The Lemon Fool

The death has been announnced of the French cyclist Robert Marchand. Born in 1911 he was a prisoner of war during world war 2. I hope I am as fit as him at the age of 109. The following comes from his Wikipedia page.

Aged 35 he finished seventh in the Grand Prix des Nations in 1946. He returned to cycling in 1978 and continued training after his 100th birthday. In February 2012, he set a world record in one-hour track cycling in the over-100 age group at 24.250 kilometres (15.068 mi). He improved this record to 26.927 kilometres (16.732 mi) in January 2014.

On 4 January 2017, he set a world record in one-hour track cycling in the over-105 age group, covering 22.547 kilometres (14.010 mi) in one hour, and the 105 year old centenarian declared: "I could have done better, if I had seen the 10-minute warning card, otherwise I would have pedalled slightly faster".

At the age of 105 he was recognised as the world's oldest competitive cyclist by Guinness World Records.

Marchand put his remarkable fitness and longevity down to a diet consisting of lots of fruit and vegetables, a little meat, not too much coffee and an hour a day on the cycling home-trainer.

After he turned 106 Marchand's doctors advised him to stop competing for world records. He obliged, but refused to quit racing completely. In early February 2018 Marchand completed a 4,000-meter race in the same stadium where he made his last record.

Marchand celebrated his 107th birthday by going for a 20-kilometre bike ride in the Ardèch.

Cinelli

If you ever set a pub quiz, a better-than-usual sports question would be to cite his guinness book records - numbers that would be totally unremarkable for a younger cyclist - and ask what it is about Marchand's achievements that make them record-worthy.

From memory there are two of them: about 29km in an hour at over 100, and 22km at 106.

wow..

cinelli wrote:The death has been announnced of the French cyclist Robert Marchand. Born in 1911 he was a prisoner of war during world war 2. I hope I am as fit as him at the age of 109. The following comes from his Wikipedia page.

Aged 35 he finished seventh in the Grand Prix des Nations in 1946. He returned to cycling in 1978 and continued training after his 100th birthday. In February 2012, he set a world record in one-hour track cycling in the over-100 age group at 24.250 kilometres (15.068 mi). He improved this record to 26.927 kilometres (16.732 mi) in January 2014.

On 4 January 2017, he set a world record in one-hour track cycling in the over-105 age group, covering 22.547 kilometres (14.010 mi) in one hour, and the 105 year old centenarian declared: "I could have done better, if I had seen the 10-minute warning card, otherwise I would have pedalled slightly faster".

At the age of 105 he was recognised as the world's oldest competitive cyclist by Guinness World Records.

Marchand put his remarkable fitness and longevity down to a diet consisting of lots of fruit and vegetables, a little meat, not too much coffee and an hour a day on the cycling home-trainer.

After he turned 106 Marchand's doctors advised him to stop competing for world records. He obliged, but refused to quit racing completely. In early February 2018 Marchand completed a 4,000-meter race in the same stadium where he made his last record.

Marchand celebrated his 107th birthday by going for a 20-kilometre bike ride in the Ardèch.

Cinelli

Which proves you don't needs steroids to do well at the sport.

What a great advertisement and inspirational person

AiY

how many attempts at these records have actually been made by somebody over the age of 105 etc ?

That sint to knock his acheivements at all - I cant see the history of it consisting of many attempts though

AsleepInYorkshire wrote:Which proves you don't needs steroids to do well at the sport.

What a great advertisement and inspirational person

I actually doubt they would mandate drug tests for the over-100 records. I bet Lance Armstrong claimed his performance came from training and eating well too

Scott.

At 68 I thought I was prety good (and at 62 did a 315 mile ride to London in 23h15 mins with a ride speed of 16.1mph) but this chap is absolute top of the tree.
The story does two things for me: humbles and motivates.

EssDeeAitch wrote:At 68 I thought I was prety good (and at 62 did a 315 mile ride to London in 23h15 mins with a ride speed of 16.1mph)

That's impressive!

RC

EssDeeAitch wrote:At 68 I thought I was prety good (and at 62 did a 315 mile ride to London in 23h15 mins with a ride speed of 16.1mph) but this chap is absolute top of the tree.
The story does two things for me: humbles and motivates.

Sheesh - I have to stop for breath half way up the stairs

Hats off to you good sir

AiY

EssDeeAitch wrote:At 68 I thought I was prety good (and at 62 did a 315 mile ride to London in 23h15 mins with a ride speed of 16.1mph) but this chap is absolute top of the tree.
The story does two things for me: humbles and motivates.

Um, if you're doing three-figure mileages in your 60s, you are indeed good. I'm suitably impressed.

The fact there's a tiny handful of people impressing at much older ages doesn't detract from that. Once upon a time I rode with one[1]: he'd cycled in the 1928 olympics; this was the late 1980s and he was still hard to match.

[1] In the context of a club.

UncleEbenezer wrote:

EssDeeAitch wrote:At 68 I thought I was prety good (and at 62 did a 315 mile ride to London in 23h15 mins with a ride speed of 16.1mph) but this chap is absolute top of the tree.
The story does two things for me: humbles and motivates.

Um, if you're doing three-figure mileages in your 60s, you are indeed good. I'm suitably impressed.

The fact there's a tiny handful of people impressing at much older ages doesn't detract from that. Once upon a time I rode with one[1]: he'd cycled in the 1928 olympics; this was the late 1980s and he was still hard to match.

[1] In the context of a club.

I have not done a 100 miler for about three years now. Not really due to inability but a series of surgical procedures has interfered. Rode 4,000 miles last year though and averaging 150 miles a week for the last six. Used to run ultra marathons.
I regularly see cyclists in their 80's doing 40 to 50 mile rides amd hope to emulate them.

EssDeeAitch wrote:

UncleEbenezer wrote:

EssDeeAitch wrote:At 68 I thought I was prety good (and at 62 did a 315 mile ride to London in 23h15 mins with a ride speed of 16.1mph) but this chap is absolute top of the tree.
The story does two things for me: humbles and motivates.

Um, if you're doing three-figure mileages in your 60s, you are indeed good. I'm suitably impressed.

The fact there's a tiny handful of people impressing at much older ages doesn't detract from that. Once upon a time I rode with one[1]: he'd cycled in the 1928 olympics; this was the late 1980s and he was still hard to match.

[1] In the context of a club.

I have not done a 100 miler for about three years now. Not really due to inability but a series of surgical procedures has interfered. Rode 4,000 miles last year though and averaging 150 miles a week for the last six. Used to run ultra marathons.
I regularly see cyclists in their 80's doing 40 to 50 mile rides amd hope to emulate them.

My other recollection is Charles Darville (whose surname I've probably misspelt), who in his 90s would still ride from Sheffield for the York rallies. This was the early 1990s, when I lived in Sheffield myself and - at one third of his age - would consider that a satisfying ride.

UncleEbenezer wrote:

EssDeeAitch wrote:

UncleEbenezer wrote:
Um, if you're doing three-figure mileages in your 60s, you are indeed good. I'm suitably impressed.

The fact there's a tiny handful of people impressing at much older ages doesn't detract from that. Once upon a time I rode with one[1]: he'd cycled in the 1928 olympics; this was the late 1980s and he was still hard to match.

[1] In the context of a club.

I have not done a 100 miler for about three years now. Not really due to inability but a series of surgical procedures has interfered. Rode 4,000 miles last year though and averaging 150 miles a week for the last six. Used to run ultra marathons.
I regularly see cyclists in their 80's doing 40 to 50 mile rides amd hope to emulate them.

My other recollection is Charles Darville (whose surname I've probably misspelt), who in his 90s would still ride from Sheffield for the York rallies. This was the early 1990s, when I lived in Sheffield myself and - at one third of his age - would consider that a satisfying ride.

Sheffield is seriously hilly - much more so than here in Northumberland and the gearing on his bike would have been much higher and require more strength. I have just found this on the Cycling UK Forium posted in 2008

"Sheffield CTC had a rider who was cycling well into his nineties and wasn't short of the magic century and still on the road when he moved to the sunlit byways. I believe his name was Charles Darville (and apologies to all concerned if my memory has failed me). I think he died about 10? years ago. He was featured in a 40 Minutes documentary on cycling I have on tape from the early nineties, a sad affair as most of the people featured have passed away. He was still solo camping in his late eighties or early nineties and always seemed to be at York Rally".

Sounds like another remarkable person.