In the most highly anticipated attempt in recent history, time trial powerhouse Filippo Ganna did more than shatter the UCI Hour Record on his first attempt, he smashed the farthest distance ever covered on a bike, covering more than 56.7 kilometres on the velodrome in Grenchen, Switzerland on Saturday evening.
In a super-human, superlative-defying performance, Ganna’s astounding distance covered exceeded the performance of Hour Record legend Chris Boardman, whose 1996 mark of 56.375 was relegated to the archives when the UCI revised the Hour Record regulations in 2014.
The Briton made that mark using the now-banned ‘superman’ position on a wing-like Lotus bike, but since 2014, the records set on equipment or positions deemed non-standard by the UCI have been dismissed as official Hour Records and a new wave of ‘unified’ records entered the books.
The Italian got off to a slower start than the current record holder, his Ineos team’s performance engineer Dan Bigham, who rode 55.548 kilometres on August 19 as a sort of test event for Ganna’s Hour.
Ganna, a two-time world champion in the individual time trial and winner of five time trials in the Giro d’Italia, started out somewhat slower than Bigham but after the 15-minute mark, he began steadily powering ahead of the Briton’s pace.
Midway through the hour, the 26-year-old phenom was on pace to cover 55.86 kilometres and the chants of ‘Pippo! Pippo!’ echoed from a group of supporters in the nearly empty venue.
By the 40-minute mark, Ganna began to approach the speed of the ‘best human effort’ record set by Boardman. With 10 minutes still to ride, Ganna’s average speed looked to go well past it into the heart-thumping territory of 57 kilometres per hour.
But the pain of the hour began to bite in the closing minutes and Ganna was forced to back off the rocket-like pace and, wobbling in some of the turns, the Italian’s suffering could be felt through the television signal.
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