Phil Deeker rides 1,000 cols in 100 days

Sometime road.cc blogger Phil Deeker has ridden up a thousand cols in 100 days. This staggering self-imposed challenge has entailed almost half a million metres of vertical ascent since May.

Deeker is the man behind Tour de Force, where riders complete the Tour de France route a week ahead of the race, and also created Rapha Travel’s Cent Cols Challenge (CCC) in 2009. To mark his 60^th birthday, he plotted a route from Bastia in France to Bilbao in Spain comprising the ten CCCs taking place in 2017.

Deeker’s efforts saw him ride the roads of the Appennini, Dolomites, Vosges, Black Forest, Jura, Alps, Cévennes, Massif Central, Pyrenees and Northern Spain, averaging 200km and 5,000m of climbing every day.

He scaled the 1,000th climb in Cantabrico on Wednesday, October 4.

“I wanted to go on a very long bike ride in the mountains to mark the end of the first chapter of the CCC story,” said Deeker. “My passion for sharing the experience of riding dawn to dusk in the mountains remains as strong as ever.”

In 2007, Deeker set himself the challenge of riding 300 cols in France in the space of 30 days. He did it in 28, raising £10,000 for charity.

His efforts this time around have so far raised £25,000 and you can donate via his Virgin Money Giving page. Money will go to the London BMX project.

So that’s what you do for your 60^th and last month we reported on a Lithuanian man who had celebrated his 40th by cycling triple the elevation of Everest.

What sort of a ride have you got planned for your next birthday?