This Saturday, at 6 am Perth time 18th March (Friday 17th 2200 GMT) sees the start of the inaugural Indian Pacific Wheel race. Set in Australia this is a solo unsupported bike race from Fremantle (Perth), WA to the Sydney Opera House, NSW covering 5,491km across some of the toughest terrain Australia has to offer. From the long straight desert roads of the Nullabor Desert, The Great Ocean Road in South Australia, to the Australian Alps approaching Sydney; this is going to be an incredibly tough race.

What’s more, the line up for this race is arguably one of the strongest ever for an ultra-distance bike packing race. Kristof Allegaert (3 time TCR Winner), Mike Hall (TABR, TD winner), Jessie Carlson (TABR Winner, TD runner up), Sarah Hammond (Aka the Purple Dot), Juliana Buhring (Aka JuJu), Steffan Streich to name a few of the hitters.

Full lineup is here: https://www.indianpacificwheelrace.com/2017roster

All of the main contenders have stated a desire to compete for the win, so should be an exciting race to follow.

The brains behind this race are those behind Curve Cycling. I’ve recently picked up my very own Curve bike based on the legacy of what these machines have done. TABR, TD, Race to the Rock… I would have loved to have taken this bike back to Oz to ride the IndyPac, perhaps next year?

Following this race will be compelling ‘viewing’. It’s really fascinating following these races – there’s no Eurosport here, it’s all about dot watching. Following the live trackers on the website: https://indianpacificwheelrace.maprogress.com/, you can see

in near real time the progress of each of the riders. Having Google Street view open on the side to see what the terrain is they’re covering, where they’ve stopped, you can really get to a level of engagement with each athlete (if that’s what you can call them?!) that doesn’t exist in many other sporting arenas. The reporting from the race will be from the riders themselves, followed by watching their twitter, Instagram and Facebook updates. Many of the riders are also fairly well know vloggers, so there will likely be much live streaming on Instagram & Facebook – watch out for Ryan Flynn, Cycling Maven and Durian Rider to name a few. To follow individual riders check out this page with all the participants info’s.

I’ve got massive respect to everyone taking part in this race and wish them all the best of luck!