The Polish Triple

[Bendy Ben]

It's not a touring trip

The way I see it is we have 12hrs to get the mileage done, then 12hrs to rest and eat.

Might make it 7 days

The others - so far one is more than capable and the other needs to get back on his bike.

And then there's me. Better get doing something....

[Jack Hughes]

1000 miles over six days gives you an average distance of 167 miles per day. That's eight hours solid cycling each day minimum. The question is whether you can all maintain that pace for six continuous days.

It's about 1300km, 800 miles, according to Ben's route map. Some of which is Channel.

100 miles per day would be a reasonable target.

[Sir Jibbenstein]

It's not a touring trip

Some perspective: you are planning to ride 40% of the distance the Tour de France riders do, in 28% of the time they take, with your average day being 20 miles longer than their longest day. Thats after a HIM and an OD

Think for this to succeed you need (and afford to be) to be more realistic.

Does your route take into account cycle friendly roads? Or is it down the AutoBahn and Autoroute? I'd say a support car is essential for this, someone to take the luggage to keep your bike light, someone who can refill bottles and provide food en route.

What about bike and position? 24hr Turbo Torment destroyed my wrists; I got cyclists palsy from spending too long on drop handlebars. I'd say at the minimum you'd need clip on tri bars, or maybe even touring bars. Saddle sores are another very real prospect.

Then there is the issue of training for it, getting your body used to being in a riding position for 12 hours a day, day after day.

You can pull this off (now now Kev), and I'm certain everyone here is behind you, you just need to get planning and training!

[Bendy Ben]

Maybe forget the OD then ?

The ride home post race is what I'm interested in.

Salient points as ever jibby

With regards to routing I'm yet to explore this. Maybe I need to garmin a route from postcode to postcode and see what happens.

To be honest there are a few things I need to square away before I think about the actual planning stage.

A bike fit will be required and I'm not going it on my Kebel - it's far too aggressive

[Sir Jibbenstein]

If the OD is something you want to do, do it! My point was that when saying 6 days you should account for 2 days hard racing first. Be great to see you conquer this, so don't want you to see you set yourself up for failure by trying to do more than is possible!

Have a look at http://bikeroutetoaster.com You can plug in a start and end point, tell it you are on a bike, and that you want to avoid unpaved bike paths. It'll spit out a long route and you can use that to break it into manageable chunks and individually route those sections.

Have you spoken to Lynne? Sure she'll have some great advice after her long distance exploits!

[Bendy Ben]

Jibby

That's a great link - cheers

And I'll be heading up to Bridgtown to chat with Lynne as soon as the home stuff is finished in the next couple of weeks

[Bendy Ben]

Ps a thinking drive over, race, then we will have a mini bus for return leg driven by a medic friend and or a sports consultant Dr friend in case things really go bent.