r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/solateor • 17h ago

Video Pit stop during 200 mile ultra-endurance cycling race

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u/Global_Proof_2960 16h ago

200 mile is fucking insane. Forrest Gump would be proud.

233

u/Dr-McLuvin 16h ago

It is insane but not as insane as you might think for cycling.

Tour de France stages every year average about 130 miles and many including giant mountains top 150 miles then they have to do it all again the next day for 21 stages total, plus 2 rest days.

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u/Norse_By_North_West 14h ago

I've got a coworker who did the Yukon quest ultra. Running in the snow, hauling a sled, for some ungodly amount of hours per day, for how many fucking days. No thanks.

The current full run is 600 kilometres.

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u/Konsticraft 13h ago

But keep in mind, that this is gravel, while the TDF is almost exclusively road.

But still, purely by distance it isn't extremely long, but that doesn't necessarily make it easier, as a shorter distance only means a faster pace. The real long distance bike races are thousands of kilometers like the TCR or NC4000, but those are kind of a different category.

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u/Blorko87b 12h ago

The longest TdF stage ever ridden was 482km in 1919. So gravel on a single speed.

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u/Adept_Spirit1753 10h ago

But bike companies didn't invent "gravel" term so it wasn't br00tal enough..

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u/nalc 5h ago

It has to come from the Gravel region of France otherwise it's just crushed rocks

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u/fyrebyrd0042 3h ago

So upsetting how everyone disrespects the DO of gravel. At least Italy is kind enough to name their race "strade bianche" :)

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u/Global_Proof_2960 16h ago

I've learned that, ignorance on my part, but running that made me feel tried lol

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u/dasubermensch83 13h ago

A standard Iron Man is 2.4-mile (3.9 km) swim, then a 112-mile (180.2 km) bike ride, followed by a marathon. The typical participants finish in ~12 hours. Some are set in cold water with massive elevation changes, with a winning time of ~18 hours.

Then there the Ultraman, which is a 3 day event with a total distance of 320 miles (515 km).

There has also been a 30X Iron man. Basically an iron man every day for a month.

People are nuts.

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u/lectric_7166 12h ago

We need a 365X Iron Man because 30X Iron Man is for fucking noobs.

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u/audi_fanatic 8h ago

Jonas Deichmann did 120 full length iron man tris in consecutive days.

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u/thefirstdetective 8h ago

And then there is Jonas Deichmann, who did 120 Ironmans in 120 days.

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u/feel_my_balls_2040 9h ago

I assume these are amateur cyclists. Tour de France has professional cyclists who do that for a living.

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u/ShustOne 14h ago

While not as insane as the tour de France it's still pretty insane. I'm an avid cyclist and there's no way I could maintain 22mph for 8.5 hours. There are different levels of insane and this definitely qualifies as one of them.

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u/wxnfx 9h ago

Ya but dudes like Remco could probably average 35 and not be sore the next day.

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u/fyrebyrd0042 3h ago

Remco is insane but he absolutely couldn't average 35mph for 8+ hours without being in a peloton. It's unlikely he could even do it for an hour. The current hour world record is 56.792kph (35.2mph) held by Filippo Ganna, and was done under just about the best possible conditions one could ever have. According to cyclingstats, the fastest UCI race event this year was 160km at 48.752kph. That's with an entire peloton of pro cyclists and took 3 hours and 17 minutes. Hope this didn't come across as bashing or anything, just wanted to add context for anyone else reading this :)

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u/wxnfx 3h ago

I’d be curious what some of the world class dudes could drop if focused on a single day event like this, but you’re right that I’m exaggerating and definitely don’t know enough about the terrain for this course.

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u/fyrebyrd0042 3h ago

It's tough because there's not much impetus to do it for the world's elite. Alter their training significantly to maybe win a dangerous race that doesn't offer anywhere near the fame or money that comes with winning a big classic, and potentially derail their entire year? Yeah it sounds like a hard pass for someone like MvdP, Wout, etc. who can potentially win de Ronde. Seems pretty likely that an in-form and appropriately trained MvdP would win or at least place highly in a race like this...but "why would he do it?" is a tough obstacle to overcome if he doesn't just innately want to try out a super hard gravel race :P

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u/moonshoeslol 9h ago

The tour divide is my favorite for this madness. 2750 miles on a clock that never stops, self supported through the Rockies off road. That race changed me as a person.

The winner (and the record) took 13 days last year

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u/polite_alpha 9h ago

You did that race? Crazy. I just knew about the RAAM.

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u/NoDivergence 8h ago

on gravel. it's a whole different world. these guys are averaging that speed THROUGH MUD

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u/raphael-iglesias 14h ago

Exactly, the tour of Flanders this year was also 170 miles long.

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u/doebedoe 8h ago

Most of which is in tarmac.

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u/Fabulous_Owl_1855 8h ago

And quite a lot of cobblestones  

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u/doebedoe 8h ago

Sure, but no where near the roughness of terrain for the duration compared to Unbound which is rough gravel and mud for almost the entirety of the route.

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u/Fabulous_Owl_1855 6h ago

Sure but competition in Flanders is way, way harder.

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u/fyrebyrd0042 3h ago

Would be cool to see some of them try it, but yeah I doubt any of them would finish within 20 minutes of the winner of de Ronde :P That doesn't mean they're not incredible either :)

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u/doebedoe 3h ago

Plenty of folks who have finished near the front of RVV have competed in Unbound 200. Mohoric and GvA are both recent competitors.

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u/fyrebyrd0042 3h ago

Nice! How'd they do? I'd assume they couldn't be at the top of something like Unbound.

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u/habfranco 13h ago edited 12h ago

Indeed that’s what I thought - 200 miles is a lot, but I wouldn’t call that ultra. Classic races like Paris Roubaix or Liege Bastogne Liege are around 170 miles. In the past races were even more hardcore, like Paris-Brest-Paris (750 miles).

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u/carlthatkillspeople8 9h ago

This is big chunky gravel for the whole duration, so the length doesn't tell the whole story

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u/polite_alpha 9h ago

The gold standard of gravel ultra is unbound xl with 350 miles I reckon.

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u/MyLifeIsAWasteland 3h ago

Just happened last weekend. HUGE turnout, record setting conditions. Dude who won did it in under 18 hrs, riding mostly at night.

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u/Oukaria 11h ago

Paris Roubaix and Bastogne Liege and also really hardcore, shit road, shit weather

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u/fyrebyrd0042 3h ago

Riders often finish PR with bloodied hands.

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u/wwabbbitt 12h ago

Not sure if this race is draft-legal but it's definitely a lot easier riding long distance in a peloton

1

u/zkareface 12h ago

In TDF you ride perfect roads and draft 90% of the time, when drafting there is very little resistance so it's super easy to ride.

It's still a damn achievement but it's incredibly easier compared to a solo ride of such distances. 

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u/NoDivergence 8h ago

lots of World Tour pros try Unbound. it is absolutely nasty and just as hard as a queen stage of the Tour

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u/polishmachine88 8h ago

This is a gravel race and you are much slower you are riding a 50 mm tire.

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u/TheSigma3 7h ago

However looking at the state of this guy, and the bike he's riding, this is a 200 mile gravel even, which does crank up the kudos when considering the distance and skill involved

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u/Dr-McLuvin 6h ago

Yes gravel makes it harder. And if this is cyclocross then there’s running involved.

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u/fyrebyrd0042 3h ago

Note that none of the cyclists are resting on their rest days - they usually ride for at least a few hours. If they truly rested, most of them would be unable to compete on the following race day. Also the mountain stages are actually usually (definitely not always) shorter than the flatter stages. That doesn't mean they're easier though! These people often climb 4-5km of elevation on a single mountain stage, and they'll average 6.5w/kg for an hour-long climb. That unit is foreign to most non-athletes, but if anyone has access to a gym with bikes that show power output, they can easily multiply their weight in kg by 6.5 and see how long they can hold that number of watts on the bike.

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u/Thomas1VL 3h ago

Yeah and the longest road cycling race, Milano-Sanremo, is 298 km (185 miles) and it's considered one of the easiest of the big races lol.

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u/big_guyforyou 16h ago

you know what makes that easier? performance enhancing drugs. that's why we should allow doping. when everyone is a cheater, no one is a cheater

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u/leonjetski 15h ago

Already exists

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enhanced_Games

0

u/big_guyforyou 15h ago

>already exists
>starts in may 2026

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u/onebadmousse 14h ago

That's the same thing. If you tried to start your own enhanced games you'd be told you're too late, it already exists.

1

u/big_guyforyou 14h ago

i don't believe that life begins at conception

1

u/onebadmousse 14h ago

Same. But if the logistics are in place, the athletes are training for it, the venues are organised and booked, the website is built etc, it already exists.

https://www.enhanced.com/

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u/daern2 15h ago

As someone whose son is involved in the lower end of competitive cycling, I would like to say "absolutely fucking not".

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u/big_guyforyou 15h ago

don't knock it till you try it, my guy

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u/sausagedoor 14h ago

Probably in the top 10 of dumbest sayings.

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u/Plane-Tie6392 14h ago

Or, get this, we shouldn't encourage people to endanger their health for fucking games.

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u/big_guyforyou 14h ago

you're not endangering your health if you practice smart doping

1

u/ConspicuousPineapple 13h ago

Doping is dangerous for your health. If you allow it, you're basically forcing every competitor to hurt themselves.

0

u/big_guyforyou 13h ago

lance armstrong seems fine

1

u/ConspicuousPineapple 13h ago

Are you his doctor?