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

Interesting stuff going on for 5th spot. Nelson Trees has stopped to rest in a monastery and Rory McCarron is gaining ground, 60km difference now.

Great ride to get up to 13th

Lots of women scratched today, my post from this morning is now v out of date. They're still all champions if you ask me.

Interesting stuff going on for 5th spot. Nelson Trees has stopped to rest in a monastery and Rory McCarron is gaining ground, 60km difference now.

Nelson was apparently struggling with heat exhaustion / dehydration and hole in tyre on a remote gravel road

Hope he gets good rest, he's put in a hell of a ride so far. I can't imagine how brutal it must be out there.

I was wondering what the logo was for. Impressive work @skinny!!!

Just been alerted to the win via the gold banner, amazing work @skinny. Truly amazing.

Looks like Geoffroy Dussault rolling in now. He had a hell of a strong finish.

Chris Davies has scratched

Samuli in 11th now - on a mission! Also impressed by London bike accident lawyer Rory McCarron in 6th and Melissa is biting at Hippie's heels again. And Geoffroy ... what a machine! This is proving to be a fantastic phase of the race. The whole thing has been epic.

Still not got the little orange pro badge though :(

#notaprobro

Looks like a flurry of riders finishing in the next 12(?) hours - five currently in Macedonia and a fair few behind them in Serbia and Bulgaria.

No.73 Liam Hendry, seems to have left something important behind in the UK, just nipped back to get it

I can't see his feet

A scratch who didn't turn his tracker off?

.

4 Attachments

I prefer left the hob on ;)

Did they just show a bit of this on BBC breakfast? Saw something on a screen when I was passing but no sound.

No, that was Mark Beaumont who is currently trying to break the record of 80 days cycling round the world.

Lol. No chance. Media couldn't care less, which is quite good I think.

Just been and digged about, at 08:23 there's a bit of a chat about Mark Beaumont trying to cycle the world in 80 days (supported) http://www.artemisworldcycle.com/

Ah cool. Looked quite long-distancy!

@skinny Amazing congrats mate!

Yeah, he scratched a few days ago - friend of mine.

So away from the excitment of those crossing the line are riders who are still not yet half way and destined to be riding for another 10 or more days.

We lost our back marker yesterday when Chris Davies called it a day just on the northern edge of the Alps. His last couple of days had seen his progress slow to around 40km a day, a speed that would have meant months on the road. A real pity as I had hoped that his approach to the race showed a plan to complete the race albeit in a longer than usual time.

He is replaced as lanterne rouge by Jeremy Mah #257b, formerly part of a pair with (I presume) his brother Colin who scratched five days ago. That said, it was Colin who appeared the faster one when they split but Jeremy is now moving steadily ahead. He is currently on the border with Slovenia with around 2460 km to go. He started off averaging 180 km a day but by day 4 this had dropped to an average of around 130 km a day and may be dropping. He started riding around 11 hours a day but is now down to six, seven or eight. Yesterday he only rode for five and a half.

120 km ahead of him is David Coulon #130 who continues to move steadily and, one hopes, to a plan. David is riding now between 7 and 11 hours a day. The distance that he has covered in the past few days has varied from 200 km to 100 km. He was on the road early today and is keeping a decent piece. He doesn't tweet often but his recent tweets have been a tad surreal:

Drunk reeinder's milk with North saami people somewhere in norway
#tcr5 North route.

being one example. Perhaps this refers to the fact that he has taken the northern route into Austria rather than @skinny's into Slovenia.

Ahead of David is a bunch of eight riders separated by only 75 km and the back marker of these is only 30 km ahead of David.

These are #227 Christian Fichter #165 Josie Jones, #211 Rishabah Malhotra, #205 Hector Nunez, #200 Goran Arsovski, #Tina Nestoroska, #188 Daragh Browne #53 Wiesia Kuczaj.

These have split into the norther and southern (Austria/Slovenia) routes. Wiesia is riding around 160 km a day, a very sustainable distance and is out on the bike between eight and twelve hours a day. She should be into Hungary easily today.