How to make a 1280km bike ride seem easy

Ron Skelton completed the 5000km Race Across America around 12 hours inside the 12-day deadline. Photo / Getty Images

Hatepe Hill. The name sends a quiver of fear through the heart of any rookie cyclist preparing for Saturday's Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge. It's long - about 2km - and steep and lurks three-quarters of the way around the 160km anti-clockwise course. For the average rider, it's daunting and climbing it eight times is virtually unfathomable. But for crusty old campaigner Ron Skelton, it's... "easy!"

His enthusiasm probably needs some context. Skelton (53) finished third in last year's eight-lap Extreme Enduro event, clocking 68h 27m 14s for the 1280km and surviving on just 40 minutes' sleep over the three days.

But, really that was a pedal in the park compared to what lay in store for him seven months later. Skelton's performance at Taupo earned him a spot in the legendary Race Across America (RAAM) and, rather than let the opportunity slip by, he mortgaged his house in the West Auckland suburb of Massey and gave it a crack.

If you want a taste of RAAM, search out Bicycle Dreams on the internet. It's an award winning movie based on the annual 5000km trek from Oceanside, California, to the Annapolis naval academy in Maryland.

Traversing Death Valley (oppressively hot), the Rocky (high and freezing) and Appalachian (steep) Mountains, and the plains (windy) between, this isn't like the Tour de France, where you get to sleep in comfort each nightand start again the next morning.

RAAM competitors have 12 days to complete the course and the clock keeps ticking whether their eyes are open or not. In June, Skelton and Wellingtonian Josh Kench became the first Kiwis to attempt the race singlehanded as opposed to a team (relay) campaign.

Kench, who had won the Taupo Extreme Enduro, placed 10th overall in just over 10 days, while Skelton and his Team iRONman arrived at the finish in 11 days, 13 hours, 37 minutes. So, you see, anything less doesn't really hold the mystique it used to. "Now I've done RAAM,eight laps of the lake isn't really much," reflects Skelton. "It doesn't even get you to the foot of the Rockies. I feel I can race that distance now - I can compete instead of just complete, if you like. "RAAM has changed my perspective on what's achievable and I'd put that message out there to others. If a short, slightly overweight truck driver can do it, so can you."

To be fair, Skelton's credentials are more impressive than he makes out. He's now finished 24 NZ Ironman races and some of those were achieved under considerable duress. One year, he took part still recovering from a bout of malaria he'd picked up while on army duty in Timor. In another, a leg injury forced him to walk the entire 42.2km marathon leg.

"Some of the experience and values that are instilled in the defence force have served me well in my ultra-distance racing," says Skelton. "Discipline, mental discipline, self-discipline . . . you've got to maintain that discipline all the time and not go too fast. You know there will be highs and lows but you try to level them out. With experience, if you're feeling bad, you know to just hang in there for 30-40 minutes and you should be right.

"Durability is probably mystrength. I'm not fast but I'm suited to this type of event." Bicycle Dreams inspired Skelton to enter RAAM but also gave him plenty to think about as he prepared. It showed competitors pushing themselves to the very limit and often beyond, resulting in severe sleep deprivation, hallucinations, physical collapse and even death. More humans have flown into outer space than finished RAAM and while space travel may have had a 20-year head start, the race still has a completion rate of barely 50 per cent. Three-time winner Wolfgang Fasching of Austria has also climbed Mt Everest and claims the world's highest mountain is more dangerous but RAAM is physically, mentally and emotionally harder to do.

This year, Team iRONman was a comparatively lowbudget enterprise, short on race experience and specialist expertise. Other support vehicles were plastered with sponsor logos and ferried crews of up to 12 that included doctors, psychologists, dieticians and massage therapists.

Their rivals didn't have Kiwi ingenuity on their side, though. Skelton's band of five barely knew each other before assembled in Los Angeles, but simply got along and got it done, while others around them struggled and fell. "The only way we could have had a better team was to find a better rider," he quips. "Everyone had their moment and I was grateful they were there - a rider simply can't do RAAM without a good crew."

After lapping Taupo on a diet of mainly baked potatoes, Skelton experimented with a specially designed endurance fuel, supplementing it with Subwayrolls, hashbrowns, fruit and Vegemite sandwiches.

He banked on sleeping two hours a day and probably averaged a little more than that, usually in the afternoon to escape the summer heat. "I did nod off a couple of times on the bike but stayed upright and woke up quickly. The hallucinations were more like optical illusions really.

At night, cracks in the road appeared to have different shapes and forms. Some looked taller than they were, and you'd be slowing down and braking. Sometimes things would take the appearance of being faces."

Hoping to cover about 400km a day, Skelton was wary of burning up too much energy in the deserts, where temperatures hovered around 45 degrees Celsius in daylight. He started conservatively and this caused some concern among race officials, who worried he might not reach Durango, Colorado, within the first elimination deadline.

Slightly annoyed at their lack of faith, he lifted his pace, arrived with three hours to spare and never looked back. RAAM's highest point - Wolf Creek Pass (3310m) - is about 500m higher than Mt Ruapehu. Just as testing as the climb were the freezing temperatures on the long descent down the other side.

Days later, Skelton got really lucky when an overnight head wind swung round behind and blew him 600km across Kansas in 24 hours. That put him half a day ahead of schedule and he ultimately finished half a day inside the deadline.

Over the final kilometres, the Appalachians slowed him to a walk but, after dicing with Swiss Karl Haller the entire way, Skelton still found enough energy in the tank to outsprint the tall policeman through the streets of Annapolis.

There were a few nervous moments along the way but he arrived at the finish line feeling pretty chuffed with himself. "If weather conditions had been worse, I mightn't have achieved it or I might have had to work a lot harder on less sleep to make it. But I felt really fulfilled. I made the cut-off time and had no real dark moments - it went pretty much how I planned."

Five months later, Kench hasn't bounced back sufficiently to defend his Lake Taupo crown but Skelton is fizzing and already considering a return to RAAM.

"A month ago, I was still getting the feeling back in my fingers but now I'm right as rain and fully recovered." He hopes more Kiwis will also take on the world's toughest cycle race. The Taupo Extreme Enduro, starting on Wednesday, is their chance to qualify.

They'll need to finish in under 76 hours and Skelton suggests they pace themselves accordingly. "At all times, stay within your comfort zone and don't be tempted to go outside it, even for short periods. You should be going about 75 per cent effort. Once you go beyond that, you'll have trouble recovering. "And keep something in reserve for that last lap."