The Alt Tour, a Self-Supported Tour de France
Professional road racing cyclist Lachlan Morton is attempting to complete the Tour de France this year. Except: He’s doing it entirely on his own, without teammates, support vehicles, and transportation from the previous day’s finish to the next day’s start (which might be dozens or even hundreds of miles apart). That means he’ll be riding an extra 1500 miles, climbing an additional 50,000 feet in elevation, shopping for his own meals, and still trying to beat the peloton to Paris. Here’s a quick explanatory trailer:
You can follow his progress on Rapha’s site and check out updates in this Instagram Story. He’s currently ahead of the peloton, even riding day four in Birkenstocks:
Ah, but — the day three press release had an ominous note in it. Right after telling us that Morton had “picked up a tub of couscous and a couple of bags of nuts for dinner” came the real kicker: our protagonist had a bad knee, and had bought new pedals to allow a switch to flat shoes.
So on day four, Morton set off with his new pedals and covered both stage four and stage five of the actual Tour de France — in a pair of Birkenstocks. Despite his sensible sandals, Morton managed to average the same speeds as the day prior, getting through the time trial in 1:17.
(via matt)
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