippy

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #282 on: 22 August, 2016, 03:57:04 pm »
According to the Trackleaders website, there appear to be five people still going.  Rather oddly they appear as only three markers, so I presume that's because there are two pairs as well as one single racer?  it must be a hard slog to be that far behind, but all dues to them for keeping going.

If I am reading it correctly, then Cheng-Hui Hseih, No 92, is that lone rider, and appears to be spending as much time not moving as she is riding.  Since, she is apparently cycling back to Taiwan, this 3800km stretch is just over one quarter of the way home, and I don't suppose she expected to be rushing!
Actually, it is rocket science.
 

clarion

  • Tyke
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #283 on: 22 August, 2016, 04:45:49 pm »
Hearing Emily Chappell's account in a different context yesterday was fascinating.  A recording was made, but I have no idea whether/how that will be available.
Getting there...

quixoticgeek

  • Mostly Harmless
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #284 on: 22 August, 2016, 07:54:48 pm »

Looking at the kit that people were carrying on their bikes, and the fact that Kristofs bike only weighed 12kg all up. Do any of the competitors carry bike locks? or do they just take the bikes in to the rooms when in hotels?

Also, Did Kristof actually sleep at any point on that ride? Amazing stuff.

J
--
Beer, bikes, and backpacking
http://b.42q.eu/

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #285 on: 22 August, 2016, 09:54:52 pm »
I had a cafe lock.  I didn't always use it.  Some people didn't bother.  Just like audax, really.
I also took my bike into hotel rooms.  Most people did although some said they weren't able to.  I would have (and did) insist/ed.

Kristof rode for the first 2 days without sleeping but afterwards I believe he got 4-5 hours per night.  His main strengths are that he is fast on the road and has everything sorted out so that he wastes almost no time on faffing.

Phil W

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #286 on: 22 August, 2016, 10:05:51 pm »

Looking at the kit that people were carrying on their bikes, and the fact that Kristofs bike only weighed 12kg all up. Do any of the competitors carry bike locks? or do they just take the bikes in to the rooms when in hotels?

Also, Did Kristof actually sleep at any point on that ride? Amazing stuff.

J

Kristoff was travelling much lighter than the others. I saw a post on it somewhere. No bivvy equipment, a small bag on the handlebars and a frame bag I believe.  Quite a few weren't travelling all that light looking at their setup.

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #287 on: 22 August, 2016, 11:41:03 pm »
I had a small lock and didn't use it much. I may not bother with it again. ~100g

My bike was around 16kg without food or water so say 19kg loaded. It's a Kinesis 4S Disc frame with strong, well-built wheels, wide rubber, powermeter, Di2, aerobars - built to finish TCR, not to win, I would say and it is also now my commuter/winter training bike although I haven't sold my old Kinesis 4S yet. I also had down jacket and bivvy and a range of cold weather options, ie. 3 pairs of gloves, 2 pairs of shorts, rainjacket, hand warmer gels, etc.

In Europe I'd not bother with that stuff again and I'd ditch some of my three spare lights! for a more powerful head torch or helmet light like Exposure Joystick.

If I had a clue and planned better I'd ditch the bivvy and down jacket - I only used it once when I got caught in the storm and arrived in PLuzine at 3am with no food, water or shelter. #likeaboss

Did KA ride through the first two nights? I thought he was on a 4-5hr sleep schedule every day? I've not bothered looking at any race data, I was just happy to finish!

Next time though I will be racingz for placingz so look out. Probably TransAm though.

quixoticgeek

  • Mostly Harmless
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #288 on: 23 August, 2016, 12:54:51 am »
I had a small lock and didn't use it much. I may not bother with it again. ~100g

My bike was around 16kg without food or water so say 19kg loaded. It's a Kinesis 4S Disc frame with strong, well-built wheels, wide rubber, powermeter, Di2, aerobars - built to finish TCR, not to win, I would say and it is also now my commuter/winter training bike although I haven't sold my old Kinesis 4S yet. I also had down jacket and bivvy and a range of cold weather options, ie. 3 pairs of gloves, 2 pairs of shorts, rainjacket, hand warmer gels, etc.

What tyres did you run?

Did you see anyone running 26" wheels at all ?

Quote

In Europe I'd not bother with that stuff again and I'd ditch some of my three spare lights! for a more powerful head torch or helmet light like Exposure Joystick.

How did you power all your lights/gadgets?

Quote
If I had a clue and planned better I'd ditch the bivvy and down jacket - I only used it once when I got caught in the storm and arrived in PLuzine at 3am with no food, water or shelter. #likeaboss


So you mostly slept in hotels ?

Quote

Did KA ride through the first two nights? I thought he was on a 4-5hr sleep schedule every day? I've not bothered looking at any race data, I was just happy to finish!

Next time though I will be racingz for placingz so look out. Probably TransAm though.

I love the idea of the TCR, but I've not even done a 50k audax yet, so it may take me a year or 3 to build up to it. It also means I'm starting from a blank slate.

J
--
Beer, bikes, and backpacking
http://b.42q.eu/

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #289 on: 23 August, 2016, 06:39:30 am »
The bivvy vs hotels is the main difference in kit.  Kristoff always uses hotels and so doesn't take sleeping kit.  However, I recall that Josh Ibbet, who won last year, slept out most of the time.  I'd say maybe 80% of people took bivvy eqpt but quite a few didn't.

The 2-3kg in weight doesn't make much difference to speed in itself but, the more luggage you have, the more time you spend unpacking and re-packing it. 

For TransAm I wonder if you could rely on hotels or would have to camp out some of the time?  I'm pretty sure Mike Hall has bivvied when he has set his records.

I didn't see anyone with 26" wheels.  They would make the bumpy bits even worse.  Most people used dynamos.  I managed with AAs and battery packs, which worked fine but meant I had to manage my phone battery by keeping it on aeroplane mode most of the time (so didn't tweet like a canary - unlike some peeps with dynamos!)

I think KA rode a good way before his first stop, but I've not checked the data either, so that could be wrong.  But he, and all the top riders, have a sensible sleep schedule for the bulk of the ride.  If you ride all night, you just knacker yourself out for the next day.

mattc

  • n.b. have grown beard since photo taken
    • Didcot Audaxes
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #290 on: 23 August, 2016, 08:47:59 am »
I do believe that part of the Kristof myth is this riding through the night business!

http://trackleaders.com/transconrace16i.php?name=Kristof_Allegaert

Pretty sure he slept for about 4 hours every night*, EXCEPT the first one (with a midnight 10pm start, no-one was likely to sleep). A quick look at the tracker suggests the first stop was at CP1 - the dots are perhaps 10miles apart at:

Code: [Select]
- Point #290 received at: 12:04:39 AM (CEST) 07/31/16
 (23 days, 9 hours, 5 minutes ago) (1:02:04 since start)

- Point #293 received at: 04:51:27 AM (CEST) 07/31/16
 (23 days, 4 hours, 18 minutes ago) (1:06:51 since start)

Then at midnight 2 days in, a few hours into Switzerland, right by lake Thunersee.





*The speed vs time graph has now been ruined by re-scaling, but it was easy to see during the race.
Has never ridden RAAM
---------
No.11  Because of the great host of those who dislike the least appearance of "swank " when they travel the roads and lanes. - From Kuklos' 39 Articles

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #291 on: 23 August, 2016, 09:30:16 am »
Yes, that's probably right. There is some junk statistic going round that says he only stopped for [a short period] in the first x days. I think that it is just wrong but has confused lots of people.

It was a 10pm start. A surprising number did sleep the first night, but not people at the sharp end - or me!

mattc

  • n.b. have grown beard since photo taken
    • Didcot Audaxes
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #292 on: 23 August, 2016, 10:02:31 am »
I believe the junk statistic came from reading the rider summary tab on the tracker screen - that tended to give almost no hours stopped  for every rider! Maybe cos your tracker had to give two EXACTLY identical positions to register as stopped?
Has never ridden RAAM
---------
No.11  Because of the great host of those who dislike the least appearance of "swank " when they travel the roads and lanes. - From Kuklos' 39 Articles

seraphina

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #293 on: 23 August, 2016, 10:16:25 am »
Really enjoying the writeups, thanks hippy!

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #294 on: 23 August, 2016, 11:52:45 am »
Did you see anyone running 26" wheels at all ?
How did you power all your lights/gadgets?
So you mostly slept in hotels ?

I didn't see many people at all. Maybe there were some 26ers.

2 LiIon battery packs, some AA and AAA batteries + SP dynamo + D1 Igaro USB charger on the bike + USB wall charger in hotels

From memory, slept in:
Checkpoint hotel at CP1, 1hr
Tried to bivvy but to cold in near Swiss border, 20-30min of shivering
Hotel at CP2 (didn't need to but saddle issues were killing me), feckin' hours!
Hotel in Verona (nice), ~3hrs?
Hotel in Pordenone (nice), ~3hrs?
Powernap in bus stop maybe in Bosnia or just before entering Bosnia?
Motel Kiwi in Bosnia (check self in at 3am), ~3hrs?
Bivvy at parcours start in Pluzine, Montenegro as everything was closed, ~3hrs?
Hotel Macedonia, just before Greek border, 2hrs?
Bus stop sleep somewhere in Greece, no idea time
Bivvy in bus stop somewhere else in Greece, ~3hrs?

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #295 on: 23 August, 2016, 11:57:02 am »
The bivvy vs hotels is the main difference in kit.  Kristoff always uses hotels and so doesn't take sleeping kit.  However, I recall that Josh Ibbet, who won last year, slept out most of the time.  I'd say maybe 80% of people took bivvy eqpt but quite a few didn't.

The 2-3kg in weight doesn't make much difference to speed in itself but, the more luggage you have, the more time you spend unpacking and re-packing it. 

For TransAm I wonder if you could rely on hotels or would have to camp out some of the time?  I'm pretty sure Mike Hall has bivvied when he has set his records.

I didn't see anyone with 26" wheels.  They would make the bumpy bits even worse.  Most people used dynamos.  I managed with AAs and battery packs, which worked fine but meant I had to manage my phone battery by keeping it on aeroplane mode most of the time (so didn't tweet like a canary - unlike some peeps with dynamos!)

I think KA rode a good way before his first stop, but I've not checked the data either, so that could be wrong.  But he, and all the top riders, have a sensible sleep schedule for the bulk of the ride.  If you ride all night, you just knacker yourself out for the next day.

James carried a bivvy and came 4th after he had a day or more out and rode from 139th so a bivvy can be quick. Hotels can slow you down - more faff, more comfort = more time.

TransAm will definitely require more bivvy time and will likely have bigger temp range so I might need to think about different sleep kit.

I had so many power options - if I had a proper data connection I'd have tweeted a lot more! :)

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #296 on: 23 August, 2016, 12:54:09 pm »

From memory, slept in:
Checkpoint hotel at CP1, 1hr
Tried to bivvy but to cold in near Swiss border, 20-30min of shivering
Hotel at CP2 (didn't need to but saddle issues were killing me), feckin' hours!
Hotel in Verona (nice), ~3hrs?
Hotel in Pordenone (nice), ~3hrs?
Powernap in bus stop maybe in Bosnia or just before entering Bosnia?
Motel Kiwi in Bosnia (check self in at 3am), ~3hrs?
Bivvy at parcours start in Pluzine, Montenegro as everything was closed, ~3hrs?
Hotel Macedonia, just before Greek border, 2hrs?
Bus stop sleep somewhere in Greece, no idea time
Bivvy in bus stop somewhere else in Greece, ~3hrs?

I had a similar mix, but it looks like I generally slept a bit longer than you. 
My strategy was to either ride or sleep and do v. little else so I think I had longer night stops and spent more hours riding than most people, but my riding speed was lower than others I encountered, ie they kept overtaking me!

Also as well as night sleeps I also had naps when I got the dozies through the day - on benches, in parks, in fields, etc.  I decided I would stop when I felt that there was a risk of nodding off while riding.  So I probably did that every other day.

My stops were:
Bivvied at a campsite by the Loire that I'd used before - reasonable sleep, 4-5 hours
Bivvied by the road somewhere in Burgundy - c.3 hours, didn't sleep much and got cold, and wet from lots of dew in the morning
Hotel at Neuchatel (5 hours) great sleep
Bivvied at about 1700m altitude on the way up the Gothard Pass.  2 hours - best sleep I've ever had.
Hotel by Lake Garda, c.5 hours - good sleep
Bench in a town somewhere in N. Italy about 50km on from Passo Giau.  1.5 hours, hardly slept a wink. 
Bivvied in bus shelter in Thunderstorm near Rijeka (Croatia) - c.4 hours.  OK sleep.
Hotel at Bihac in Bosnia, c.5hours, good sleep
Hotel at Kiselic, 25km before Sarajevo, c.5hours, good sleep
Bivvied in bus shelter 25km past Skopje, c5 hours, crap sleep (was looking for hotel and discovered one 200m further on in the morning)
Bench somewhere in northern Greece. c.1.5 hours
Bench in Turkey about 80km short of the finish, c 1.5 hours. 

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #297 on: 23 August, 2016, 01:41:54 pm »
I had a similar mix, but it looks like I generally slept a bit longer than you. 
My strategy was to either ride or sleep and do v. little else so I think I had longer night stops and spent more hours riding than most people, but my riding speed was lower than others I encountered, ie they kept overtaking me!

Also as well as night sleeps I also had naps when I got the dozies through the day - on benches, in parks, in fields, etc.  I decided I would stop when I felt that there was a risk of nodding off while riding.  So I probably did that every other day.

My stops were:
Bivvied at a campsite by the Loire that I'd used before - reasonable sleep, 4-5 hours
Bivvied by the road somewhere in Burgundy - c.3 hours, didn't sleep much and got cold, and wet from lots of dew in the morning
Hotel at Neuchatel (5 hours) great sleep
Bivvied at about 1700m altitude on the way up the Gothard Pass.  2 hours - best sleep I've ever had.
Hotel by Lake Garda, c.5 hours - good sleep
Bench in a town somewhere in N. Italy about 50km on from Passo Giau.  1.5 hours, hardly slept a wink. 
Bivvied in bus shelter in Thunderstorm near Rijeka (Croatia) - c.4 hours.  OK sleep.
Hotel at Bihac in Bosnia, c.5hours, good sleep
Hotel at Kiselic, 25km before Sarajevo, c.5hours, good sleep
Bivvied in bus shelter 25km past Skopje, c5 hours, crap sleep (was looking for hotel and discovered one 200m further on in the morning)
Bench somewhere in northern Greece. c.1.5 hours
Bench in Turkey about 80km short of the finish, c 1.5 hours.

After the saddle debacle I was pushing the sleep dep a bit until I realised I was unlikely to catch the small group in front (who knows though, really) and then I lost data and the ability to follow the race so I didn't care any more and just slept whenever I needed to.

I also had a powernap on a bench down south, near Garda maybe, before Verona.

Salvatore

  • Джон Спунър
    • Pics
Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #298 on: 23 August, 2016, 02:17:55 pm »
Mikko Mäkipää (mkpaa otp) has a flickr album of 23 (so far) bikes used at  Transcontinental 2016,  and another album of his experiences of the race.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/mkpaa/albums

Quote
et avec John, excellent lecteur de road-book, on s'en est sortis sans erreur

cjm

Re: Transcontinental 2016
« Reply #299 on: 23 August, 2016, 03:08:31 pm »

From memory, slept in:
Checkpoint hotel at CP1, 1hr
Tried to bivvy but to cold in near Swiss border, 20-30min of shivering
Hotel at CP2 (didn't need to but saddle issues were killing me), feckin' hours!
Hotel in Verona (nice), ~3hrs?
Hotel in Pordenone (nice), ~3hrs?
Powernap in bus stop maybe in Bosnia or just before entering Bosnia?
Motel Kiwi in Bosnia (check self in at 3am), ~3hrs?
Bivvy at parcours start in Pluzine, Montenegro as everything was closed, ~3hrs?
Hotel Macedonia, just before Greek border, 2hrs?
Bus stop sleep somewhere in Greece, no idea time
Bivvy in bus stop somewhere else in Greece, ~3hrs?

I had a similar mix, but it looks like I generally slept a bit longer than you. 
My strategy was to either ride or sleep and do v. little else so I think I had longer night stops and spent more hours riding than most people, but my riding speed was lower than others I encountered, ie they kept overtaking me!

Also as well as night sleeps I also had naps when I got the dozies through the day - on benches, in parks, in fields, etc.  I decided I would stop when I felt that there was a risk of nodding off while riding.  So I probably did that every other day.

My stops were:
Bivvied at a campsite by the Loire that I'd used before - reasonable sleep, 4-5 hours
Bivvied by the road somewhere in Burgundy - c.3 hours, didn't sleep much and got cold, and wet from lots of dew in the morning
Hotel at Neuchatel (5 hours) great sleep
Bivvied at about 1700m altitude on the way up the Gothard Pass.  2 hours - best sleep I've ever had.
Hotel by Lake Garda, c.5 hours - good sleep
Bench in a town somewhere in N. Italy about 50km on from Passo Giau.  1.5 hours, hardly slept a wink. 
Bivvied in bus shelter in Thunderstorm near Rijeka (Croatia) - c.4 hours.  OK sleep.
Hotel at Bihac in Bosnia, c.5hours, good sleep
Hotel at Kiselic, 25km before Sarajevo, c.5hours, good sleep
Bivvied in bus shelter 25km past Skopje, c5 hours, crap sleep (was looking for hotel and discovered one 200m further on in the morning)
Bench somewhere in northern Greece. c.1.5 hours
Bench in Turkey about 80km short of the finish, c 1.5 hours.

How much time did you spend looking for food, or was there always something on the route?