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Last month our Accounts Senior, Jaimi Wilson took on the epic Transibérica ultra race, an unsupported, one-stage road cycling race across the Iberian Peninsula in Spain.

As a rider, Jaimi had to plot and follow her own route to reach the 10 mandatory checkpoints.  The race started and ended in the city of Bilbao and included some of the most diverse and challenging routes on the Iberian Peninsula.  Jaimi’s route totalled over 3,600 km with over 45,000 metres of climbing.  This is over 5 times the height of Everest!  Jaimi’s finish time was an astonishing 11 days, 16 hours and 22 minutes, finishing as second female and ninth overall.

We were super excited to catch up with Jaimi and hear, in her own words, about her incredible adventure.

Jaimi’s Adventure

‘I arrived in Bilbao a week before the race, in order to acclimatise and enjoy some time in the area before the ultra race began.  Temperatures were expected to exceed 40 degrees in some places, so this time was critical.

We started at 9pm, just on sunset from the Guggenheim museum with a 4km neutralised start and a police escort to ensure a safe passage through the busiest part of the city.  I was filled with a mixture of nerves and excitement as we made our way through the city with the fading noise of cheers and air horns, not knowing what highs and lows lay ahead for myself and my fellow riders, how long we would be out on the road for or even whether we would make it to the finish line.

I love the excitement and the energy at the start of a race like this and after the 4km neutralised start it was fun to see all the other cyclists darting off in different directions as they began to follow their own routes towards the first checkpoints.  A couple of hours after leaving the city and well into the mountains, the night was silent. Although I knew riders would be all around me, I saw no one and the clear night sky treated me to tens if not hundreds of shooting stars.  By sunrise I was closing in on checkpoint one, as I made my way through the beautiful, dramatic landscape of the Cañón del Río Lobos Natural Park towards the checkpoint at the Hermitage of San Bartolome.

A few kilometres after the first checkpoint, I came close to being bitten by two aggressive sheep dogs to the dismay of the farmer, who came running down the road waving his stick and hurling rocks towards the two dogs!  Luckily, I’m used to upsetting dogs and I was quick to react, hopping off the bike and positioning it between myself and the two dogs.  The heat started cranking up as I pedalled on towards the Pyrenees on a mixture of beautiful backroads and some boring, busy and long national roads.  I had calculated that I would be burning between 6,000 and 8,000 calories per day, so food and water is imperative to any ultra distance race but being Vegan in Spain does not help matters.  I survived primarily on a diet of fruit, nuts, crisps, biscuits and bread, only managing to have three hot meals the entire race.

As nightfall began to fall on the second night, the smaller roads and beautiful scenery of the Pyrenees lay ahead of me as I made my way to the French border.  I had cycled 485 km in the first 24 hours and was quite happy with my progress.  The competitive side of me was tempted to ride through the second night but I knew this would be a bad idea further down the line.  I reminded myself of the plan I had made to sleep for 2-4 hours each night after riding through the first night.

As I passed through a small village around midnight, a group of guys outside a bar called me over to say that other cyclists in the race had taken a rest in the back of the bar.  I thought it would be a good idea to do the same and unpacked my matt and sleeping bag and had two hours sleep before continuing my way towards checkpoint two.  Passing over the Pyrenees mountains into France, with some spectacular scenery, was a real booster to the morning.  However, as the day went on, it really began heating up and I was struggling under the heat of the sun as I made my way towards the Tourmalet (a famous mountain pass over 2,200 metres featured on many a tour de France).

This was such a stark contrast from the 35 degree heat in the bottom of the valley before the climb, to reaching the summit at sunset in a band of cloud and fog, soaking wet at 6 degrees, made for a very chilly 15km descent.  I made the decision to take a hotel that night.  With nothing being open in France after 10pm it meant I had to cycle 160 km over the Spanish border to the first town.  Thankfully, the town happened to have a 24 hour reception.  Arriving at 5:30am was worth it to take a shower, charge my electronics and to collapse into bed, setting an alarm allowing for 3 hours sleep.

The next day was beautiful riding through the Pyrenees and I had a lot of fun through the idyllic landscapes.  I saw a couple of other riders as we made our way along the dead end road to the third checkpoint of the source of the river Cuervo.  This day I also had a couple of dotwatchers (people that follow the race online, following the reports and trackers of the competitors) cheering me on which does wonders for the spirit and motivation!

After reaching the third checkpoint and making my way South West along the route, I got a couple of hours sleep on the outskirts of a small village.  In the early hours of the morning, fatigue began to catch up with me and day 5 was a tough day.  Feeling tired, suffering in the heat, aches and pains starting to mount up, saddle sores and general discomfort plus back pain, by the end of day 5 I decided to stop early, get a hot meal, and take a hotel for a good rest.  I set my alarm for what I thought was 4 hours sleep, only to wake up almost 10 hours later.  I winced looking at the tracker, knowing that when I went to bed, I was 50 km behind the first female and I was now 220 km behind!

A bit of a disaster but, surprisingly, that next day of riding was one of my favourite days, I felt strong on the bike, most of my aches and pains had eased and my mood had been hugely lifted.  The next few checkpoints became a blur as I no longer saw any other competitors and very little of the media crew.  I continued having an amazing time pedalling through such diverse and spectacular landscapes Spain had to offer, the highlight being the arrival at the cathedral in Santiago de Compostella, the holy site at which thousands of pilgrims make the 700 kmhike across Spain.  The whole square was filled with emotion and it was a really nice highlight to glimpse the end of the journey of many pilgrims who had been hiking across Spain on their own personal pilgrimages for over a month.

After Santiago the heat resided, and the nights actually came in pretty cold.  I had experienced temperatures from 38 degrees down to 4 and that variability makes it difficult to prepare and pack for but is also a challenge of the race.  I had made a few mistakes along the way with routing choices and had some problems keeping my electronics charged which had cost me time and I began to worry I was not going to make the ferry back to the UK.  On the penultimate day I calculated I had around 300 km to go and was hopeful I should arrive by early morning, giving me enough time to make the bus to the ferry port in Santander.

The ultra race had different plans and a few obstacles were thrown my way to deter me.  After having more GPS problems, I headed into the final sunset, planning on riding through the night to reach Bilbao.  Within a couple of hours, a pretty impressive electrical storm appeared in the distance and I really enjoyed watching it from afar, except it didn’t stay afar and the wind picked up immensely and a downpour of heavy rain soaked me to the skin.  I could barely stay riding straight on the road and the lightening grew closer and closer until it struck a telegraph pole only a few metres away from me.  Lighting up the sky around me and sending sparks across the road.  At this point I was starting to think it really wasn’t a good idea to continue pedalling and luckily, I found a bus shelter and took refuge for almost 3 hours until the storm had passed.

Continuing, I began to feel tired around 4am and had to stop multiple times and cat nap on the side of the road, which in hindsight maybe wasn’t the most sensible of ideas!

Feeling the pressure of making the ferry I really cranked up the pace after sunrise, realising I may not reach Bilbao until lunchtime.  The final checkpoint was at the peak of a mountain pass and as I climbed into the cloud the rain grew heavier and heavier.  At the checkpoint the downpour was so heavy I couldn’t use my phone to load the next segment of the route so thought I would just continue down the mountain and load the next file under some shelter.  When I finally found some shelter, I realised I had ridden almost 10km and lost 2,500 feet of elevation in the wrong direction.  It took me over an hour to climb back up to the checkpoint and continue in the right direction to Bilbao.

I pushed on hard in a state of tiredness and anxiousness about making it to the finish on time and had one last mishap before finally reaching the finish line.  Feeling exhausted on a long and very warm descent I nodded off for a split second and ended up veering into the rough verge of the road. Fortunately, I had slowed down quite a bit before hitting the tarmac, minimising the damage to a couple of cuts and bruises and some torn kit!

I eventually arrived at the finish line in Bilbao to a nice warm welcome from the other 8 riders in front of me and the media crew.  I was hustled straight into a car and given a lift to Santander where I made the ferry by the skin of my teeth.  A hectic end to an amazing time racing around one of my favourite countries. An absolute pleasure.’