Tommy Godwin: 75,065 miles in a year

Godwin passed Nicholson's record on the October 26, 1939, with two months and five days to spare. Bennett achieved this distance nearly a month later, then climbed off his bike and answered the call to war. Godwin was allowed to continue, and on December 31, 1939 he'd racked up a massive 75,065 miles.

But Tommy wasn't content to settle with that - he continued riding until May 14, 1940, setting the record for the time taken to 100,000 miles - within 500 days.

Godwin's achievement was legendary beyond cycling fans. He met royalty, appeared on television, was interviewed by Richard Dimbleby for radio, and lent his image to advertising posters. The ride had taken its toll, though; Godwin required a period of rehabilitation to learn to walk normally and uncurl his hands. Yet within weeks he was serving his country in the RAF.

via cyclingweekly.co.uk

Quite simply put the ultimate feet in endurance cycling. While the current big records like round the world attempts stand at 160 or so days for about 18k miles Godwin did 75k in 365 days. A nearly incomprehensible 200+ miles a day. With mileage often in access of 300 miles a day. Rain, sleet or snow, in brittain, with only one day off for the entiire year.

Tour Divide, the most grueling bike race in the world

via pinkbike.com

I still can't believe that Kurt Refsnider blew away the previous record for the great divide by finishing it in 15 days, 21 hours, and 1 minute. Congrats Kurt!

Though I'm not even sure if this is official yet this is a full 2 days, 5 hours faster then Mathew Lee's seemingly untouchable finish of 17 days, 16 hours, 13 minutes.

To top it all off Jefe Branham came in just behind him at 16 days, 16 minutes while riding it SINGLE SPEED!

A large amount of riders are still coming in. There seems to be no news articles or summaries anywhere that can even remotely capture the excitment and stories and yet the TD race discussion on bikepacking.net is growing so rapidly I can't keep up. It currently stands at some 1,860 comments: http://www.bikepacking.net/forum/index.php?topic=2179.new

The tour divide has definitely gotten big this year with some 140 or so riders, but is still getting suprisingly little press which is fine by me. Maybe one day I'll get to ride it before it get's all grown up and the bar is so high one can't even hope to finish in the now much shortened (thanks to Kurt's new record) cut-off time.

Do the huge success this year it will no doubt get much bigger next year.

The best snapshot I have seen capturing the mistique of the ride has been by photog Devon Balet who posted some superb shots of the tour divide including a couple wonderful videos. They start to capture what a wonderful thing the divide is, but beware the second video. In it's own absolutely wonderful and superb way it also captures just how wild and crazy and un summarizeable the event is. This is not an event that has been polished and possibly cannot be polished for mainstream appeal. It's riders and their amazing stories are as varied and wonderful as any come. It's what I love about it.