Indian Pacific Wheel Race - IndyPac - IPWR

He’s not racing it apparently...
headwinds all of day 3
He’s finding it hard to get on the bike.
Sore legs
Feeling ok - next few days will be easier

Tell him to piss off... not racing it.

That's the Ian To argument from last year's TCR. Except he didn't make it till he'd fucked up.

Abdullah has reached ceduna, ie the end of the desert, and the lead is now 200km.

Terrain doesn't change massively for the next couple of days, just there are little towns every 30-60km, where everyone goes to bed at 9pm, and the countryside is a bit more interesting. He'll get a lift from having reached ceduna.

burn

Abdullah did a 480.8km day yesterday. 1,324m @ 21.3 km/h. 22 hours of headwind

It is a phenomenal ride. The guy may be a nutter, I've not watched his vids and don't really care, but that is amazing. Those roads are not hilly but riding for 22 hrs in a day takes some doing. A lot of people don't even manage that in the 24 hour TT!

He’s not racing it apparently...

We've all been there. Well, I have. Hard times, lose hope, quit (but keep moving forward because you still have to finish), recover (sleep or food or painkillers or whatever) then work out a way to continue faster, then goals are reset or motivation returns, then you go again, now you're racing again.

You mean I only had to ride 22hr TT? Damn, why did no one tell me?!

Long days indeed, but they do sleep too.

1 Attachment

Good chart.
What it shows is that it is Stepahane that is slowing down the most. The slope of his line decreased on the last day. That is mainly why Abdullah is building his lead - he's just riding faster.

You mean I only had to ride 22hr TT? Damn, why did no one tell me?!

At least they did tell you you only had to do it for one day

We've all been there. Well, I have. Hard times, lose hope, quit (but keep moving forward because you still have to finish), recover (sleep or food or painkillers or whatever) then work out a way to continue faster, then goals are reset or motivation returns, then you go again, now you're racing again.

Yes, best to ignore things people say when they are racing. Emotions go all over the place. We don't all react well all the time. That's part of the attraction, getting massively pushed out of comfort zone, etc.

After I did the TCR I was saying to someone that I'd had a great time, one of the best things I'd ever done, etc. And my wife said, based on my calls with her during it, 'I thought you hadn't enjoyed it all, you seemed to be having a terrible time!'

Tell that to TABR hippy.

You do have a terrible time but you don't remember pain so you do remember the adventure component and then soon afterwards you're all like "well, it wasn't THAT bad" even though a day before you were "I'm never touching a bike again!!!!"

So like most people when they have/want their second kid?

Interesting to see the difference in strategy. Abdullah is doing 22 hour rides with 8 hour sleeps. Dan Welch is the most consistent at around 15 hour rides and 6 hour sleeps. It looks like Stephane tried to match Abdullah for speed to start with and then decided to go into his own rhythm.

That's why most people seem to say humans 'forget pain' otherwise we'd never (women would never) have kids again, putting future generations at risk.

Stephane saying on FB that he might have to quit as his dynamo is bust and no lights
Critical point of failure

No backup lights? It's not like he's a rookie at this.

#rookie

There's actually academic research on it (that my wife looked up to prove to me that I was deluded when I said I'd enjoyed TCR) showing that people put far too much weight on how they feel at the end of something, ie good, also remember the worst bit but then completely disregard all the other bits that were also shit

No backup lights?

Batteries are really heavy, such a hassle to use, bad for the environment, require too much brainpower to know when to charge them, etc...
no?

I'm quite aware of how much I hate these races, of how much pain I'm in on a daily basis, of how much mental stress I'm going through. I spend ages sharing how much I hate them with the GoochNetwork fans. And yet...

I still carry battery lights. I still carry batteries. I just like dynamos.

I've never failed to finish one of these races because of kit failure...

Stephane taking a room at Nundroo to try charging his stuff. Also didn't sleep last night so it may be that his stuff is ok, just he's doing something wrong as tired.
Either way he is going to lose a bit of time.

I stayed at Nundroo as I needed to stop and boot my tyre.
It's a bit scuzzy. There was no light in the showers and very little food. But it had a room with a bed.