The last time Alexandar Richardson made the news round here, it was because he had been violently robbed of his bike in Richmond Park... this time he ensured no thief would be able to catch him by riding from London to Brighton and back in a little over four hours, at a phenomenal average speed of 39/5km/h (24.54mph).
> What can be done about the latest spate of bikejackings? Episode 9 of the road.cc Podcast
For most of us London to Brighton is enough (this journey even has its own very popular sportive) but for the Alpecin-Fenix man it was straight back to London again with the total elapsed time on his Strava file revealing that he only paused his Garmin for ten minutes during the whole ride; that could well have just been the time waiting for lights, so it's unlikely he stopped for a quick lunch.
In the comments, Alexandar confirmed that the ride was solo and definitely not motor paced; in the past some pros have had their suspiciously fast rides (even for pros) flagged by Strava sleuths who suspect motor pacing. He added: "…this ride was not motor paced nor with other riders and was on a road bike in a conventional position. You’ll have to work the rest out yourself ! Happy riding"
He also says that his power averaged 303 watts, with a normalised power of 332 watts. Ready to claim your free meal? See you back in London in four and a bit hours!
We're guessing that Mr Boardman has influenced this result somewhat, as data released by Strava Metro has found that Manchester records the most cycling commuters per capita in the UK.
While Londoners are most likely to record their commuting data in Europe and have far more cycle commuters overall, it's Manchester where there are the most compared to the general population with 400,000 cycling commutes recorded this year already. Strava reckons that the next-most popular cycling cities in order are Bristol, Newcastle, London and Cardiff.
Strava estimates that in Britain, 13,000 carbon tons were saved by cycling commuters, which is a carbon offsetting equivalent to planting 650,000 trees, or to taking 6,500 cars off the road for a year.
The data also generated heatmaps to show the most popular areas for cycling. In Manchester, those were Oxford Road, Manchester Road and the Bridgewater Canal.
Chris Boardman, who is course the Transport Commissioner for Greater Manchester, commented: “It’s fantastic to see Greater Manchester leading the way on the number of commuters who chose to travel by bike and that’s before we have wide scale provision of connected routes. It’s no coincidence that the current number one route is Oxford Road which is where we have quality, segregated lanes in place. The appetite is clearly there to ride when it feels safe.
As we roll out the UK’s largest cycling and walking network, we’ll be enabling even more people to leave the car at home and get to schools, shops and workplaces under their own steam. I’m looking forward to seeing the numbers rocket.”