Sofiane’s World Record Attempt: a True Adventure

When Sofiane Sehili set out from the southern tip of Portugal 44 days ago, he knew that trying to ride all the way across Europe and Asia in record time would be an adventure. That was part of the appeal. As Sofiane put it: “This route starts in the familiar—Europe—and moves into the unknown. Heading into Slavic cultures, then Turkic, then Muslim cultures… and then the great emptiness of Central Asia. Kazakhstan, Mongolia… these are places that are truly foreign to me. I like not fully understanding what’s happening around me.”

In today’s connected world, where a hotel room at the end of the earth seems just a few clicks away, it’s easy to forget that traveling across continents is still an adventure.

Following Sofiane’s adventures, I’ve been thinking about the stories I heard from René Herse’s customers, who traveled all over Europe and beyond in the 1930s and 40s. Back then, crossing a border could take an entire day. Madame Porthault told me how they had to hide their foreign currency inside their tires, and retrieve the bills after crossing the border.

For a few decades, it looked like progress was inevitable, that borders were opening, that the world was becoming smaller. Lately, it seems that this trend has been reversing.

Already before he started, Sofiane had to re-route, as war broke out between Israel and Iran. More recently, he found himself stuck on the border between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Bicycles were not allowed to cross the border. Sofiane back-tracked to the next city, Beynew, figured a way to get on a train across the border (despite all seats being booked far in advance), crossed into Uzbekistan, then rode back to the border to pick up his route where he had left it.

That wasn’t the end of his woes. Heading into China, he found out that there is a 10-kilometer-wide No Man’s Land between Tajikistan and China. And bicycles are not allowed in that zone. So he’s detouring deep into the Himalayas, on the Pamir Highway. Climbing the second-highest paved road in the world is not conducive to fast average speeds… and ‘paved’ is relative in the Himalayas.

All the while, the green dot of the current record holder marches on. Speaking of which: The tracker does not show Jonas Deichmann’s actual route, just the distance he had traveled at this point. When Sofiane changes his route, Jonas’ green dot magically moves onto Sofiane’s new route. So while Sofiane has ridden more kilometers than Jonas by this stage of their rides, Jonas was able to use a more direct route back in 2017, and his final distance was much shorter than Sofiane’s will be.

Sofiane started the ride on a new set of 700×38 Barlow Pass Endurance tires. He was planning to replace his tires at the half-way point, but the package his partner sent to a hotel along the way never arrived. That means he’s got more than 12,000 hard kilometers (7,500 miles) on his tires. That’s far beyond their normal service life, and the roads in the Himalayas are rough and wear out tires fast. So in addition to the problems of crossing borders, Sofiane has been battling flats on his worn-out tires.

What’s so impressive to me is that Sofiane is doing this record attempt completely unsupported. There’s no support car carrying his luggage, no media crew, nobody to book accommodations for him, nobody to overhaul his bike… it’s just Sofiane, all by himself.

But that doesn’t mean Sofiane is without friends. Hearing about his worn-out tires—and the difficulty of finding quality tires in these remote places, much less his preferred Rene Herse rubber—we’re going to get him replacements as soon as possible. Sending a set of tires to China isn’t as easy as sticking a FedEx label onto a box. Parcels need to clear customs, and that’s not something you can easily do unless you know the process and language. So we looked at alternative ways to get Sofiane his much-needed tires.

My first call for all things related to China goes to David Wang, who runs Brook & Breeze there, a company that makes porteur-style chromoly bikes for dogs and their humans. As luck would have it, one of David’s employees is in the U.S. right now, and returning to China this week. We’ve overnighted Sofiane’s tires to her, and she’ll carry them in her luggage and then dispatch them to wherever Sofiane finds himself early next week.

Speaking of friends, literally thousands of cyclists are following Sofiane’s tracker and his updates on Instagram. It may be hard for him to feel it when things aren’t going according to plan, but there’s a huge amount of goodwill from all over the globe. We’re all thinking of Sofiane as he tackles all these obstacles, one by one. This adventure is proving to be a bit more than even he expected, but if there’s anybody who can deal with the unforeseen, it’s him. Good luck, my friend!

Follow Sofiane’s journey:

• Sofiane’s tracker
• Check his Instagram for updates.