Transcontinental Race No. 5 - TCR5 - #TCRN05 - 2017

Bjorn through the tunnel and on the descent to CP4 now. 3h50 behind Skinny.

Wow so soon @skinny will have a bonus sleep available

Punctured. Bike shop. Moving again. Wasted another hour or more

Ah bugger. Keep on keepin' on though Hippy - you're doing great.

It looks like Ian (16) has stopped, assuming for re-routing so will probably see him avoid the E81 road.

Must be for food or something as he's been stopped for an hour so far.

Jonas also stopped on the outskirts of Sebes, just over 8h behind Bjorn. [EDIT] Now on his way through Sebes.

Bjorn tracker update but it's a dodgy position putting him in the middle of the mountains way away from the road.

You're doing brilliantly hippy. Keep pushing.

And more gooch updates needed.

Your killing it. Keep pushing on

Might be for sleep (Ian), he rode through last night

Skinny lead is 3h24 according to the last update from Bjorn.

Skinny's been moving since 4:28 this morning, Bjorn about 5:30.

Didn't skinny stop an hour earlier? So they're on about the same sleep?

Skinny probably aiming to finish on Sunday as I think he had said 'under 9 days'.
Only Kristof has done a TCR in that kind of time (and Richard Dunnett in the first one!). Kristof did 8 days 15 hours last year. Maybe Skinny would like to beat that...? I've not done any numbers on the feasibility of that, but I'd expect him to be focusing on a specific time target rather than just on beating the other racers.

Looking at the distance covered each day and the fact that, while many climbs lie ahead of him, he has probably done the worst of the climbing and the fact that he has been fairly consistent in distance each day, he should finish on Sunday. The question will be what time.

Vastly different controls/routes renders a single TCR record pointless surely?

He's got about 43h to be under 8d15h and frrt suggests he has 831km to go.

831km / 24kph = 34.625h so it should certainly be possible for him.

with less climbing to come he might do more like 26kph, so could sleep 8 hours and still make it in record time.

I am excite.

Of course another way of looking at it is that @skinny has as far to go as Chris Davies has cycled so far.

with less climbing to come he might do more like 26kph, so could sleep 8 hours and still make it in record time.

...possibly arriving in second place if he sleeps for 8 hours.

@hippy in non-sequitur haiku tweeting controversy. "Shit restocking fail. Paid over tyre I skipped shops (pubs). This climb sucks."

Nah. Bjorn's cooked.

Vastly different controls/routes renders a single TCR record pointless surely?

Sure. Just I would expect him to be aiming for some particular time. If it was me, I would be. I don't know what it is, as he didn't share that, beyond saying under 9 days.
If he was just riding to beat the guy in second place, he might lose a bit of focus once he'd built up a bit of a buffer , and he certainly hasn't.

Nah. Bjorn's cooked.

Bjorn's not pushing as hard as he can because there's nothing he can do to win it. But Skinny can lose it! If Skinny slept for 8 hours, Bjorn might find a bit extra.

He is also still 800km from the end.

He is looking fabulous, but he still needs good luck to hold for another 800km. He has ridden a fabulous race and is beyond awesome, but he's got to keep all his shit together for a while yet. I hope and expect everyone is right, but the fat lady has barely started her voice exercises.

Yes. This^.

Fingers crossed nothing happens but still possible he takes a wrong turn and doesnt realise or finds he is forced to backtrack because of a closed road due to construction. Or he has a serious mechanical or something else.

Those things are all unlikely. And we are cheering for him. But he hasn't won it yet.

he might lose a bit of focus

lol... we're talking about skinny right?!

Predicting tonight will be Skinny's last sleep.

Are you a hit-man.