James MacDonald – Indoor track attempt – Oct 21, 2021

Masters 200km Indoor Track Record

Rider Report

Equipment: BMC Trackmachine 01, 3T Brezza II Nano bars, Mavic Comete track disc wheels with Ceramic Speed bearings and EAI 17 tooth gold rear sprocket, Rotor 2InPower track chainset with 62 carbon chainring. Bisaddle EXT sprint adjustable saddle.

Nutrition: Secret Training Big Energy, occasional banana and baby food.

This was primarily another training session in preparation for the 24 hour record attempt next year. As we found on the 4 hour session a month ago it is highly motivational to aim for the Masters records along the way so we targeted the 100 km record I took last time (i.e. to better it) and also aim for the 200 km, 6 hour and 300 km records. The end goal was the 200 mile record but we ran out of track time as we had started late so we replanned for the 300 km to be the end goal.

We used the same strategy as the 4 hour ride last month, go out slightly above 24 hour pace and see how it feels. The atmospheric pressure was high on the day so it required a bit more power than the 4 hour ride, this was ok as it’s primarily a training ride anyway. About 2 hours in did an interview with GCN over the radio while riding which was a nice distraction, shortly after I asked where I was in relation to my 100 km record and Toby (my race engineer) told me I was on target to beat it by a few minutes so rather than push harder I just sat at that speed and rolled over the finish line at 400 laps to the cheers of the crew and the assembled spectators that had been in the velodrome to do aerobic exercises in the track infield. It was funny to see them all signing waivers for the GCN film crew that were there again recording the journey of my 24 hour preparations. I look forward to seeing their reactions properly when the film comes out.

I continued onwards to 200 km and the record was broken with celebrations from the team only as there was literally nobody else in the velodrome at that point. It was quite nice to do that with just the crew there.

The 6 hour record fell with less fuss as the team had already calculated it 45 mins before. The final target was the 300k distance and the last 50 laps were quite special, the Welsh junior cycling team had started to arrive and were looking up at the large display showing my time elapsed and lap counter with some confusion. They seemed to almost not believe someone could ride that many laps on the velodrome and were photographing it and sharing it with others, they gave me a cheer when I crossed the finish line on lap 1200. It was very cool to do that with the young generation of track cyclists there watching it.

All in all it was a great day on the track, 4 Masters records broken and 1200 laps in the bank, onwards to the next session.