Our own Chris Hall took part in the Red Bull Time Laps, a 24 hour race with a twist.
This weekend just gone we saw the inaugural Red Bull Timelaps held at Windsor Great Park. The event itself was something a little different; a 25-hour race between teams comprised of 4 riders. Our own Chris Hall was in a team (Walrus) with YouTube vlogger, Francis Cade, British Land Speed Record holder, Ken Buckley and pro cyclist, Lawrence Carpenter. We knew this was a team with real potential, but in reality, they were going out there to have fun. Below Chris shares his thoughts from the challenge.
'Lawrence was our first rider up. It seemed right to have someone who had the most recent racing experience starting, as the start of these events can be a bit messy. We were right to do this as 2 laps in there was a nasty crash and the race was suspended for an hour or so. With that in mind, when the race restarted, Lawrence was back out on the circuit.
Each lap was 6.8 km with about 50 meters of climbing. There were a couple of sharp turns and gravelly corners, but generally it was an OK course. I went into this thinking it would be more of a time trial, but in reality, this was a race.
As a team, we figured out a strategy; we aimed to do hour-and-a-half stints at what was supposed to be our threshold (it ended up much harder than that). I then did a big stint in the night to get Lawrence lined up to do the power hour. During the power hour, every lap of a different, shorter course counts for two. After this we all aimed for 2-hour stints until the race ended at 12:00 midday on Sunday.
Our team came 3rd in the Men’s category and 5th overall out of 150 teams! We managed 133 laps, with a fastest lap time of 9:25, averaging 11:18 per lap. During my three stints, I averaged 315, 268 and 246 watts. The pace was something I really hadn't quite expected and each of us going so hard on our first stints helped secure a strong position during the night hours and whilst it rained the next morning'.
You can see what happened by watching Francis Cade's vlogs: