Transcontinental Race (London - Istanbul) - #TCRNo4

i've done distance before, 1400km in 7, but am looking at 1400km in 5, what you mentioned as less exhausting than something else. what made it less exhausting? regular rest, a particualr set-up? etc

It (endurance riding) is about minimising time spent not riding. Doing Audaxes taught me to do this because of the time limits and minimum average speed that it is built on. The intermediate controls close at predetermined times and it forces you to keep focused on making progress. The other major key is going at a pace that doesn't require you to sleep for hours to recover. You get this by training.

The first few 200km rides I did I spent about an hour at each control (50km, 100km, 150km) leaving only ~10 hours to do the riding (I wasn't particularly fit when I started doing them). I watched as others were in and out of controls using much less time.

Averaging 15kph may seems easy for a 200km ride but as the rides get longer you need to factor in more food stops, sleep stops, etc. In 2009 when I was doing lots of Audaxing I could finish a 200km in ~10 hours with a calorie intake of <1000kcal before/during the ride. I had lots of miles in the legs and the fat metabolism was well trained. Obviously this isn't fast (I'd be looking to do that in ~7 hours at triathlon pace, but I'd have carb drinks.) But I couldn't extend this strategy easily to 300km and certainly not to 400km and beyond.

LEL (1400km in 5 days) was easier than PBP (1200km in 4 days) because I had slightly less riding to do each day to keep ahead of the minimum (288km/day vs 320km/day). In real terms this translates into being able to sleep for longer once I do stop before I need to get going again.

For a race such as the Transcontinental you don't really have any meaningful time limits imposed, and so it would be up to you to keep yourself going and keep the rest to a minimum. I'm not sure how I'd fare on a ride like TCR as I would probably lack the self motivation required to push on at a pace. (Not that I'd challenge the leaders anyway, I'd be comfortably mid pack - 14 days probably).

For a generic endurance ride you could, of course, set your own minimum average speed (adjusted for the mountain stages) and then ride to your own imposed cutoffs. 1400km in 5 days is ~12kph so if you have a route in mind you can work out where you need to be by when and try and stick to it. Riding Audaxes (300km+) will really help getting you into this mindset. 400km rides are good as they're long enough that most people require sleep, but short enough that you don't build up enough of a buffer for a long sleep.

There are lots of efficiency gains you'll pick up if you do more and more, and longer and longer, Audaxes. Amazing how obvious they are in retrospect but so many people new to it do the same things initially, e.g.

Get to control
Faff around for 5 minutes
Go to toilet
Order food (something big that takes a long time)
Wait for food slumped in chair
Get food, eat it
Start to pack up
Remember they need to text/tweet/FB
Remember to get water bottles filled
Go to toilet again
Leave

Whilst the smarter people do:-

Eat little and often on the bike
Get to control
Order food (something that takes a short time as they've been eating on the bike)
Put stuff down on table
Get water bottles filled whilst waiting for food
Go to toilet whilst waiting for food
Text/tweet/FB whilst waiting for food
Get food, eat food
Pack up and leave

Don't underestimate how hard it is to think clearly enough to plan this properly when you're tired. Being able to do so comes from experience (of getting it wrong!)

The key bits are:-

• training, the faster you can go at the "all day" pace the better
  
• eat on the bike
  
• faff less when you stop (approaching somewhere to stop you need to mentally plan what you need to do and what order to do it)
  
• work out when/how your body tells you it needs sleep. Pushing it can be a horrible experience.
  
  

I had to have an hour long power nap in a church porch (thank God I was carrying a space blanket) in Brampton on LEL 2009 because I'd sat up talking to people at the Eskdalemuir control rather than getting 3 hours kip. I felt fine leaving Eskdalemuir but an hour later I was starting to doze off (on the A7 of all places). Couldn't find anywhere to sleep in Longtown (all hotels full), no surprise as it was pissing it down, so pushed on to Brampton where I decided I just had to stop. Probably wasted 3 or 4 hours in total, all because I didn't take the sleep when I had a chance to.