Just what goes into beating a world record? Cyclist follows endurance specialist James MacDonald as he attempts to break the 100-mile indoor record
Words James Spender Photography Mike Massaro
At 2.05pm on 21st February 2024, James MacDonald let go of the spectators’ fence and rolled down the banking towards the racing line. With gravity on his side to help spin up his huge 62x17 gear, the 53-year-old Scot made the first pedal rotations towards his target: ride 100 miles around London’s Lee Valley Velodrome in less than 3 hours 46 minutes and 16 seconds.
Train. Pedal around in a circle 644 times. Time it. Become world record holder. Simple. Only it isn’t. There’s a whole lot more that goes into a world record attempt, as we found out when we caught up with MacDonald after his latest endeavour. And it doesn’t always go to plan.
Proven ability
An experienced ultra-cyclist, MacDonald currently holds the world records for the fastest return from Land’s End to John O’Groats – 2,776km in 5 days 18 hours and 3 minutes, set in 2017 – and the fastest 100km cycled on an indoor velodrome – 2h 19min 19sec, set in 2021. Over the years MacDonald has taken on myriad other records, some successful then overthrown, others close but no cigar. Which begs the question, how does a rider in the business of breaking records choose which scalps to go for? The answer lies in the process itself.
‘I took on the 24-hour record last May, and I broke a couple of age-group records within that – the fastest 500km and fastest 300 miles [13:52:13 and 13:24:19 respectively] but I didn’t break the 24 hour,’ says MacDonald. ‘It was just brutal, but pretty quickly afterwards my race engineer, Toby [Ellis] said, “Right, we’re going to come back and do the 100-mile record. It’s 100km pace but a little bit less, so you just need to ride at 100km pace, and then just do another 60km.” So it was because of the disappointment of the 24 that I wanted to do the 100-mile. I know my FTP, I know the power needed, I know it’s doable.’
In a sense this is how all modern speed records are undertaken on the track (road is different, for example the 100-mile outdoor record is officially held by Christoph Strasser at 3:32:58, with an unofficial record claimed by Jonathan Parker at 2:50:12 with a 33.6kmh tailwind). Riders have a huge amount of data at their disposal, and given the indoor track is a controlled environment, ‘all’ a rider needs to do is ascertain they can produce the effort needed to keep t
