Congratulations to Ingolf Micklisch who set a new 60-69 age-group record in the HWMR (7-day Time Trial) on an upright bike and non-drafting categories.
Highest Weekly Mileage (HWMR) Ride Report Ingolf Micklisch
The race Season for ultra distance racing 2024 was officially over for me and checking some of the existing records I was hooked to try at least one attempt for another record.
Coming across the highest Weekly Milage Records I noticed it might be doable to break the record for my age group 60-69.
However, since I had the idea in October and did not train for the record attempt nor did I get a chance to setup a support crew. So, the wild idea came up using Thanksgiving holiday week for an attempt. Local riding friends as well as non-riding friends mentioned that would be cool and that they would monitor my progress and be available in case something happened.
My goal was not detailed, and I had no specific plan. Mentioning it to my coach I mentioned I would like to use this attempt to test myself potentially to learn for such 7-day attempt and maybe doing it again in 2025 with crew support and proper training for it.
Picked two main loops 4 and 5 miles mainly riding clockwise and the combination of both about 8 miles. That way I would be able to stay close to home as base for refilling water, changing lights and other batteries as well as getting nutrition and sleep. In addition, it helped for friends to keep an eye on me when on the road and be available in case something unexpected happened.
Day 1
I started about 5 minutes after 11am local time. Picked the 4-mile loop first and kept going a bit harder than I should but I felt good. During daytime I stayed on the 4-mile loop and planned to have a stop at my house latest every 6 hours. Not having a crew, I was hoping I get along ok with 6 hours on the bike.
First stop showed me that I am desperately missing crew support. Even I had food prepared it took a while to get it ready, eat, refill the 3 bottles and getting back on the road.
After the first 6 hours I went back out for a few more laps on the 4-mile loop and once getting dark switched to the 5-mile loop which was busier during daylight. I stretched the second session a bit more to get close to 7 hours since I wanted to save my rides every day around midnight. It worked out very well and did good progress on first 13 hours. Actually, more than I thought I could do in such 7 day attempt.
Day 2
After refilling bottles and swapping all lights and batteries I went back out to the 5-miler loop. Used mostly position on aerobars. Traffic at night was very low so it was easy riding. Kept pushing harder than initially planned. As planned, I set stops at home for food, bottle replacements and fresh lights and batteries every 6 hours. That kind of worked out ok but noticed the stop time was longer than I expected. Tried to compensate it with speed. Every stop I left with fresh bottles of to drink as well as at least two jelly sandwiches that I could use to eat while riding. Overall distance was interesting to me. The cool thing was that (counting the first 24 hours) I could have easy made it into RAAM Solo qualification. No need for it since I finished RAAM Solo but was a good feeling and surprise to me. So, I kept the pace up and kept my 6-hour schedule. For bathroom stops I start using a city park that was next to the two loops. During daytime I stayed mostly on the 4-mile loop and nighttime on the 5-mile loop. That worked out very well.
Day 3
Getting back home at midnight I set alarm up top have a 30-minute power nap plus changing lights and batteries. Unfortunately, the day started bad by simply not hearing the alarm … Just another downside for no crew support. You need to rely on yourself completely. The good thing was that I felt fresher for riding. The bad part was that I lost 3 hours. So milage was down. And that day was kind of bad for me having a flat front in the afternoon which was a quick and easy fix but hit a rock from a construction vehicle later the evening and had bad noise so returned to home base checking and swapping tires. Miles have been down more than I wanted. Those situations showed me that crew support is priceless. Was a low mile day due to that situation.
Day 4
Due to the lost time, I changed strategy a bit more … Went to 2-3 hour sleep a night and reduced number of stops to stop at home base only twice a day and have shorter water refill stops at park on the routes. I could compensate a little bit and improved miles again hoping to go for 2000–2100 miles target.
Overall, the 4th day went decent and had no issues during the day. However, I did start using the 5-mile loop even during the day time due to holiday schedule came with lower traffic.
Day 5
Day started well and was happy with performance. The sleep pattern with 3 hours sleep went well and the reduction of stops did no harm. Due to reducing stops I added a few more jelly sandwiches in the jersey pockets. Water was refilled at park and overall performance stayed consistent. Main issue in the morning was heavy fog that caused me to leave glasses off until the fog went away. It was a bit tough for speed since visibility was not very helpful. Still managed it ok. Towards evening the weather changed a bit unexpected. Wind turned around a few times and start getting stronger.
Day 6
What a change to the day before. I was rested enough but the wind starts getting annoying and no expectation to calm down. Normally I do not mind with wind but this time it was mostly head and cross wind and only short sections tail wind. The overall strategy I kept as is and no changes. Miles had been ok.
Day 7
It was supposed to be last full day riding. I did ok and got used to heavier shifting wind. The general schedule I kept same as last two days. However, I noticed in earlier Afternoon that I lost focus and my concentration went down. So I returned back to home base and decided to take 2 hours break with mostly sleep time. That helped a lot. Went back on the road and as of my calculations I was on good track to get at least around the 2000 miles. Since I had a few hours until midnight and 11 hours for next morning. Unfortunate once it turned dark, I had the disaster struck me badly. Kept an eye on the bike lane most the times. Lane looked clear the next couple of hundred yards and once shortly checking some information on the bike computer I looked up and … an uber driver had pulled into bike lane in front of me and stopped. My response time was everything but perfect. Could not get to the brakes quick enough and getting left of the car was no option due to traffic and right of the car was a tree. So I hit the car hard and bike was damaged badly but I turned out to be OK after all. OK – I lost a few hours on the ride but still made a very good distance.
Overall, for not preparing specifically for the attempt and doing it completely without support crew I was happy with the overall distance I was able to ride. In the aftermath the recovery process starts and plans for another 7-day attempt in year 2025 started. Lessons learned for sure are that without crew support that type of record attempt is very tough to do. Still, I learned a lot from this and it should help me in future attempts. Plus, I am happy I got out of the accident ok and still improved miles a lot for my age group.
