Image: ©7Cycling
2016 is over and everyone, including myself, is busy preparing for the start of the 2017 season. Before it begins, I wanted to write a brief recap of last season by the numbers.
In 365 days, I rode my bike 33,898 kilometers, which isn't quite around the world but it is an average of 92.9km per day. I only drove around 5,000 km in my car, so I definitely saved on petrol.
During the year, I had a total of 43 days off the bike and most of those were due to travel. For the days that I did ride, I averaged 105.3km per day.
I rode 1,058 hours with an average speed of 32.0 kph. That's 3 hours and 17 minutes for every day that I rode. My wife worked 1,520 hours last year, so she wins the 'who worked harder' bet.
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During the year, I summited the equivalent of Mount Everest 37.3 times with 330,317 meters of elevation gain. For those Australians reading, that's 148 times up Mt Kosciusko.
My favourite statistic of 2016 is the fact I burned 725,000 calories while riding my bike. That's the equivalent of 1,287 Big Macs. Or around 340 large pizzas. Or around 1,900 slices of cheesecake. Or 4,531 KFC drumsticks. Or around 679 liters of ice cream. Or around 6,600 bananas...
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During the year, I took 73 flights and numerous trains and buses. Despite all those flights, I have yet to earn any frequent flyer status that gets me any useful benefits.
In 2016, I spent only a quarter of the year in Australia: 97 days in my home country. While racing and training, I spent over half of the year sleeping in strange beds with 202 nights in hotels. This didn’t even include the nights I spent away visiting family or friends!
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As a result of all this travel, I rode my bike in 18 different countries in Australia, Europe, Asia and North and South America. I went as far north as Norway and as far south as Melbourne, Australia.
In those 18 countries, I did 81 UCI race days composed of nine one-day races and 14 stage races. I also had five training camps during the year in five different countries.
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So that's 2016 in a nutshell. I got to see a lot of places and have many memorable experiences. In two days, I board my first flight for 2017 as everyone from Team Novo Nordisk heads to Spain for the first training camp of the year. Time to start burning off all that holiday ice cream!
Chris Williams rides for Team Novo Nordisk - the world's first all-diabetes professional cycling team
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