Your greatest cycling achievement

[derrick]

When i was 64 years old, i did this https://www.strava.com/activities/301362611
Have done a few tours in Europe, Have done the Spanish mountains a few times, London to paris a couple of years ago in 32 hrs, the Rockacoba earlier this year. Lots of plans for next year. Still do the odd TT. at 67 years old i ain;t doing bad.

 

[Dayvo]

Two tours and a day ride are my achievements.

Tour one was a 6-week tour with a mate from southern Sweden to Gibraltar at the end of October in 2005. (did actually start at Nordkapp but I fell on the first day and broke my collarbone, putting the tour off by a month and missing a third of the trip). Approx. 4,000 km took 49 days with 5 rest days. We combined camping/sleeping rough/ bed & breakfast/motels. Lost 8 kg en route.

Tour two was a solo ride to commemorate my 50th birthday by cycling from Sydney to Adelaide via Melbourne, keeping as close to the Princes Highway (coastal road) as possible. Headwinds and BIG hills were a constant challenge, plus temperatures up to 45c made it thirsty work. Stayed in pubs and campsites all the way. Took about 6 weeks and rode 2,330 km. Didn't lose much weight due to staying in pubs.

And the one-dayer. Inspired by Steve Abrahams (who tried to cycle 205 miles a day EVERY day for a year to break a long-standing record), I attempted one day and took 21 hours to cycle the required 205 miles. Hard work, more mentally challenging than physically, esp. towards the latter stages but did suffer with BAD cramp on a couple of occasions.


Still fancy some more long tours but age and diminishing motivation is catching up on me.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Hitting a squirrel on a descent from Symonds Yat at 50+kph and maintaining control of the bike. Had I lost it I would have brought down 4 others.

What type of bikes were the five squirrels riding?

 

[Landsurfer]

LEJOG June / July 2018.
With a bunch of ladies and gents. And our baby.
My wife and our "looked after child" .. Riley .. aged 7 months .... in our ratty camper van "Hattie"
I cycled just over 600 miles of the full distance as i was the support van driver for a day or too, the vehicle mechanic and doing occasional child care.
One of our party did a great book of the event.
In it he made the comment that i had not completed LEJOG, I had taken the responsibility to ensure all the others did.
(I provided the support vehicle and the fuel.)
But i did complete LEJOG .. my LEJOG ... not his LEJOG ... or your LEJOG .... I finished MY LEJOG, and Julies and Rileys.
It was the best of times, 14 days of friendship, a band of brothers and sisters.
We are the WIMPS .... we're proud of all we did ....

 

[Ming the Merciless]

I think it's maintaining a love of cycling, for fifty years and counting, and not having a single year without cycling in it. During a round a world trip I didn't get much cycling in, but did manage to cycle across Tibet, parts of India plus a bit in the Andes.

 

[Twilkes]

I think it's maintaining a love of cycling, for fifty years and counting, and not having a single year without cycling in it. During a round a world trip I didn't get much cycling in, but did manage to cycle across Tibet, parts of India plus a bit in the Andes.

My wife and I would love to cycle across France and up the Alps, but unless our son gets the cycling bug at an early age it's going to be early 60s before we can manage it. Luckily cycling is one of those things you can stick at if you maintain your fitness to a reasonable level.

 

[Ian H]

I don't know which is the biggest highlight. Possibly being the first to ride the revised Calais-Brindisi 2500 in 1998 in 11 days. The occasional Paris-Brest. 27 consecutive years a super-randonneur (although that might be just a bit sad).

 

[PeteXXX]

@PeteXXX i would never had you down for 66

I'm not.. I'm 67 now

 

[gavroche]

It may not seem like much to hard seasoned cyclists on here, but for me it is riding half the Ventoux 5 years ago as I couldn't go all the way for two reasons: mechanical problems and the weather at the top was horrific. Without these , I doubt I would have done it all anyway but still happy with my effort.

 

[HLaB]

I could say my Euro sportives (The Tour of Flanders, Liege Bastogne Liege, the Marmotte or the 312) but I think my greatest achievement was being able to cycle through my health problem of late and hopefully I came out of the other side strong

 

[EltonFrog]

I’ve had lots of great adventures on my bikes, I couldn’t really say they were great cycling achievements, a few of them did take me out of my comfort zone though.
My first sportive of 50 miles in 2010 around Brands Hatch, I didn’t have clue what I was doing.
My longest ever ride 125 miles.
The first ride London/Surrey, what a great day.
And the Fragrant MrsP and I with bikes a credit card, a toothbrush and a change of shorts flew with our bikes to Paris and cycled home.
The five boro’s challenge New York
The Cape Argus
The Berlin Velothon ( we didn’t come last)

all good fun.

edited to add another highlight was my first FNRTTC. Whitstable, that was fab too.

 

[DCBassman]

Considering my total recorded mileage is less than some on here clock up in a couple of months, I still regard doing London to Brighton at 63, on a stock Trek 800 Sport, a quite reasonable pinnacle.
I intend to do it again next year, on the Trek again, but it ain't stock no more, no sirree!
I'll also have another go at Ilfracombe to Tavistock, I think.

 

[Donger]

I never imagined I would ever achieve anything on a bike. At 6'6" (1.97m) and always weighing between 19 and 21 stone , I always reckoned I was just not the size or build to ever make a cyclist of myself ... being twice the mass of your average cyclist. At the age of 48, I took up cycling, and by the age of 58 had done my first (and so far only) 100 miler, and had completed 14 climbs that had featured in the Tour de France, including 5 in the Alps and the Vosges that were 1st category TdF climbs. That and recently completing the equivalent of my first complete lap of the planet (24,901 miles) and being about to complete my 60th consecutive month of the Metric Century-a-Month Challenge. I know that's not on a par with the achievements of many on this forum, but I'm doing my best to fly the flag for outsized cyclists.

 

[Spiderweb]

Coast to Coast when 8 of us raised lots of money for both Cancer research and a local children’s hospice and the first time I rode 100 miles in one day.

 

[Sharky]

Haven't done my greatest achievement yet. Hopefully, that will be in 2020, when I reach my 500th time trial event and over 9000 TT miles. Currently on 487 TT events, so just 13 to go. Taken me a long time to do 487 events, starting in 1967 and none of them particularly fast, but have ridden a few most years since '67.