Lael Wilcox is known as one of the world's best ultra-endurance cyclists. She's ridden over 150,000 miles in more than 50 countries. Now, Lael is going after her wildest idea yet: to break the record for cycling around the world. Her goal is to ride more than 18,000 miles in 110 days.
Lael Wilcox is known as one of the world's best ultra-endurance cyclists. She's ridden over 150,000 miles in more than 50 countries. Now, Lael is going after her wildest idea yet: to break the record for cycling around the world. Her goal is to ride more than 18,000 miles in 110 days.
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Lael Wilcox:
That's, for me, why I started loving cycling is because of bike packing. You carry what you need, go long distances, and then it's so unpredictable. The bike's basically the tool to do this, and I think it grabs people from different sports or different ways of life because of the adventure of it.
You get to kind of cater it to your preferences. How far do you want to go? What kind of riding do you want to do? You start looking at maps, and seeing how you can connect places. There are a lot of skills involved, but it's also really dreamy.
Shelby Stanger:
Lael Wilcox is known as one of the world's best ultra-endurance cyclists. She's ridden over 150,000 miles in more than 50 countries. Lael doesn't just go the distance. She also competes in bike packing races. She's broken records crossing the US from north to south, and from west to east. On these rides, Lael carries all her own gear. She spends weeks at a time crossing plains and mountains, riding through intense heat and storms, and even encountering some impressive wildlife.
Now, Lael is going after her wildest idea yet: to break the record for cycling around the world. Her goal is to ride more than 18,000 miles in 110 days. I'm Shelby Stanger, and this is Wild Ideas Worth Living: an REI Co-op Studios Production, brought to you by Capital One. When Lael Wilcox was 28 years old, she borrowed her mom's bike and entered her first race. It was 400 miles long, and she finished second overall. She had never biked that far before race day.
Now, just nine years later, Lael has made a career out of racing and bike packing. She normally lives in Tucson, Arizona, but at the time of this interview, Lael was back where she grew up in Alaska, preparing for another long distance cycling event.
Lael, I just want to start. Thank you for coming to a studio in Anchorage Alaska to do this interview. It's nine o'clock in California, and sunny, and it's still pitch black dark where you are.
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah.
Shelby Stanger:
What is that like?
Lael Wilcox:
Alaska, it's got its own time zone. It's eight o'clock here, and the sun won't come up until 9:45. We're gaining daylight. I grew up here, but I just got up here three days ago, and it's such a shock and it's so cool. It's so snowy and beautiful, and so cold. It's like negative 12.
Shelby Stanger:
Whew. Oh, man, and I'm complaining about 59. That's amazing. What was it like to grow up in Alaska? Where do you live now?
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah, so now I live in Tucson, Arizona, which is a super common place.
Shelby Stanger:
That is like the most extreme opposite.
Lael Wilcox:
I know, but Alaskans are such snowbirds. They're like, "I want to go to the desert. I want to go to the sun." I think for me, it's because I grew up the darkness, and I like winter, but the darkness is tough. I'm up here for about five weeks, and it's refreshing, it's different. I've seen six moose biking since I've been home. It's so much fun.
Shelby Stanger:
Oh, that's so cool.
Lael Wilcox:
It was fun to grow up here in the summer. It's endless daylight, and it's so wild, even in the biggest city in the state.
Shelby Stanger:
I think I need to go to Alaska this year. You're selling me on it. What other sports did you play as a kid, or did you just gravitate towards biking?
Lael Wilcox:
No, not a bit. I loved sports as a kid. I started running when I was six, and I always wanted to go farther. I ran a 10K and I was like, "Yeah," I lost feeling in my legs and I was like, "This is so cool." Then I played basketball, and I played soccer, and I skied. I did everything I could just because I liked it, but I wasn't very good at them. I was fine, but if I had been better, I probably never would've biked.
Shelby Stanger:
It's funny how the world takes you on this path that leads you exactly where you're meant to be. How did you get into cycling? Was it like by necessity? I don't think of Alaska, I guess I do think of it as a big place that people do these grand bike rides, but I'm curious, why'd you pick that sport?
Lael Wilcox:
It wasn't when I was growing up. We learned how to ride bikes as kids, but I didn't really know it as a sport. It was like kind of you ride to see your friend, or to the store, or whatever, but I didn't really start riding until I was 20. Then that was, I was going to college in Tacoma, Washington, and I was working at a brewery. It was downtown Tacoma, I think four miles away, down a huge hill, and then back up the hill at the end of the shift. I borrowed a bike to ride to work.
I've never owned a car. I've never really driven. Then the bike was my first vehicle, and it was like, it's such a wild change. I was like, "Wow, this is so much faster than walking." I was riding to work and then all over town. Then my first big ride was riding to my sister's house in Seattle, and it was like 45, 50 miles. I was like, "I don't know if I can get there." I didn't even know people rode that far, and it was just the biggest deal to make it.
Then immediately during that ride, it clicked. I was like, "If I could ride to Seattle, I could ride across the country." This was probably like 2008. Then a few months later, that's what I was doing. I was like, "I think I'm so impulsive, I'm so kind of bitten by these ideas that I just have to do them." That totally changed my life.
Shelby Stanger:
You rode to your sister's house, you made it, and then what happened?
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah. Then I was like, "I want to do a ride across the country." I was like, "Okay, this is so cool. I won't know where I'm going to sleep, but I'll just carry a tent, and try to ride 50 miles a day, and figure it out." I didn't have any money. I think I worked for a few months, and then did my first trip down the East Coast from Montreal to Key West, Florida. This is so cool. I'd never been to any of those states. I was always in the west. I learned a lot.
I was like, "Where can you camp for free?" I didn't want to spend any money. I didn't have any. Then I'm like, "What do you eat along the way? What do you actually need?" It was kind of scary, but then it's a pretty fast learning curve. I ended up in Florida in November, and I was out of money and as far south as I could go, so I got a job as a petty cab driver, like the bicycle taxi. That's actually when I got my license, because you have to have a driver's license to be a bike taxi driver.
Shelby Stanger:
That's funny.
Lael Wilcox:
I practiced for one hour and then took the test, and then when I passed, I was like, "I'm never driving again."
Shelby Stanger:
You don't drive?
Lael Wilcox:
No, it's terrifying. It's like, I'm behind the steering wheel and I immediately break out in a sweat.
Shelby Stanger:
You don't drive, but you'll ride your bike in Alaska past bears and moose, and in the middle of nowhere, and camp where there is no one.
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah, but isn't there something alluring to that? You're like, "I want to see those animals." I can't believe they still exist.
Shelby Stanger:
That first cross country bike trip was in 2008, and after that, Lael did everything she could to continue bike packing. She worked half the year in restaurants and bike shops, and the other half she spent riding around North America, Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. For Lael, bike packing was the top priority in her life. After seven years of ultra cycling for fun, she started racing. Talk to me a little bit about bike packing and what hooked you in.
Lael Wilcox:
I think that's, for me, why I started loving cycling is because of bike packing. You carry what you need, you go long distances, and then it's so unpredictable. There are a lot of skills involved, but it's also really dreamy, to experience nature like that, to spend that time outside, and then also feel like you're going somewhere. The bike's an easy way to carry stuff versus putting it in a pack on your back, and you can make better distance in the days, and kind of mix it up between trails, and roads, and all of that.
Shelby Stanger:
Any stories about bike packing, those early days, that really stand out that you could tell us about?
Lael Wilcox:
I remember one ride, I started with pants and a T-shirt, and then I get cold, so then I go to the gas station, buy a sweatshirt. I was like, "This is what I want to do. I want to go with nothing, and just see what happens." Then that kind of sank its teeth into me. I later that summer did my first race on my mom's bike. It was like a 400-mile race. There was a cutoff time of 32 hours, and I was like, "I don't even know if I can finish."
Then just that was enough to excite me to try. I was going into something where you really don't know if you can possibly do it. I was like, "That's so cool. Then if I don't, who cares?" Then I finished in 27 hours, and I was like, "I'm not even that tired. I feel fine." I think that's when I really realized like, "Oh, yeah, I could just go forever." Then as it progressed, I started finding bike packing races, these ultra endurance races from point A to point B.
I had zero interest in racing, but I thought if somebody put this route together, it's probably pretty special. I started following those routes as ways to travel, like treasure maps. Then I was doing that for several years, working jobs in restaurants and bike shops to save money to travel. Then towards in the seventh year of that, I realized I'd still be in Israel when this race was happening. I was following the route, and I was like, "Well, maybe I'll try the race and see how it goes."
Then that was really when it clicked that I loved racing. I loved the competition. I loved chasing these guys, and trying to beat them, and trying to strategize, minimizing sleep. It's just this wild game where you're like, "Can I cross the country faster than everybody else? How is that possible?" It's like, "Yeah, you have to ride, you have to ride fast, but you also have to, in this style of racing, take care of all your own needs. You have to find food, and places to sleep, and fix your bike, and kind of deal with all the elements." Something about that, I just thought, oh, this is the best.
Shelby Stanger:
You were really good. You won.
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah, what a surprise to me and everybody else. It's like, you never know what you can do until you try. You're like, "That looks impossible to ride like 850 miles, but it looks impossible for everyone." It's like, who knows that they're good at that? Like, how are you going to do day five? When you're out there, how's your body going to respond? How are you mentally going to feel? Can you keep going?
Then for me, it was such a huge deal to realize I could do this, and I could do it well, and I liked it. Yeah, it hurt, and there's a lot of sacrifice involved, but overall, I really enjoy being out there.
Shelby Stanger:
After that first bike packing race, Lael took the world of ultra-cycling by storm. She flew home to Alaska, bought a new bike, and within a couple of weeks, she competed in the Tour Divide Bike Race. The route starts in Canada, passes south through the Rocky Mountains, and ends at the Mexican border. To her surprise, Lael ended up breaking the women's record by two days. Shortly after, she did another solo time trial of that same route, and she ended up breaking her own record by another day and a half.
The next year, Lael won another race crossing the US from west to east, beating all the other competitors, including the men. Even though she was making her mark on the professional cycling scene, Lael wasn't making much money. She and her wife, Rue, were waiting tables at a pizza restaurant when she eventually landed her first contract as a sponsored athlete. Once she got that gig, things started to shift.
Rue is a photojournalist, and together, the two started making content for cycling brands. When we come back, Lael tells us about some of the craziest experiences she's had on the bike, and her plan to break another outrageous record this year. When professional endurance cyclist, Lael Wilcox, was in her twenties, she discovered a talent and passion for long-distance bike racing.
The type of cycling that Lael does often requires that she spends weeks or months in the saddle. In fact, last year, Lael spent 330 days on her bike, and she competed in several multi-week races in Europe and North America. With all the time she spent riding. Lael has had some amazing adventures, including plenty of funny moments and close calls.
On most adventures, any good adventure, something doesn't go as planned. When you're self-supported, that means you're carrying all your own gear. You've got to take care of your own food, where to stay, your bike if it breaks, et cetera. Any stories of when it didn't really go that well, but you got out of the jail?
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah, every time. There's always something crazy that happens. When I think about it, I'm like, "Well," the worst part is being at home before the ride and waking up in the night, imagining everything that could go wrong. Usually, when you're out there, something goes wrong, but you don't know what it's going to be, so you can't prepare for it.
Gosh, I've done this race from Canada to Mexico five times, and the stuff that happens out there, some is scary and some is hilarious. One night, I was sleeping by a bridge, and I wake up in the night and there's a white fox right next to me. I'm like, "Whoa." Then I kind of yelled at the fox, "I'm really tired, I just want to sleep," and I fall asleep again. Then I wake up in the morning and the fox has stolen all of my food.
Then you're like, "Is this real right now? Then what do I do?" It had stolen three-quarters of a pound of salami, cookies, chips, all kinds of stuff. I had a few pieces of bread. I was like, "I've got to ride 130 miles to get food." I knew down the road, there was kind of a bed-and-breakfast, but I'm such a nut, I don't want to take the time to sit and eat breakfast. Then I get there, and I ask them if they'd put it all in little Ziploc bags so I could carry it with me and eat it on my bike.
That same route, years later, I ran into a mountain lion at midnight. I don't know what to do, I'm by myself, it's dark. My lights had shined on some eyes. I was like, "Oh, no, what is that?" Then I kind of stop, and it lights up, and I see the shape. I was like, "Oh, my God, a mountain lion." I've never seen a mountain lion before. Then it's like, what would you do? I just stopped, and I stood there, talking to it.
Shelby Stanger:
What did you say to it?
Lael Wilcox:
I was like, "Hey, I'm just here. I just want to get by." Then I hear this kind of chirping, and that's like the sound the cubs make. Then I'm like, "Okay, this is probably really bad, because it's like a mama mountain lion and cubs." Then you don't want her to feel protective of the cubs and go after me. I just stood there for 10 minutes talking, and I'm kind of close to the top of a path. I was like, "Okay, if she starts coming at me, then I'll turn around and try to sprint down. The downhill will be like my safety."
I'm also trying to break a record, so I'm like, "Well, I really do want to get by." Eventually, I'm just like, "I've been here for 10 minutes," and I start just rolling my bike slowly forward, still talking to her, and then she goes ahead of me and walks me down the road for I don't know how long. It felt like 15 minutes, just walking. I'm behind, walking slowly.
Then eventually she ran down the side of the road. Then I was like, "Ah, I'm out of here." Then immediately, my light lights up a white and black tail, and it was a skunk right ahead of me. I was like, "This night will never end."
Shelby Stanger:
What about bears?
Lael Wilcox:
Bears I see a lot, because I'm from Alaska. Then riding down through Canada, the first time, I saw a hundred bears, but the bears generally don't want to attack you. I would just yell, like, "Hey, hey," and then change the pitch of my voice if it didn't move. Usually, eventually, the bear would run away. I've only had one bear kind of come at me where I was like, "Uh-oh, uh-oh."
Shelby Stanger:
Tell that story.
Lael Wilcox:
I had done this project to ride all the roads in Alaska, and then the next summer, I went back there with Rue on my birthday. I'm like, "Cool, I'm going to ride these roads again," because they were some of my favorites. So beautiful, no trees, wide open land. We're riding together, and then kind of a few hours in, she's like, "I've had enough." She goes back with the bear spray, and then I'm like, "Well, I'm going to keep going."
Then I see a short road out to the coast. I start riding that, and then I see this blonde grizzly. Usually I just yell, I'm like, "Hey, hey." Then the bear reared up and starts coming towards me, and I was like, "Oh, my God, this is real." Then I just turned around and started sprinting away and the bear lost interest.
Shelby Stanger:
You couldn't have out biked a bear, could you have?
Lael Wilcox:
No, no. If the bear wanted to get me, that would've been it. These animals are so fast.
Shelby Stanger:
Aren't you not supposed to run away?
Lael Wilcox:
What are you supposed to do?
Shelby Stanger:
Well, I don't know. Yeah.
Lael Wilcox:
I'm not going to stand there and wait.
Shelby Stanger:
There's no rules, really, huh? Good for you. Obviously you're here today, so we know. How was that conversation with Rue when you got home?
Lael Wilcox:
Oh, man. I wonder when I even told her, because sometimes I just get back and I'm so shelled, I forgot. Then a day later, I'm like, "Oh, yeah, this happened." This time, actually, we had a flight out the next day and I was like, "Oh, I'm still going to ride all the way to this village," but then it's like 75 miles back.
I get there in the evening, and then I'm like, "I really hope I can find somebody to hitch a ride with back." There was some guy that was there fixing the telephone lines. He gave me a lift, and I was like, "Oh, thank God." Otherwise, I'd have to ride all night to get back.
Shelby Stanger:
I love that you're comfortable hitchhiking.
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah. The thing in Alaska, it's like the easiest place to hitch, because there's one road. I don't know, I think people are good. It's nice of them to give... If I got a weird vibe from somebody, I'd just be like, "I don't think so," but I've gotten some... So funny. I got a ride with a guy once, and he was actively hunting. He's like, "I saw something, I saw something." Then he shot a coyote and he's like, "This will only take like 40 minutes." He skinned it and put it on the roof. I was like, "What is going on?"
Shelby Stanger:
Oh, wow. That's amazing. Yeah, you have some stories, Lael.
Lael Wilcox:
It's so... The hitching is almost even more fun, but I'm like, I actually like riding my bike, but I want to get back.
Shelby Stanger:
I'm in awe of Lael's positivity, even when she's in the most extreme situations. Actually, as we were producing this episode, Lael was biking the Iditarod Trail Invitational in Alaska. The route crosses over frozen rivers and lakes in the far reaches of Alaska's wilderness. It was cold, like negative 40 degrees, but even so, Lael came in first in the woman's division. Lael's next project is a little bit bigger.
This summer, she's going after around the world record. Her goal is to bike 18,000 miles in 110 days. Starting May 26th, Lael will ride from Chicago to New York City. Then she'll fly across the Atlantic for the European leg of the journey, riding from Portugal to Georgia, the country. From there, she'll fly to Thailand and bike to Singapore, before crossing Australia and New Zealand. Finally, she'll finish up her trip by cycling from Alaska back to Chicago.
You have this really wild idea. You have wild ideas, tons of wild ideas, and now you're attempting to break an around the world record on a bike. How did this idea come to be? What's your why?
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah, it's something I've wanted to do since I raced across the US. It's cool these records exist, but then you're like, "What does that even mean to race around the world?" You have to connect continents with flights and that kind of stuff. I started, I've been kind of thinking about it, and then looking into what are the actual rules? Is this something I'd like to do?
I started thinking about it in 2016, and then last summer, I was riding to the start of the Tour Divide, which starts in Banff, Canada. While I was riding up there, I was like, "This is so much fun." I was riding through the mountains in California, and it was so super beautiful, and I'm like, "This is what I want to do. I just want to ride every day, and then just cover this distance, and see if I can have fun along the way, and kind of just be doing my own thing, so it's outside of a race."
I decided, yeah, last year, I'm going to go after around the world record, which means I have to ride at least 18,000 miles, either east or west. I make my own route, and I get to ride in a lot of new places, so across Australia, across New Zealand, across Turkey to Georgia, but then go to some familiar places like riding from Alaska to down the west coast of the US, and up to Route 66. For me, it's like, I've been racing and doing stuff for maybe about eight years, nine years, and I want to go bigger.
I wanted to do something that I'm like, "Can I finish that? How long will it take?" Then I also want to invite people to come ride with me. I think it'll just be fun. It'll be hard, but also a once in a lifetime experience. I can't believe I get to do this.
Shelby Stanger:
It's going to be so awesome. What's the current record?
Lael Wilcox:
The women's record is 124 days, so I'm aiming for 110.
Shelby Stanger:
Amazing.
Lael Wilcox:
Which means I have to average 163 miles a day, but then you lose a few days to travel and that kind of stuff. I think I can do it.
Shelby Stanger:
I'm so excited for you. You'll be supported, though. Rue will be there.
Lael Wilcox:
Well, she'll be there to shoot. She'll be there to take photos and videos, but there's no difference in the record between supported or self-supported. There's just one record.
Shelby Stanger:
Interesting.
Lael Wilcox:
You could have an RV follow you and take care of your needs. I don't think that sounds like as much fun, but I do think there are different ideas of what support means. Now, it's like, if you talk to somebody, that's support. I'm like, "I'm riding around the world. I want to talk to people. I want to see people. I want to be a part of what I'm passing through."
I think I'm going to take care of all my own needs, but it's like an open invite for people to join. Hopefully, it's like a rolling party.
Shelby Stanger:
I get that you're not someone who needs a lot of things, but it's still expensive, like bikes, and plane tickets, et cetera. How are you funding it?
Lael Wilcox:
Totally. This is a huge gift. My bike sponsor is specialized, and I've been riding their bikes since 2015, and I told them this idea and they're like, "Oh, we can cover your expenses to do that." For the most part, like basic travel, or regular plane tickets, and some hotels and food, because it's expensive. That's a lot. That's huge. Then I had this idea, and I wasn't going to rope Rue into doing it because it's so long, and at first, she's like, "Forget it. You can go do that, and I'll stay home."
Then the more I talked about it, the more she's like, "I want to be there. I want to shoot that. I want to document it." Then we're kind of putting together a budget with some different sponsors to cover her expenses. Then really, if we can not spend all of our money, that'd be great, but I probably will.
Shelby Stanger:
Is there one thing you're really looking forward to, or one thing you're a little nervous about?
Lael Wilcox:
Oh, man, I don't know. I'm scared. I wake up like, "What if my bike breaks?" I think the thing is, I have confidence for stuff that takes like two weeks, three weeks, and I'm like, "Three months, four months? So much could happen." Then this is fear in the night, and then when I'm awake in the day, I'm like, "Oh, it'll be fine. It's just a bike ride. If something breaks, I'll fix it or I'll deal with it."
Shelby Stanger:
You must feel so courageous, and badass, and alive after doing something like that.
Lael Wilcox:
Yeah, I think it's helped me gain confidence. I'm not great at a lot of these things. I am not a great bike mechanic. I'm terrible at navigating, but the more you do it, the more confidence you gain that you can do it, or even riding in the cold. You're like, "Okay, I've ridden in negative 20 for a few days, and I was okay." All my clothing froze to my face, but I survived.
I think it's just like, you take steps into trying something harder or scarier, and this stuff still does scare me, but then I'm like, "I have to try to do that," because I don't want to be stopped by fear. Not for this stuff.
Shelby Stanger:
If you want to follow along with Lael and all the incredible work she's doing, check out her Instagram at Lael Wilcox. She and her wife Rue have made some beautiful videos, and tell stories of their adventures so wonderfully. You can also learn more about Lael on her website, LaelWilcox.net, that's L-A-E-L-W-I-L-C-O-X.net. If you liked this episode of Lael, then you'll also like the episode with professional ultra runner, Courtney Dauwalter. The two reminded me so much of each other. We'll link that episode up in the show notes.
Wild Ideas Worth Living is part of the REI Podcast network. It's hosted by me, Shelby Stanger, produced by Annie Fassler, Sylvia Thomas, and Sam Peers Nitzberg of Puddle Creative. Our senior producers are Jenny Barber and Hannah Boyd. Our executive producers are Paolo Motila and Joe Crosby. As always, we love it when you follow the show, take time to rate it, and write a review wherever you listen. Remember, some of the best adventures happen when you follow your wildest ideas.