Tour des Stations Ultimate 1000: Ollie Bridgewood's first ultra-endurance race

One ride. 1,012 gruelling kilometres covering every major pass in Switzerland. Nearly 26,000m of elevation gain. Rides don’t get much tougher than the Tour des Stations Ultimate 1000, one of the hardest ultra-endurance events in the world.

Here at GCN, we’re more than familiar with the Switzerland-based Tour des Stations event. Both Ollie Bridgewood and Conor Dunne have previously tackled its 'Ultrafondo', a 242km test with 8,848m of climbing. It’s so tough that Conor missed out on the time cut, while Ollie crawled to the finish, but only after reaching levels of suffering he’d never experienced before or since.

Until now. Not content with completing the Ultrafondo, Ollie decided it was time to delve deep into the world of ultra-endurance riding by enrolling on the Ultimate 1000. It was about time. Nearly every GCN presenter had undertaken an ultra-endurance challenge at some point, except Ollie.

More comfortable on his local time trial course or hill climb than suffering for over 15 hours, the furthest he’d ever ridden before the event was 380km, just over a third of the 1,012km distance he’d need to cover to complete the event. Included in that distance is nearly 26,000m of elevation gain, over three times the height of Mount Everest.

It would prove to be the toughest challenge Ollie had ever undertaken, but could he complete it? Watch the full video to find out.

We enjoyed Ollie’s suffering so much that we decided to make a documentary out of it. It will be available later this year, but in the meantime, you can explore our full collection of adventure and ultra-endurance films over on GCN+.

Oliver Bridgewood

GCN Tech Presenter

PhD Chemist turned cycling enthusiast, bringing the lab coat to GCN Does Science