Some rides go on; and ON, and ON!! Want to ride really, REALLY long? Think a century is too easy?

Maybe World UltraCycling Association is for you. Those are rides that go on. An on, and ON! Just look at their calendar of events. Distances up to 3000 miles!

Think PBP. Think RAAM!

For events such as those, conditioning the body (including the gut) isn’t the only thing that must be done. The prospective participant must figure out how to get a couple of hours’ sleep out of every 24, and still make the cut-off time. There must be times when riders feel like they’re sleepbiking.

PBP, for example, is 1200 kilometers (744 miles). A solo rider must finish in 80 hours. That might sound like a lot of time, but think about it. Three days and eight hours to cover that distance. It’s like a double century every day for three days in a row, and then some.

They say, make time for sleep by making time on the bike. That means, you need to be able to ride at a decent pace if you want to make checkpoints in time. Those 744 miles divided by 80 hours comes to 9.3 mph, an easy pace on flat ground. But take a look at the ride profile! Looks like there’s a lot of climbing involved. Besides, riding at an unvarying 9.3 mph would mean never having enough of a time cushion to take a break.

In fact, riders need to work to “get ahead” earlier in the ride, so they have that bit of extra time to catch a few winks.

And then they can ride on.