Congratulation to Isa Pulver who has set the Women’s 50-59 record on a standard bike during the 2023 RAAM.

Isa was the fastest Overall finisher!

Rider’s Narrative Summary

Record attempt

USA West-East WUCA Record Attempt during RAAM by Isa Pulver, start on June 13th 2023

Name of rider(s)

Isa Pulver

Start date and exact start time to the nearest minute

Tuesday June 13th 2023 at Saturday 01:17 pm (local time)

Exact start location described so that someone else could find the same spot

Oceanside at the Peer, California, USA

What were conditions like?

The weather conditions were a bit of everything. At the beginning in the desert, it was exceptionally not so hot, but cooler in the mountains. Especially at night by downhill, I was happy to have a warm jacket. In the first third we were lucky with a tailwind, but in the second half we had strong headwind and crosswind. And at the End we had a lot and heavy rain and it was very fogy. But overall, I think we had weather as you can expect on RAAM.

Why did you want to do a record?

When I decided to compete in the RAAM for the 3rd time and in a new age category, my big goal was to beat the current category record. When I read that the WUCA accepted the RAAM as a Corss Country Distance Record, I was of course very happy and officially registered the record attempt.

What equipment did you use? Anything special?

I did the race with my 3 Scott bikes, Plasma for the flats, Foil as allrounder and Adict for the mountains.

What did you eat & drink?

I only ate liquid food during the whole race and drank isa-pulver. Liquid food like gel, ensure, milkshakes, yoghourt, philadelphia, Ice creme.

What was the best part?

The most beautiful part was the monument valley. The most emotional part was the crossing of the finish line. When I realized that I was not only the 1st woman at the finish line, but the first over all. not even a team that started 4 days later could catch up with me.

What was the hardest part?

The last two stages of around 40 miles each were the most difficult for me. It was raining heavily, the wind was coming from all sides, the fog was so thick that I could hardly see anything, and tiredness overtook me. Thanks to music, singing, fan news from Switzerland and conversations with the team, we made it to the Timing Line – Rams Head Roadhouse. I was more then happy.

As the temperature dropped and the rain got so strong that I had to decide to stop and change my clothes, it was hard. And then, to continue the record attempt in rain clothes was not easy for me. But I told myself, do your best and don’t give up. They are other peoples the have bigger challenges than only the clothes.

Did anything particularly unusual happened?

After about 1800 miles we were involved in a car accident. A car from behind drove into our bike rack from the support car and rammed the whole side of the car. Fortunately, no one was harmed. Fortunately, we were able to repair the car on site, but unfortunately the bicycles were more damaged. We were able to replace the front wheel on the mountain bike, but I couldn’t use the time trial bike anymore.

Exact finish location described so that someone else could find the same spot 

Annapolis, MD, City Dock,

Exact finish time

Friday June 23rd 2023 at 09:10 am