It’s the time of the year when everyone is heading off for the holidays, spending time with family and taking advantage of the opportunity to explore some new locations on the bike. It’s also a great time to unwind by catching up on your reading, so we’ve decided to finish 2016 by revisiting some of our best articles of the year.
When Australia’s Bridie O’Donnell set a new UCI world hour record of 46.882 kilometres in January of this year, it was a momentous occasion, and thousands of fans crowded the Adelaide’s Super-Drome to witness a new historic benchmark. And while O’Donnell’s record stood for only a month before American Evelyn Stevens broke it, we are sure that it was a day the 41-year-old O’Donnell will never forget.
We had photographer Tim Bardsley-Smith there on the night to capture the images that bring to life the story of this impressive feat.
– Anne-Marije
Bridie O’Donnell set a new UCI world hour record of 46.882 kilometres on Friday night in front of a crowd of thousands at Adelaide’s Super-Drome. The weather was a warm 29°C and the pressure favourably low for the attempt, which took place in a city swarming with cyclists in the midst of the Santos Tour Down Under. The 41-year-old O’Donnell was calm, confident and composed as many of the top names of the cycling world looked on. She focused her attention on a carefully laid out pacing strategy which the Australian rider was convinced was the key to success in the final hour of her year-long effort to deliver a new world record. It was. The physician not only beat the record, as she delivered lap after lap of consistent times, but added an impressive 609 metres to the mark of 46.273 kilometres set by American law professor Molly Shaffer van Houweling at high altitude in Mexico just four months ago
We had photographer Tim Bardsley-Smith there on the night to capture the images that bring to life the story of this impressive feat.
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- The heat was on with temperatures nearing 30°C but O’Donnell was well prepared for this after a December test run in temperatures of 40°C. “We had this oppressive heat in Adelaide so that was really terrific as it helped us work out what my cooling strategies will be,” O’Donnell told Ella CyclingTips in the weeks before the attempt.
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- The record-breaking bike had a 55×14 setup.
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- It was time to begin and O’Donnell looked calm, composed and even able to flash the crowd a grin. In that moment you would have never guessed of the nerves she had to overcome. “I’m not pretending I am a robot. I really did feel terrible yesterday mentally. I was very nervous … I think I imagined all of the things that could go wrong,” said O’Donnell. “I had a better sleep last night and I woke up feeling much more calm and comfortable.”
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- Once she was off O’Donnell quickly slipped into a remarkably consistent rhythm. She planned to keep her times around the 19.2 second a lap mark and they rarely strayed far. She constantly reached the key milestone times on target for a new record.
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- The final ten minutes approached and O’Donnell remained on-track to comfortably beat the record. There were a couple of slightly slower laps that saw the projected distance tick down slightly, but it was nothing more than a momentary pause in the relentlessly consistent pace.
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- There were minutes to go and it was clear that this would be the night when the former domestique grabbed the limelight with a new UCI world hour record.
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- She did it. It’s a new UCI world hour record of 46.882 kilometres.
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- “I can’t believe I broke a world record.”
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- It was O’Donnell who had to turn the pedals but it was a team of about ten that made the attempt happen. “All those people believed in me and were remarkable in their support of me and I am so honoured and privileged to have that support,” said O’Donnell. “The best way to thank those people is to be great and do your best.”
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- “I have to say the thing I am most proud of is I just stayed relentlessly positive,” said O’Donnell. “I would even say to myself if I rode a bit of a crappy high line on a corner, ‘okay next one do it better.'”
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- UCI president Brian Cookson and vice president Tracey Gaudry congratulated the new record holder. Cookson sounded confident the record would fall even before O’Donnell ventured onto the track. “It’s a fantastic uplifting feat and I am sure we are going to see something very special this evening,” Cookson told the crowd in the run up to the attempt.
