Tuesday 3 July 2012

Running the Numbers on the Tour Divide

Siting again in my quiet, warm office at the gym my mind turns once again to the Tour Divide MTB Race/Ride/Adventure.

The mid field is coming in as day 25 of the 2013 event rolls on. Nathan Mawkes from NZ is closing in on Antelope Wells and should get in before dark. Looks to be about 100k out. Great job - consistent as ever!

I have been looking at expectations for my own attempt in 2014 and here is what I think I will aim for.

In Ollie's interview he suggested that rolling for 17, re-stocking/fueling and planning etc for 2 and sleeping for 5 was his pattern. 

The current years 10th place finisher was Eric Schraufnagel. Looking at the race flow diagram, he took close to 500 hours to complete the distance. Dividing this by 24 gives 20.8 days. At 17 hours riding time a day an average speed of 12.9k would be needed to achieve this.

Easy!

Of course, there would be no breakages of body or machine, walking through snow pushing a fully laden bike at 5k an hour will kill the average from very early on in the race and just losing the plot for a day here and there will not be an option...
 
Not so easy! Plenty of time to re-calculate the numbers. Kinda fun too...

Hats off to all the competitors past and present, finishers or not!