Mark Beaumont's Around the World in 80 Days Cycling Challenge

Mark Beaumont #80days #ArtemisWorldCycle

Having recently completed our six-day cyclingadventure around the Deux-Sèvres department of France, the amount of support we received was something I hadn’t expected, but certainly an important factor in keeping our spirits up. We had a live tracker app running on Sarah’s phone and this enabled people to follow our progress and come out to meet us in the right place and at the right time. I was also humbled by the many comments we received saying we were an inspiration, and I appreciate we are all different, but what we achieved in comparison to the cyclist we cheered on today was nothing. Mark Beaumont, who is attempting to cycle around the world in 80 days is a true inspiration. You can read more about his challenge on his website here.

Mark Beaumont #80days #ArtemisWorldCycle

Mark left Paris on his bike 78 days ago and has been cycling ever since, covering over 200 miles a day, surviving on about four hours sleep and having to consume around 9000 calories daily to keep him fuelled up. He has been heading east since leaving Paris, cycling through Europe, Russia and Asia before flying due south from Beijing to Perth. He cycled east to Brisbane, flew to Invercargill on New Zealand’s South Island, cycled to Auckland and then flew north to Anchorage in Alaska. He then cycled across North America to Halifax Nova Scotia, before flying to Lisbon in Portugal. He has crossed Spain and the Pyrenees and is back in France cycling in the rain on the final push towards Paris. This is extreme cycling and we couldn’t let the opportunity pass to cheer him on as he cycled through Poitou Charentes this afternoon.

Mark Beaumont #80days #ArtemisWorldCycle

We too set off east, but in the car this time, stopping regularly to check our route against his tracker information that seemed to only update every fifteen minutes (and he can cover quite a number of kilometres in fifteen minutes). Despite using three mobile phones on 3G, an iPad tethered to one of the phones, an atlas and the sat nav, we missed him to begin with, but once we knew which road he was on we were off again. We followed him, caught him up, overtook him and pulled in ahead of him to wait. It was quite exciting to see him approach and be able to do some clapping, cheering and giving of words of encouragement, just like we had received a week ago. That same tired face I’ve seen on his daily video updates, often looking tired enough to fall asleep while talking to the camera, looked up, smiled and lifted one hand from his handlebars to give me a thumbs up in thanks.

Me, looking rather excited at meeting Mark Beaumont

Mark is scheduled to cycle to within 180 miles of Paris this evening and finish his epic journey tomorrow afternoon, meaning if all goes to plan he will have smashed the Around the World in 80 Days Challenge, by completing it in 79 days.

Best of luck Mark, you are an inspiration. 

#80days #ArtemisWorldCycle