When Sarah Ruggins went for a medical check-up this week, she told the doctor she had been on a “long bike ride”. Her body had been through a lot of stress, she explained. She wanted to make sure her kidneys were working as they should, and that she wasn’t about to “implode”.
“I walked in a little sheepishly and said I’ve been really busy the last week,” she tells Cycling Weekly.
‘Really busy’ is an understatement. Last Friday, Ruggins broke the overall record for cycling the length of the UK and back – John o’ Groats to Land’s End to John o’ Groats (JOGLEJOG) – doing so in five days, 11 hours and 14 minutes. During that time, she rode 2,700km, climbed well over 20,000m, and slept for only eight hours.
“People are struggling to comprehend the distances,” she smiles. “As am I, to be fair.”
A PhD graduate from Canada, now a finance professional, the 37-year-old had spent five months planning the record attempt, together with a crew of eight people, who would support her from two vehicles on the road. Less than two days before the scheduled start, however, the plan changed suddenly. Stormy weather in Cornwall made it safer to start in Scotland, and do the route backwards. LEJOGLE became JOGLEJOG. The team made its way up north.
It was 8am on a Sunday, 11 May, when Ruggins set off from John o’ Groats. “I was very calm and ready, with a clear mind,” she says. “When I started, I was almost in tears, but it was from gratitude for having my crew around me, and the fact that I was able to make it to that point.”
There were years in the Canadian’s life when she feared she would not walk again.
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After a childhood spent on the athletics track, breaking national running records, Ruggins was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune condition. She was 15 at the time, bedridden and in need of round-the-clock care. It would take 10 years before she had the strength and confidence to return to sport.
“All I remember was that the pain was so bad,” she remembers. “People would ask me how I felt about not being able to run, and I didn’t care. I just cared about getting through the day. I couldn’t go to school. I couldn’t do anything. I remember just feeling fear, and feeling like I wanted to give up. I didn’t care about anything, and I thought it would never get better for me.”
Through posts on her Instagram page, Ruggins’s crew gave updates on her JOGLEJOG progress. The plan was to stop every four hours, but only for 10 minutes. Each day’s nutrition involved taking on 11,000 calories, served in Huel shakes, cream cheese bagels, and porridge laced with double cream and peanut butter.
Everything started swimmingly. Ruggins reached Land’s End – the midway point – on a high, clocking the fourth fastest one-way time. She allowed herself 30 seconds for the turnaround, and before she knew it, she was riding back through Bristol, where hundreds of fans cheered her on.
Then the sleep deprivation began to set in. In the hours that followed, the Instagram updates shifted in tone, telling of “cracks” starting to show and lapses in lucidity. Some posts voiced concerns for her physical health.
“For the crew who had never seen anyone in a heavily sleep deprived state, it was quite startling to see,” Ruggins says.
At one point on day four, the 37-year-old collapsed on her bike. Fortunately, one of her crew members had anticipated the fall, and ran out of the van to catch her before she hit the floor. “I’ve been told this – I don’t remember it,” she now laughs. “I started swerving like a young child who’s just off their training wheels, and I was slowing down quite significantly.
“That accumulated sleep deprivation shows up in your body mentally through confusion. I forgot why I was riding a bike. I forgot where I was. I needed my crew in my ear, in comms, basically reassuring me that everything was fine.”
At the same time, though, the bouts of confusion left Ruggins in a “semi-meditative state”, something she found “quite peaceful, actually”.
Returning to John o’ Groats, five and a half days after she left, Ruggins became a Guinness World Record holder. Under the weight of the exhaustion, she folded her body against the signpost, and sat on the grass.
“I just started sobbing, and I couldn’t stop for quite some time,” she says. “I think it was just that release that I did exactly what I said I was going to do.”
Her new record took almost seven hours off the previous benchmark, held by James MacDonald since 2017. It was a feat of will and determination, a “ long bike ride”, in Ruggins’s words, by a woman who was told she might never walk again, and who only took up cycling two and a half years ago.
What’s the lasting message she wants people to take away from her achievement? There’s no pause as Ruggins launches into her answer. “You can accomplish anything if you’re surrounded by the right people, and if you talk to yourself the right way,” she says assuredly. “If I could do it, other people can do it.”
Ruggins is collecting donations for two charities: The Bike Project and Bikes For Refugees. At the time of writing, she has raised more than £17,500. Donations can be made through her GiveWheel page.
