A pair of cyclists have succeeded in an attempt to ‘Everest’ Box Hill – by riding up and down the Surrey beauty spot 73 times within 23 hours.
‘Everesting’ is a craze fuelled by the performance-tracking website, Strava, that sees riders attempt to climb the equivalent of Mount Everest’s height, 8,800 metres, within a single day.
Yesterday, we reported how Australian James Middlemiss had become the first paracyclist to join the Everesting Hall of Fame after riding up his local hill 64 times in a day to beat 44,000 other entrants to win this year’s Rapha Rising Strava Hill Climb Challenge.
Now, Roger Barr from Hampton and Ciaran O'Hara of Enfield are set to join him after starting their effort on Box Hill at 5am on Friday morning and carrying on until they had equalled an ascent of Everest, reports Get Surrey.
Mr Barr told the website his exertions had caused him "a few blisters and a bad knee," adding, "I feel really tired."
He said: "I've done a lot of marathons and I'm as tired as after one of them.”
The pair completed their ride just before 3.30am on Saturday morning, and he said his plans for the rest of the day would revolve around "eating and eating."
He went on: "My wife wanted to go shopping but I'm just too tired.”
He also acknowledged the support he and his cycling companion had received, saying: "It was amazing how many people got behind it.
"At 11pm on Friday a lady turned up with fish and chips for my dad and pasta for us. And at midnight there were four guys cycling along with us.”
However, he added that he and his friend had endured "a few motorists yelling abuse."
Their efforts now need to be verified by Strava for their Everesting achievement to be officially acknowledged.
46 thoughts on “Two cyclists ride Box Hill 73 times to bag an ‘Everest’”
Just go out and ride your
Just go out and ride your bloody bikes for crying out loud!
~X(
This is all getting a bit silly.
Some Fella wrote:Just go out
Umm… They did!
😉
A mate “everested” a climb in the Peak District a couple of weeks ago.
Someone has already done Hardknott Pass too!
http://www.everesting.cc/
To right. Just go for a
To right. Just go for a bloody ride. What is the point. I think that I am going to be the first man, oops person to rise over 15 cattle grids carrying 18 empty coke bottles.
upinthehills wrote:To right.
Good lord, cheer up. As someone has already pointed out to the last person that asked why didn’t they just go out for a ride – they did. So they used a sort of artificial challenge to use as a target but, so what ? It prompted them to do something slightly mad, doing something they obviously like doing – and it’s something they and some others can talk about, and maybe take pride in, for time to come.
It’s also quite impressive…. what’s the problem with that or with a cycling site reporting on it ?
Shhhh grumpy…well done
Shhhh grumpy…well done chaps.
Shhhh grumpy…well done
Shhhh grumpy…well done chaps.
Bah! going up and down a hill
Bah! going up and down a hill all day just for Strava points !?
Men! (sighs, shakes head)
‘Grand old duke of Strava?’
‘Grand old duke of Strava?’
Local guys did that on a hill
Local guys did that on a hill behind Glasgow called the Crow Rd a few months back. It’s a bit longer (3 miles) and you add 900 feet with each ascent but even then, it took about 30 odd ascents.
But 73? That would drive me to distraction!
Q: Why did you climb
Q: Why did you climb Everest?
A: Because it’s there! <:P
Q: Why did you cycle Box Hill 73 times?
A: Because it’s smaller than Everest! 🙁
Question – did they rely on
Question – did they rely on the barometric sensor or a GPS estimate of height gain, or is there land survey data that provides the altitudes at both ends of Box Hill? There can be quite a lot of variation in the first two!
Anyway, chapeau to the mad bats!
Quote:He went on: “My wife
Funnily enough, I feel like that all the time and I’ve never cycled up Everest.
Some points:
Sometimes riding
Some points:
Sometimes riding from point A to Point B isn’t enough or Strava and his website wouldn’t exist.
Boxhill is also A. Closer than Everest and B. Has a road going up it.
The Ordnance Survey and 10’s of thousands of GPS tracks should give a reasonable accurate figure, no one is sure how tall Everest is anyway. No one walks up Everest from sea level anyway too.
Can I do a Mariana Trench challenge for the most descending in a day. Where would the longest continuous negative gradient?
On the Butterfield diet Saturday is treat day! Bon Bon Bon Bons.
bikeboy76 wrote:
Can I do a
The road from the top of Mt. Haleakala on Maui, Hawaii, is 35 miles and a shade over 10,000 feet of descending. might be a good place to start. you’ll only need to do four.
Dave Atkinson wrote:bikeboy76
Helicopter back to the top?
Actually, Wow http://www.strava.com/segments/614610 Haleakala seems like the idea mountain for this sort of thing. Three reps of this would be nicely over the limit, nice even climbing. Obvs nothing like that in the UK.
I see someone has already bagged Mam Tor near me. 0.001% change of me ever achieving this. Well done chaps.
Dave Atkinson wrote:bikeboy76
I’m off to research helicopter shuttle costs in Hawaii!
I’m only giving kudos if they
I’m only giving kudos if they did it in full expidition kit with oxygen tanks. 😉
Hang on, they finished at
Hang on, they finished at 3:30am the following day? They didn’t Everest anything, then.
Try again lads! 😉
Nick T wrote:Hang on, they
From the Everesting site above
– It does not matter how long the ride takes, but it must be ridden in one attempt (i.e. no sleeping in between). Breaks for meals etc. are fine.
Roger Barr * First known 1 15.08.2014 Box Hill, Surrey, UK 340.7 22:02:49 8,852 Strava file Male
Ciaran O’Hara * First known 1 15.08.2014 Box Hill, Surrey, UK 340.7 22:02:49 8,852 Strava file Male
They are officially on there. The Earth takes 24 hours to rotate but it never stops rotating so any point is arbitrary, why choose the antipode?
bikeboy76 wrote:cut and paste
It was a wind up, mate.
Olympus Monsing will be the
Olympus Monsing will be the next thing then, or maybe Rheasilviaing.
OldRidgeback wrote:Olympus
Would this be a Cyclocross challenge?
Seriously this is not a Strava challenge, click on the link. You [might] criticize it as it was dreamt up by Australians, but the challenge is no more artificial than any route you choose to pick. If you need a specific goal to achieve something epic then so be it. The same people mocking this as stupid will have been applauding the blokes who took a Boris bike up Mont Ventoux.
Airzound, please provide us with evidence of your day climbing over 8000m in the Alps or something suitably epic.
bikeboy76 wrote:OldRidgeback
I’m not mocking it as being stupid. I’m just suggesting that it’s in the nature of these things that once a precedent has been set, someone else will want to take things that bit further.
And by the way, this wasn’t
And by the way, this wasn’t just for Strava-fame. Ciaran was raising cash for a hospice in Northern Ireland. https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/everestingboxhill
Did they use oxygen towards
Did they use oxygen towards the end?
.
.
What a pointless exercise. At
What a pointless exercise. At least doing something like climbing the Three Peaks has a proper goal, but riding up and down Box Hill 73 times is mental.
If they had climbed the Alp d’Huez, then the following cols with in a day – the Croix de Fer, the Iseran, the Galiber, the Izoard, la Bonette then this would be seriously impressive and a goal worth aiming for but to cycle 73 times up Box Hill as if climbing Everest to get a Strava prize is just plain stupid. It’s cheating as well as no way do you have to deal with the affects of altitude. Who ever got altitude sickness climbing Box Hill =)) ?
Airzound wrote:What a
Gosh, isn’t it fun (and easy) to belittle the efforts of some people who actually went out and rode their bikes to complete a tough challenge? It’s still 8,000m of climbing in a single ride. There’s nothing ‘proper’ about any arbitrarily chosen route – the three peaks is just for the sake of it, as it this. I know which one I’d rather do (Three Peaks) and it makes me respect the effort here all the more.
But since it is so easy, can we assume you’ll be knocking one out next weekend, just to prove it? Think Hinault and Paris-Roubaix – in order to be credible in your assertion that it’s all balls, you actually do it first. I’d be more likely to take you seriously then.
step-hent wrote:Airzound
I have no desire to do anything as pointless whether for charity or otherwise. The Three Peaks challenge is not repetitive and pointless unlike climbing Box Hill 73 times ………………………….
Airzound wrote:I have no
If the point was to make money for charity, then it wasn’t pointless was it ? The total elevation was a target, Box Hill is a well known climb that’s had a lot of media exposure in the last few years and it’s presumably not an onerous distance away for the riders.
Of course there are far more attractive challenges – in terms of the surroundings and their execution – and there’s less perceived kudos than doing a much smaller number of higher peaks but doing that sort of repeat has it’s own, added issues i’d imagine. The main one being boredom you’d have thought, which hardly makes it easier, and summiting a vast Alpine peak for the third time would no doubt inspire you more and have a vastly better view – neither intrinsically have much ‘point’.
What I hadn’t expected was the wave of negative commentary on here and some folk seem to be taking this Everesting thing waaay more seriously than it’s intended to be, it’s just a fun way to achieve a target. No-one is comparing the people who do it with the mountaineers tried, and some died, climbing that peak nor demanding they get the same recognition. It’s an iconic image to use to give a bit extra impetus – maybe for folk just trying to get some more miles in or, as in this case, use it to do some good.
As for this particular event, instead of more posts whinging on about how it’s “not as good as my favourite challenge”, why don’t the potential authors use that energy to do what someone suggested earlier – go and donate *.
..or perhaps I just need to lower my expectations.
* Ah, but of course that would contradict their view of it all.
It’s quite staggering to hear
It’s quite staggering to hear “What’s the point?” from fellow cyclists. Those are words you expect to hear from the mouths of Jeremy Clarkson and the Daily Mail brigade about cyclists and cycling in general.
These guys have done something a bit mad and really, really hard within a set of rules outlined by the Everesting movement (it has to be one climb, repeated) – something I’ll wager very few if any of you moany sods could do even if you wanted.
So take a listen to yourselves and wind your necks in.
If you want to criticise based on repetitiveness, there’s always the omnium.
I did a version of this up
I did a version of this up Ditchling Beacon a handful of times, which isn’t enough to make a dent in any records. But it was on a singlespeed, so perhaps a multiplier could be used.
I have a 1 metre hill local
I have a 1 metre hill local to me, I’m going to ride over it until I’ve everested. It’s heroic.
It’s not quite the same thing
It’s not quite the same thing is it?
I have more respect for the people who cycle John O’Groats to Land’s End or round the world than with this. Sure the height is the same but let’s not trivialise a mountain that requires great feats of human endurance and which has claimed many lives. B-)
I am just appalled by some of
I am just appalled by some of the comments on there. Instead of sitting around complaining about the particular type of cycling someone else used to raise money for a hospice for dying people, why not just donate at: https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/everestingboxhill
I’m sure no-one is saying
I’m sure no-one is saying that this achievement is exactly the same as climbing the real Everest. But does it really matter as long as the two guys involved enjoyed it and felt a sense of achievement from it? And if they raised some money for a good cause then that’s got to be a good thing, right?
Bl**dy impressive
Bl**dy impressive effort.
Must have been mind-numbingly boring though!
Has anyone ever summited
Has anyone ever summited Everest and exclaimed, “woohoo, I just did the equivalent of 73 times up Box Hill!!”? 😕
Bloody hell, what a load of
Bloody hell, what a load of moaning minnies.
That’s a crapload of ascending and a hell of a long ride. I got bored after three loops of Mott Street/Lippitts Hill a while back. 😀
There is a rise of about 3
There is a rise of about 3 metres from my house to the village pub, so ‘Everesting’ the pub would require 2934 visits. I reckon I’ve just about made it over the past 20 years – Cheers !!
”There is a rise of about 3
”There is a rise of about 3 metres from my house to the village pub, so ‘Everesting’ the pub would require 2934 visits. I reckon I’ve just about made it over the past 20 years – Cheers !!”
you’ve definitely earned a pint on visit 2,395 then I’d say 🙂
That’s nothing, I’m going to
That’s nothing, I’m going to complete the 30 mile cocaine assisted cross country hop. Just as silly.
the reason Sherpa Tenzing
the reason Sherpa Tenzing looks so nervous in that photo with the union flag on everest in 1953 is because Hilary’s having a proper go at him from behind the camera for forgetting to pack the garmin and buggering their chances of a rapha badge
I think it’s crazy but rather
I think it’s crazy but rather I.pressive too. Makes me want to have a go and see if I could a dually do it.
Some of us cannot afford the time or expense to go to the alpse or wherever, so something difficult and close to home is a great idea.
I hope the raised a good sum for the good cause too.
Hats off to them =D>
Thanks for all the comments,
Thanks for all the comments, both the positive and the negative.
I am glad of the negative as it has allowed people to come out and ‘defend’ what we did and why we did it which has made it clearer to me how substantial this achievement was.
It was a tough day but it was also a fun day. We had great support, I got to sit down all day and also eat more or less whatever I wanted to keep the fire burning.
The reps also became strangely addictive as other people can testify as once they joined us they didn’t want to leave. It always turned into one more rep once they got to the top.
I will no doubt be doing one of these again however I will go solo in a test to see how far I can push myself. Progression will only come from pushing myself and finding my limits and thats exactly what I intend to do.
On a final note, donations would be greatly appreciated for a small charity that has looked after countless members of my family and close friends.
https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/everestingboxhill
Thank You
What if you Everested a Car
What if you Everested a Car Park? I am thinking the classic Fiat factory in Italy. Plenty of climbing in that. Challenging ramps all the way.
I bet that would put the wind up the haters. Climb on.