May 3/15 11:59 am - Hour Record Broken Again

Posted by Editoress on 05/3/15
 

Great Britain's Alex Dowsett has become the latest rider to break the Hour Record for the most distance covered.  Dowsett covered 52.937 kilometres at the Manchester Velodrome on Saturday, besting Australian Rohan Dennis' record  by 446 metres, set in February. After a relatively slow start, Dowsett went ahead of Dennis with nine minutes remaining in the hour.  Dowsett is the first Brit to hold the record since Chris Boardman held it between 2000 and 2005.

"The coaches gave me a plan, which I didn't like that much," said Dowsett afterwards.

"Deep down I knew it was the right plan."

"We knew we would ride at an even pace that would actually put me behind Rohan until 45 minutes."

"I wasn't too keen on that, so it was about the halfway point that I went up because I knew I had a lot left in the tank."

Dowsett is the fourth recordsetter since interest was revived in the standard after the UCI updated the bicycle regulations last year. Jens Voigt (Germany) was the first to set a new standard last fall of 51.110 kilometres. He was followed by Matthias Brändle (Austria) at 51.852 km, then Dennis at 52.491 km.  The next attempt will be by Bradley Wiggins (Great Britain) on June 7th.