First American Over 600mi in 24 Hours—Bike Sebring 2026
Woah! If you had told me 5 years ago I would be first in the world to do something athletic… I don’t know what I would have said, but it wouldn’t have been, “sounds right.” Much less a 24-hour athletic event. Sure, athletic abilities were there as a teen, but I had never done anything like it. Not to mention, I was 270+ pounds, not my normal 170-180 racing weight.
This is a summary of my 2026 Bike Sebring 24 hour race, one year after a breakout 576 mi American best at the same race in my first year of ultra cycling racing. Also described here is the use of a Cruzbike V20c recumbent bicycle.
What in the recumbent bicycle is happening here?
In the fall of 2025 I was already dreaming of a big Sebring 2026 performance. I wanted to go back on my upright and destroy my distance from last year. Faster bike, faster legs, and a mountain of experience to pull from.
The universe had a different idea.
No, I didn’t get hurt and have to ride differently. The owners of Cruzbike approached me in late Summer and asked if I had ever thought about racing recumbent bicycles. My immediate answer was no. But, life had taught me to value curiosity, so I asked them to tell me why they asked. Plus, two of my crew members from Race Across the West ride Cruzbike’s and love them.
They spoke of the benefits and the drawbacks. They described the learning curve and stigma. I did my own research and talked it over with other Cruzbike riders. I was surprised to learn that many were not forced to ride the recumbent bike and did not go back to uprights after the switch.
So, I thought if they wanted to support me giving it a try, why not?
I lost some skin. Literally skidding to a stop on the thing from 29 mph after a wobbly turn. But, my stubborn attitude knows almost no bounds when I want to use it.
After some terrifying learning and perfecting the fit, I was more comfortable after my winter training sessions that included with record breaking rides in December and January. Having added 18 world records on the recumbent, I fully committed to doing Sebring on the Cruzbike.
Prep
Sebring, Florida in February is not scorching but it’s hot enough and humid. Heat training was a massive part of my preparation.
Gut training to eat 130-160g of carbs an hour was also on the agenda. This was a skill built up over time.
Training indoors to build up fitness in a new position was painful. Similar to getting on a TT bike, new muscle recruitment means new conditioning.
Anyone who tells you it’s inherently easy to go fast on a recumbent doesn’t know what they are talking about. Everything worth it in life is hard work. No wonder Cruzbike had not found someone to demonstrate the abilities of their bike. It wasn’t like, hop on it and beat everyone. It was a tedious process of failure and adapting.
Vandoit
In the Fall of 2025, my wife and I made my race schedule for 2026 and as would be even more apparent by January, we realized racing would be our life.
We reached out to Vandoit and described our position. With similar goals and attitudes about life, the partnership formed easily and we picked up our self-branded van in November.
We are so grateful for this partnership. It means quality family time and freedom while racing all year long.
If you are ever interested in an adventure van please let us know.
Travel
This was our plan: Travel for a week, be at the race for a few days, and travel home for another week. Easy right?
Think again.
Two children, five bikes, and all the needed equipment for racing and living. This was our first real test of van life.
It was hard but so worth it.
Our kids played at the beach. Our kids learned about manatees, I didn’t even know those were an animal, haha.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s hard to be that close for that long and long drives with young children can be very challenging. But, everyone settled in after a few days.
With a MAJOR life stress two days before leaving, I was a mess. Honestly it felt like the world was collapsing for the first two to three days on the road.
But we made it and really enjoyed the second half of the travel to Florida.
Days Before
I biked every day along the way. Taking strava KOMs every day, of course (sorry all locals, I know I’m a menace). As we got to Florida the taper really started. By the time we arrived to Sebring early Thursday, I had two test days and all the prep with Bailey to get things ready.
Remember, I’m not a master of this bike yet. I had never done a bottle hand off and was prepared to do all on-bike nutrition and stop for hydration bladders as needed. But we practiced some bottle hand offs, and as my recumbent handling skills had been dramatically improving—Boom, handoffs were a solid go.
The prep for this is nuts. In order to cycle 24 hours at the pace I aim for, we have to have 15-20k calories of food ready and 24L of water. Not to mention any gear I might need.
I would shortly learn some of my prep was not enough.
Nothing new on race day
Having just learned to handle the bike efficiently, it’s fair to say I have not dialed in my aerodynamics on the bike.
John Crawford, a Cruzbike master and good friend, decided to tell me about a position change to save watts the day before the race. He hadn’t tested it until the day before and to his credit, wasn’t going to tell me. But it was too good to not say anything.
My brain automatically filed it in “crap I won’t try on race day.” I had learned the hard way to keep everything the same for race day.
But the part of me that wants to eek everything out of myself wouldn’t let it go and I silently decided to at least try it.
For the first time during the race. Stupid.
Or was it?
Your body is most of the aero drag
To be recognized and have “fans” is bizarre to me. This hasn’t been my life. It’s something I have found by happy chance in the last three years.
To have people excited to meet me, taking pictures with me, and saying thanks for the inspiration was wild.
If you ever want to say hello, do it. I promise, I’m just a normal guy, very down to earth.
So the start line was especially wild. Everyone sort of knew what was going to happen and was extremely respectful while saying hi and also locking in on their own race.
As I rolled out of the start I moved in front of everyone in the first tenths of a mile. By the first half lap or 1.5 miles I was well in the clear and moving along smoothly. Everything looks amazing. Power and heart rate were as good as they get. Doing 270-280 watts at 130-140 bpm. It was looking like an incredible day.
After getting settled I decided to try the arm position change. Might as well mess everything up the first lap or two, right?
I was absolutely blown away. I watched my speed immediately climb and felt the air move over and around my body completely differently. I’m not taking 0.00005 mph or some placebo effect. I’m taking 0.5-1 mph faster. What?!
I tested several more times and it was the same every time. I weighed the consequences and decided WTF, you never know until you try.
In the end this worked out great, although my forearms were more sore than they have ever been.
Foot challenges
The real challenge wasn’t going to be my dumb new tactic on race day. It was going to be an old friend that I thought had been tamed over hours and hours of testing and change.
My feet are a challenge. What size shoe you ask? A completely normal 49 double wide.
I had moved my cleats many times. I had tried different insoles. In fact, my first 1.5 years of cycling I had holes cut in the side of my shoes to facilitate my forefoot width.
The recumbent presented similar to issues before and I began to try familiar solutions. Eventually coming to a midfoot solution that seemed to work in January. The problem with January’s test is that it was a mess. The worst I ever felt during a challenge.
So any foot and leg issues were chalked up to the many other troubles of the training day.
I started to realize at hour 3 that my feet were not comfortable. During my planned 6 hour stop, we switched insoles to see if it would help. I had fully realized by then—this was hurting me. I had already slowed slightly and not for any physiological reason other than foot pain.
During hours 6-10 my body began to compensate for the arch tightness and pain began to develop in my knee. Not good. What could I do?
I always have spare shoes ready. Even at my first ultra I had a spare set of shoes with cleats ready to go. So, it should be an easy fix.
Nope, I’m an idiot. And not even for doing a completely new position on race day. For not having my spare shoes set up.
At least the were in the van, but they didn’t have the right cleats on them. And while going 27 mph and texting my wife about the issue, she learned I didn’t bring the right spare cleats.
No way I could have a good performance in this situation.
No worries, I brought my bag of bike parts. The pedals for the cleats on my spare shoes were there. Phew.
Nope. Complete stupidity. Both the right spare cleats and spare pedals for the cleats on my spare shoes were later found on the table in my bike room upon getting home.
Last shot. I needed them to find different pedals and the cleats for them. Tell them where to put my cleats on the shoes and we would have to stop and switch pedals. Not ideal. But, my only solution as my knee was telling me bad things would come if I continued on.
Let me quickly break down my thought process. I could continue and push through any pain I wanted to. I have built my mind to not accept stop as an answer. BUT the consequence could mean injury that takes me off the bike for a time. Not acceptable.
I was to race again in 6 weeks. Not to mention the plan in March and April is to get as strong as possible for Unbound XL in May.
So my wife and crew came to the rescue.
Amanda Coker (record-breaking ultra cyclist and friend) took my instructions for cleat placement and executed flawlessly. Jim Parker (co-owner of Cruzbike) and team twisted my speedplay pedals off and attached my favero duo pedals.
Boom. We are back in business and probably in record time. My total time off the bike during the race was under 15 minutes. That’s incredible given the issues I faced (loose headlight not even described here).
Power meter accuracy was shot. But I felt better.
Atmosphere (camaraderie)
Bike Sebring was an old school ultra cyclist hotspot. My mentor and friend Chris Hopkinson had won three times there. Only three of his 50 raced and completed 24hrs. Marko Baloh and others had frequented the event over the years. Marek Rupinski was now a frequent rider going over 500 miles this year and last.
But, after Covid this race, like many, had hurt. Race organizers and community relationships dwindled.
In stepped Larry Oslund. Or I should say in stands Larry because he has been around the whole time.
He has saved these races. And now Bike Sebring is once again a hotspot of ultra cycling excellence. After my 576 mile performance last year, many were inspired to do their best.
This makes the energy at this event incredible. Whether going for an overall record, age record, personal record, or moment best, everyone was so nice and supportive of each other.
My favorite part of the day was filming other racers on course and sending it to them afterwards. Many of these riders are like family to me now.
I’m honored to share space with others pushing their limits. Great work to all in attendance. Especially the amazing crew of each supported racer.
Half Done and A Lifetime To Go
Okay. In 2025, I died the during the second half of this race. Died a million deaths type of dying. I simply forced myself to continue.
I wasn’t expecting a miracle, I wasn’t expecting to feel good. It’s still 12 hours in with 12 hours to go. But after my 2025 races, I had learned how to have a good second half. A strong second half.
With high hopes and more experience, I completely smashed that plan to pieces.
My foot issue was resolved for one hour post shoe change. I rolled into hour 13 realizing the 11.5 hours on a slightly off setup had taken a toll.
My knee was hurt. My foot wasn’t much better. I was still in operation and actually still on pace for my 1000km goal.
Oh yeah. Only one rider has gone over 1000km in 24 hours on a non-faired bicycle. Christoph Strasser is an idol of mine. Champion of champions.
But, my goal was to get near his distance at this race. It was a tall order at sea level and on a non-perfected setup without full conditioning time. But, I was up on pace the first half and all I had to do was hold on the second half.
Even with my knee pain, I reduced my effort to a sustainable level and planned to send it home somewhere over 1000km.
Fueling was good, crew was amazing, the handoffs were perfect. A dropped bottle or two, but not bad. And, the tomfoolery of a new position was actually paying off.
All good, right? Cue the drama and reality of future aspirations.
When Do I Stop
It would eventually get bad enough that I was convincing myself just to get over 500 miles. Which sounds ridiculous because the 500 mile club is limited and highly prestigious. But, the thought of pedaling for another 10 hours felt unreachable. Mostly because I was starting to realize I couldn’t do this pace to the end and that was the goal.
Here’s the thing. If you don’t make your goal, do you throw away everything? If you aimed to make $100,000 and realize you can only make $98,500, do you give up at $80,000 just because you’ll miss your original goal? That’s ridiculous. Play it out.
Now for real talk time. Every time you quit, it’s easier to quit again. Every incomplete workout. Every missed rep. Every race you call-it-a-day early.
You shoot your future self in the foot.
So, a part of me knew quitting wasn’t on the table.
The “Goggins” part of me said, “Then we are pushing through this pain. Who’s gonna carry the boats b****?”
I learned two main things from David Goggins:
I can always do more than I think I can.
You can hurt yourself doing so.
As I hit hour 15 and 16, I wrestled the ideas. Do two more hours and call it a day at 500mi. No, that didn’t feel right.
Push through the pain and go over 1,000km like you said you would. No, you’ll be hurt for the future and rob yourself of the coming months.
Can’t quit. Can’t win.
So, what’s left?
Redefine winning. Set your own terms. Do your best.
Okay. I can do 500mi without hurting myself let’s get there and see how close I am to 1000km pace. There is still plenty of time left, and you’re holding together okay. Let’s get to 560mi. That should win you the race. In the back of my mind, I instantly knew 560 is too close to my PB of 576mi to stop. But my mind can only handle one goal at a time. 4 hours more still sounds too long.
I’m over 560mi and I already knew I was going to 577mi. That’s it. That’s the win, a new record for Sebring, America, and any Cruzbike. That’s a damn good day. You can be done then.
But, when you hit 577mi there’s 1.5 hours left. That’s 90 minutes. You couldn’t live with yourself stopping with time on the clock. You’re gonna have to pedal till 24hrs.
Here’s the thing about slowing down and not pushing through the pain. The body gets confused. I have trained it to perform at a certain level. 240+ watts was the name of the game and 255-260 was the real goal.
Now pedaling around 200 watts, my body was in shock. I could hear it sort it out. “We must be almost done.”
It was maybe as uncomfortable to go easier as it was to push through the pain of my knee and my foot. My typical 130-140 bpm hr during an event like this was sitting at 100 bpm.
My body was done in several ways now. Too smart to hurt myself and too unstimulated to work properly. This sucked.
I almost always feel like the last 1-2 hours of any ultra is easy. The amount of times I have done 2 hours of cycling tired and been fine is ridiculous. This was totally in the wheelhouse.
Nope, every pedal was a battle.
2nd Ever and 1st in a Race
Okay, so I still had to prove I was alive. My last three laps included my fastest lap time of the day.
I flew past my last full lap and slowed to easy spinning for a prorated last lap amount. I caught up to Kevin Liberacki and Marek Rupenski. I asked them how they did and celebrated their great performances. Another 500+ for Marek and a huge PB for Kevin also within 10 miles of 500. How cool!
I rolled the finish line for the final time. 165 laps. 25.5 mph. A world best 24hr race. The second person ever over 600 miles in 24 hours. A Cruzbike world best. And 612 miles fought tooth and nail. Not just physically but with sophistication and purpose. I couldn’t be more proud and I reveled in the moment with my wife, Bailey. My greatest supporter and my best friend. My kids cheered and my ultra family poured on the praise.
Aftermath
That’s insane. A world best 24hr race? No one to push me. Second place did 555.55 miles. Nothing to bat an eye at. Well into the prestigious 500 mile club and a 2nd best American performance. This put Jimmy Toner into a top echelon of 24hr racers.
But, this was 57 miles behind me. The only thing I had to push me was me. Ghosts in my head and alive in my conscious.
So, the body aftermath had to be bad, right?
My knee was swollen slightly for 2-3 days but no lasting injury. This compensation led to no foot injury.
My forearms were shot. My hands had a similar tiredness to them.
But what about other structural issues? After 24 hours people can’t walk because of the back and neck pain. Not to mention the shoulder and saddle pain.
Nope. Structurally I was 100% okay. I was as shocked as you are reading this. It’s not a gimmick, it’s a fact.
My leg muscles were hurt. But honestly I had performed at 80% of my goal. So, the muscles really weren’t as bad as I was ready for. Overall I was okay. And happy. Very happy. I could get back immediately to training. So it was a day or two of no biking and then back to it. Strava KOMs and all.
Travel home
We spent one whole day at the beach. Saw family in Albuquerque. Showed the boys the Navajo reservation. Visited Monument Valley in the daylight for the first time. It was sublime and Vandoit made it all possible. We traveled for 17 days and 16 nights. For 11 of those nights we slept in the van.
We saw animals we had never seen. We went to places we had never been. We went to State Parks. We played at the beach. We had family time. Amazing.
Thank You
I can’t possibly remember to thank everyone I should but here is a poor attempt.
Cruzbike: especially Maria and Jim Parker. Thanks for the confidence and support in all the ways.
Larry Oslund: thanks for the friendship, work on races, work on WUCA board, and so much more.
Kevin Liberacki: for your friendship and demonstration of grit.
John and Laura Crawford: for more acts of kindness to me and my family than I can name.
Amanda Coker: for race day support, friendship, peer support, and bringing the joy. Same goes to your dad, Ricky.
Marek Rupinski: for your friendship and peer inspiration.
Brian Courchesne: for a place to stay and friendship.
Susan Gryder: for the continued support even from afar.
The many viewers and follower on social. One video put out during the race had 500k views and is now over 1M a couple weeks later.
Thank you to YOU reading this. I hope it inspires you to go further and work harder.
