Has Steve Abraham started the year ride again?

ugo.santalucia

Last day tomorrow... probably no mileage to speak of, due to snow he has been homebound since yesterday.
Overall, he didn't manage to set any new record, other than his personal best and the fourth best performance ever, despite riding over 72,000 miles.

Due to lack of speed, he was never in contention with Amanda Coker, who was averaging at least 4 mph more... there are at least 4000 riding hours in these attempts, probably more, so that's at least 16,000 miles difference. He ended actually closer than that (12,000 miles short or so), which means he did ride more overall and on open roads and in a country with a real winter to speak of.
He wasn't particularly lucky with the weather, which probably robbed him of at least the best male performance (short of ca. 4,000 miles).
He announced he won't try again, which is just as well, seeing he spent the last 3 years trying to get this record. Probably time to move on before the obsession consumes him.

Chapeau to the tenacity

pinno

72,000 miles in one year on our roads in our weather is one hell of an effort.

Pity he had that incident with the moped on the first attempt as he was going along quite nicely. It's possible that had he finished that attempt, he may have held the record even if it would have been just briefly.

ugo.santalucia

If you think about it, he rode 10 times the distance I do in one year, including riding at night, often exhausted and occasionally on busy gritted roads. The chances of having one crash with that mileage are pretty high, probably 50/50 so it's something to budget (say budget for 360 riding days instead of 365). It is more unlikely to have a winter with so much weather related disruption.... that's probably a 10% chance.
He crashed in this attempt too, twice in fact

pinno

There's no doubt that he is in a very small and exclusive league and us mere mortals can only gawp at his achievements.
Endurance/audax really does not flick any of my switches but I couldn't possibly ignore both the size and implications of his efforts and I take my hat off to him.

ugo.santalucia

indeed...

although I can't stop thinking that it is an uninspiring challenge and one could achieve more notoriety (cash, sponsorships etc.) by spending less time on the road but on a more focussed effort.

The 80 days around the world, the 22 days around the Coast of Britain did more for Beaumont and Sanders than the last 3 years will ever do for Steve.

I hope he finds a way to make a living out of what he does

pinno

I'm sure it has all come at a personal cost, that we will never know.
It takes the same (bloody?) single minded attitude to attempt something as big as he did which may be precluding him from profiting from such ventures (ironically) but somehow there's something real and honest in that. Considering the scant media coverage and the lack of a tangible beginning, middle and end like in a LEJOG or a round the world, it was never an attempt that was ever going to endear itself to Joe Public.
I do not think for a moment that SA did any of this for notoriety or fame and fortune. I think he genuinely saw it as a challenge (on his scale).

ugo.santalucia

Pinno wrote:

I do not think for a moment that SA did any of this for notoriety or fame and fortune. I think he genuinely saw it as a challenge (on his scale).

I did think that too, but then he posted this on YACF a few weeks back.
I quote

One of my reasons for riding was to get my name out in the public so I can do other big rides and get the sponsors etc because this is an expensive hobby/career.
It's gone on two years longer than I wanted it to.
Lessons have been learned and I'll come out of it better equiped for future challenges etc. But for the next year I plan to help others, have fun and get back into training, along wth lots of other stuff including writing a book.