My third everesting attempt was started, spontaneously. My wife Nico went out for a gravel ride with the guys from gravelfondo, and I had the idea to start my everesting this night, again.

For the first time ever, I had a look at my most common or most favorite home climb to maybe use this one for the everesting attempt.

The most crucial thing about everesting is that you have to ride the same climb again and again until you reach the magical 8848m (8849m after the newest measurements). As I mentioned earlier I had two attempts, as the first  of the two did not follow the everesting rules as it did include two climbs in one attempt and the second try, I just could not make it as it was way too boring to sit on my bike for hours and hours climbing and descending the exact same hills for an entire day.

Comparing my situation with having some little climbing options around the house, I have to pay great respect to everesters from the flatlands such as the Netherlands or also Belgium. These guys have to climbs their hills for a hundred times and more. Definitely I would not make it there.

I rearranged my personal route a little to gain the maximum elevation from one climb and also to optimize the times of climbing including a little safer in the end, not to loose this attempt due to different calculation models.

The climb was calculated with an elevation between 424 and 427 metres of elevation. Climbing this (newly created strava) segment for 21 times should make this an everesting, so more than 8849m of elevation. The climbing length was about 6.6kms, descending the exact same way throws in 13kms for a complete loop, so about 273kms, in total. The average speed will be less than 20kph.

A strong recommendation is to plan and choose your route very well. Have a test ride and feel the steepness. It makes a huge difference of climbing a steep passage once and climbing it for twenty or even more times. It will hurt more after 15hrs in the saddle and already having climbed 6000m of elevation. If you have to get out of your saddle for making it to the top of your climb, you either want to really suffer during the next hours or you should consider another route.

Starting off in the evening, testing myself, as riding during the night is my toughest, but forecasted I could finish my attempt in the evening to get home before the second night. Ride the night when I was fresh and avoiding a night when my motivation is getting smaller and smaller. Having thought this, I packed my bidons, some haribos and some nuts. Nothing more.

Luckily a good friend of mine lives just at the starting pointof the segment. He offered a key for his front door and provided some magnesium and vitamin tablets which I haven’t used for ages. For long rides it does not suit my habits. Sugared acided water during long rides harms my mouth and tongue. Now I learned that if I only drink it during refueling stopps it was much less uncomfortable, so I will reintegrate it into my routines, again. So water during the night was assured. I promised my son to be home for breakfast, so I went home for a chat, a good coffee and a proper breakfast.

I could convince my wife to visit me during my stupid climb and provide me with some food and chilled drinks. She even went out for a climb with me. A problem shared, is a problem halved. She came out once more in the evening to provide me with some last breads for dinner, which was a great help for me so I had not to care for a food box or stuff like that. As I often say, here in this town, we have pretty much everything together to make it a wonderful living. Things are close together, even for a stupid things as everesting you do not have to travel far.

I have seen some variation in my laps, but to be honest I expected the gaps to be way bigger, due to fatigue or being hungry. the range was between 47 to 56 minutes for a complete lap, which really surprised myself. In my assumptions I did need much more than one hours for a complete lap during my weakest times.

Applying your everesting attempt to hell500.com a.ka.a everesting.cc is more and more simple by the time. You need to link your ride/ segment via veloviewer. Some days later, Andy will comment on your ride via strava and your ride will be accepted to their hall of fame.

There are two categories at hells500. Either you go the mentally tough everesting (rules) or you choose a little more elevation within a time limit of 36 hours, the so called high rouleur (rules). During the third weekend in May, a good friend of mine and myself plan to ride from Glashütte (close to Dresden) down into the alps and do some loops over there. Let us see if this is going to be sufficient to meet the high rouleur requirements.

Nutrition for this day was surprisingly small. 2 packs of nuts, 3 packs of haribo, 4 sandwiches, 2 pieces of lasagne and 10 bidons of water.

My clothing war composed as follows. A base layer and high visible jersey, for the decends I used winter arm warmers. Furthermore a BIB and leg warmers during the night. This time I tried to keep it simple and it worked out.

 

Finally, this is my ride in stats and images:

Up and down, up and down, up and down. Say no more …