Replace, Could 26, 2024:
Amid a couple of dozen biking followers, Lael Wilcox rolled away from Grant Park in Chicago, Illinois, on Could 26, to embark on her try to interrupt the Guinness World Report for the quickest journey around the globe by bicycle. With a fast finger faucet on her watch and pc display screen, the clock began ticking at 7:06 a.m native time.
“I am so excited. I have been constructing as much as this for a yr and I lastly get to go,” she mentioned to a cheering crowd.
Wilcox goals to be again at her place to begin in 110 days, after protecting some 18,000 miles.
Learn the main points about her try beneath and take a look at her carbon companion, her Specialised Roubaix bike construct, right here.
Followers can monitor her progress reside by way of her tracker and revel in each day tales from the street in her new Lael Rides Across the World podcast, created by her spouse, skilled photographer and videographer Rue Kaladyte.
Lael Wilcox’s Across the World bike
(Picture credit score: Rue Kaladyte)
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What do you do if you’ve already written quite a few prestigious Quickest Identified Occasions (FKTs) and ultra-endurance races to your identify? Properly, should you’re Lael Wilcox, you set your sights on the largest report of all of them: the Guinness World Report for the quickest journey across the planet on a regular bicycle.
On Could 26, Wilcox will set off within the quest to pedal her means into the historical past books but once more as she’s aiming to set a brand new world report by circumnavigating the world in simply 110 days.
The Guinness World Report
Quickest identified occasions (FKTs) are precisely what they sound like: the quickest identified time it has taken somebody to finish a longtime route. And the quickest journey around the globe must be probably the most prestigious.
Scot Jenny Graham holds the present ladies’s around-the-world biking report set in 2018. She rode 18,400 miles (29,600km) in 124 days and 11 hours, besting the earlier report, set by Paola Gianotti in 2014, by 20 days.
Lael Wilcox hopes to finish her journey in 110 days.
The 37-year-old Alaska native stumbled into bike racing 10 years in the past and has dominated the game of uber-long sufferfests ever since. The FKT-chaser’s listing of accomplishments merely baffles and contains information at mainly all the world’s greatest endurance races and trails together with Tour Divide, Baja Divide, Trans-Am, Navad 1,000, Badlands, Westfjords Approach Problem, and the Arizona Path – simply to call a couple of. Wilcox additionally gained the 350-mile Unbound XL in 2021 after driving her bike 600 miles to the beginning.
And he or she does all of it with a smile on her face and, famously, with no chamois – preferring to experience with out conventional padded biking shorts.
“Sure, I am nonetheless shammy-free. I’ve simply by no means had issues however I am going to let you know after it,” Wilcox tells Biking Weekly.
Regardless of her astonishing listing of achievements, the Across the World report will probably be a monumental problem, even for Wilcox.
All over the world in 110 days
Lael Wilcox on the 2023 Rapha Yomp Rally
(Picture credit score: Sean Greene / Rapha)
For an around-the-world bike journey to qualify for a Guinness World Report, the rider should full the identical distance because the circumference of the Earth — 18,000 miles— in a single route, beginning and ending in the identical place. The rider could make their very own route, and to leap between continents, air and sea journey is allowed so long as at the very least 18,000 miles are literally ridden by bike.
The present ladies’s around-the-world biking report was set in 2018 by Jenny Graham. The Scottish rider accomplished her 18,400 miles (29,600km) trek in 124 days and 11 hours, besting the earlier report, set by Paola Gianotti in 2014, by 20 days.
“The present report is actually good. [Jenny Graham] did a terrific job and it is cool to have one thing onerous to go after,” Wilcox says.
With the intention to beat this report, Wilcox says she’ll need to experience at the very least 163 miles a day for almost 3.5 months.
“I like competitors and a possibility to attempt to be the quickest. However to be the quickest for one thing that takes like three and a half months is simply loopy,” Wilcox says with fun. “I at all times get aggressive and I need to do my greatest however this one is so lengthy that I’ve to provide my greatest effort as a result of I do not need to have to return again and do it once more.”
What the GWR guidelines say
The Guinness World Information Guidelines: To qualify for a Guinness World Report, the rider should full the identical distance because the circumference of the Earth — 18,000 miles— in a single route, beginning and ending in the identical place.
The rider could make their very own route and to leap between continents, air and sea journey is allowed so long as at the very least 18,000 miles are literally ridden.
Wilcox will begin and end in Chicago, tackling North America first, adopted by Europe. She’ll then fly to Bangkok to experience throughout Thailand and Malaysia and end in Singapore.Subsequent, she’ll jump over to Australia to traverse the huge outback and New Zealand earlier than flying again to her native Alaska. From there, she’ll full her homestretch again to Chicago. (See the complete route right here).
And, like Jenny Graham, Wilcox plans to do the experience self-supported aboard the brand new Specialised Roubaix, even when the principles don’t have any restrictions round assist.
“I’ve performed numerous these races which are like per week or two weeks and sooner or later, typically the expertise, it begins feeling increasingly more the identical, even when the locations are new. That is one thing larger and scarier,” says Wilcox. “I am actually terrified, however there’s additionally one thing thrilling about that: simply attempt to do one thing that scares me.”
Now or by no means
In 2021, Lael Wilcox gained the 350-mile Unbound XL gravel race after driving her bike 600 miles to the beginning.
(Picture credit score: North Inventive)
Wilcox vividly recollects the second this humongous endeavor first appealed to her. As she pedaled to the beginning line of the Trans Am race in 2016 —a mere 2,000-mile warm-up of two,000 miles earlier than tackling a 4,200-mile (6,800 km) bike race— she had an epiphany: “What if this was the beginning of an around-the-world experience?”
“I used to be this big dreamer. I did not have any cash. I did not have a plan. All I did was get a brand new passport. And I used to be like, ‘perhaps it’s going to all maintain itself,’ which clearly it did not, however since I’ve at all times form of considered it,” Wilcox displays.
Seven years later, following the Yomp Rally final Could, that lingering concept and a way of wanderlust started to resurface.
“I simply love being out right here day-after-day, you realize, going someplace new, having the ability to experience large miles day after day,” she shares. “And now, I’ve time, I haven’t got too many obligations, I haven’t got different obligations, and I can think about what it is like.”
“I have been fascinated about doing this large experience for years; at this level, I am form of like, if I do not do it now, I am most likely by no means going to do it, so I simply need to go for it.”
When requested about coaching for such an endeavor, Wilcox shrugs.
“With these lengthy efforts, it is principally about saddle time, you realize, getting your physique used to being on the bike for thus many hours,” she explains. And Wilcox has loads of that, persevering with to log numerous hours. As we spoke, she was en path to Alaska to sort out Iditarod, the world’s longest arctic ultra-marathon by fats bike.
Again residence in Arizona, Wilcox frequently participates within the notorious weekly Shoutout, one of many quickest group rides within the nation.
“I am undecided how a lot coaching helps, however I take pleasure in it regardless. I am at all times considering, ‘What if I might experience half a mile an hour sooner for the complete journey?’ ‘What if I might cowl 10 extra miles a day?'” she shares. “Over three-and-a-half months, even these small enhancements could make a major distinction.”
An invite to experience alongside
(Picture credit score: Sean Greene / Rapha)
Greater than only a private problem, Wilcox goals to share her expertise with the biking neighborhood at massive.
Her spouse Rue, an expert photographer and videographer, will come alongside to shoot the endeavor with the intent of manufacturing a full-length video and a each day podcast.
Wilcox additionally warmly extends an invite for riders to return be part of her for a mile or two as she makes her means from one neighborhood to the subsequent.
“What’s cool is that I can invite folks to return experience with me. I can not draft, however I can experience subsequent to folks and have guests,” Wilcox says with pleasure. “They’ll comply with my tracker and simply come out and experience with me. The entire thing simply sounds form of like a storybook to me, you realize?
“It is like driving around the globe however with new folks every day. I am positive I will have loads of hours on my own but in addition, it ought to really feel like a giant rolling celebration.”
For Wilcox, the attract of this problem lies within the exploration of the unknown and the expertise of seeing the world by bike. Whereas FKTs and race wins function motivation, she treasures the journey past information.
“As soon as it is performed, I do not actually even care that a lot about information,” she admits. “I care concerning the expertise and I understand how onerous I labored however as soon as it is performed, It is nearly like they disappear,” she admits.
“Greater than something, I really feel so privileged that I get to do that. It is a once-in-a-lifetime alternative, so I am attempting to make it as enjoyable as potential. I do know it’ll be onerous and it’ll harm, however I believe I will have a extremely good time, too.”
