I press the earbud into my ear with my finger to try to hear him better. Over the telephone line, I can hear him crying as he speaks to me. And why wouldn’t he be so distraught? He’s ridden over 3,000 km through the hairdryer-like heatwave in the plains of Spain and climbed more than 30,000 metres, over every single mountain range: the Sistema Central; the Picos de Europa; the Pyrenees; the Massif Central. And, now, he’s surrounded by the majesty of the Alps, at the top of the Colle del Nivolet.
His brakes are irreparable. His race is over, 1,000km short of the finish.
A pass where the beauty grows the higher up you get until you can see all the peaks and lakes from the high point at 2,600 metres above sea level. But, he’s unable to descend from that high point in the clouds - his brakes are irreparable. His race is over, 1,000km short of the finish. I struggle to imagine how he feels and I can’t remember the last time I heard a grown man cry.
He tells me that he’s had the best experience and that he will definitely return next year. I try my best to give him sympathetic, positive words, while also feeling drowned in his disappointment.
I agree with him that he’s improved hugely since last year, 2023, where I have vague memories of him from the Solstice Sprint in England. His performances this year, where we both returned to that same race, and how far he’s ridden in VIA, we both know he’s been so strong, but he simply cannot continue riding due to the catastrophic mechanical failure of his bike. The conversation concludes.
Happily, he will rejoin us and travel to the south of Italy, to Giovinazzo, by the sea.
A couple of days later, as Matt approaches the finish in the night, the bright lights of Giovinazzo’s main piazza show him the way, the town buzzing with festivity as locals crowd in the town centre to watch and hear the music festival.
He hears the trumpeting of the VIA horn as it is blown by another rider to greet him, and completes his first ultra race successfully with a huge grin on his face, wide-eyed and high on adrenaline, his journey over.
“I nearly cried today, what an event, I hate it so f*****g much!”
Congratulations pour in from the gathered VIA community, with hugs and fist bumps. Words stream out of his mouth, a mixture of expletives and ecstatic pronouncements. He says he wants to sit down. Another rider hands him a beer.
“It taught me a f****ing lesson!” He looks at me and almost shouts while half laughing and half crying sometimes “I nearly cried today, what an event, I hate it so f*****g much!” then, grinning and looking around at the other riders surrounding him, laughs “Oh this is voluntary!"
While he recounts his tales from the road,I’m taken on his rollercoaster ride of emotions, the highs and lows that he experienced, different to what I remember all my races, and yet the same.
The day after, with a cool breeze, sat on a stone bench by the harbour of the finishing town of Giovinazzo, I listen to the conversation between the pair, Matt and Harry, who split up at the end of the first day, in Spain. Harry was suffering badly from heat stroke and, that night, he lay on the bathroom floor of his hotel room, throwing-up and shivering, in spite of the heat.
After a seemingly miraculous recovery, he managed to catch up to Matt a few days later but then had to “scratch” (that is, to give up on completing the race) soon after, in France, due to extreme saddle sores and deep bruising.
The suffering that he endured for days, I can’t imagine. I have never had to scratch due to a debilitating physical condition like he had. Harry admits candidly that after doing a similar 4,000km race in 2023 “I didn't want to touch my bike again, I hated it six months later, whereas this time I just want to do it again. I'd start it right now if I could.”
For an instant, I’m shocked by his determination.
It’s the first time her mother has travelled to the finish of any of the many ultra races she has participated in. Her husband is also there, waiting patiently. Seeing the crowd awaiting her, she has a huge smile on her face, having been riding for 15 days, across three countries and over six mountain ranges.
She comes to a stop, standing over her bike, spots her mother and immediately reaches out to her, with her bike beneath her, hugs her and bursts into tears, as does her mother. Her husband joins in the hug. It’s been a year since they buried her father and this is the end of another journey.
Her fellow VIA riders give the family some respectful space, looking on with a mixture of emotions of happiness, sadness and sympathy, all written on their faces. She later tells me that riding VIA was good for her grief and this was the best finishing experience she’d ever had.
My experience of riding a 4000km ultra race, 5 days after my mother died, was possibly the opposite and full of sadness with no release. I’m happy for her. Such a strong, independent woman - I never thought I’d see her cry.
The tears are real, the feelings true, the emotions raw and new, but as I look into the eyes of each and every one of our riders, I see the highs and lows that they’ve lived, I hear the same in their voices.
They’ve experienced so much that I’m envious of the hardships they’ve endured, voluntarily, and the beauty they’ve seen and felt. They’ve all learned something about themselves, the countries they’ve journeyed through, on this grand adventure, and it feels like I’m watching an elaborate and amazing story unfold from the other side of the window. At times, the sheer workload felt crushingly stressful, but the riders’ reactions made it all worthwhile and, regardless of our envy, we were privileged to be able to organise this event to create great, sometimes the best, experiences.
They’ve all learned something about themselves, the countries they’ve journeyed through, on this grand adventure, and it feels like I’m watching an elaborate and amazing story unfold from the other side of the window.
We remember meeting each rider on the sign-in day, the community dinner for all the riders before the race, the team, and volunteers, the exciting police escort out of the historical, starting city of Cartagena, chasing the leaders across Europe through Spain, France and Italy, through the heat, fog, over mountain passes, to the sea, to the beautiful finishing town of Giovinazzo, where we saw riders victorious but relieved for their journey to be done. It all happened in two weeks, which seemed like a blink of an eye.
A story made up of hundreds more stories are yet to be told. More have been forgotten and more will be made in the next Chapter…
