Coast to coast. East to west. Sunrise to sunset. A challenge, an adventure… and ultimately an opportunity to savour and experience the freedom of travelling across a landscape on two wheels. Chase the Sun is an annual endurance event which sees riders cycle from sunrise to sunset on the longest day of the year. With routes now established traversing the South and the North of the UK, Ireland and Italy, the event has grown over the years – with more and more adventurers challenging themselves to chase the sun. Here at Stolen Goat, we’re firm believers in helping to empower and inspire more people to find Freedom – and community – through sport. And Chase the Sun does precisely that. It’s an experience as much as it is an event. Completing the distance is a challenge and a huge achievement, of course. But that feeling of being out in nature, of experiencing all that a day has to offer from start to finish – and doing so surrounded by likeminded people… This brings memories that will last well beyond that final turn of the pedals as the sun hits the horizon. We’re delighted to be working with Chase the Sun again in 2023 to supply the official CTS cycling kit: giving this year’s intrepid riders the Freedom to chase the sun in comfort and style.
Wondering how this physical, navigational and motivational challenge of chasing the sun across the landscape started? Thinking about giving it a go but not sure what it takes? We caught up with Chase the Sun founder and self-proclaimed ‘average, adventurous cyclist’, Olly Moore to learn more about where the inspiration to chase the sun came from, and the experiences that participants take away from their very long day in the saddle. Check out our interview with Olly below, and get ready to find yourself hovering over that ‘enter now’ button!
Chasing the sun: an interview with founder Olly Moore
“I never really intended to start an event… Chase the Sun as a concept was invented by me as a personal aspiration to inspire me to pedal. As an average cyclist, how far could I go in one day?”
I’m the founder of Chase The Sun… but really I’m just the average, adventurous cyclist – much like many of the other cyclists around the world, who simply love riding their bike. And that’s how it started – me riding my bike. I never really intended to start an event. I wasn’t even part of a cycling club at the time, I just enjoyed going out and riding for the sheer joy of pedalling through the countryside.
I used to live in London, so I would head out early on a weekend and ride away out into countryside, to see how far I could get – exploring wherever whim or whimsy took me. Over those meandering miles, I’d ponder to myself: “Where could I go and what could I do if I were to just ride all day?”
Chase the Sun, as a concept, began to take shape in my mind as a purely personal goal and aspiration. It was something I came up with to inspire me to pedal. I started to play out the scenarios of what day I would choose and where I would go if I were to try and ride all day. I settled on the longest day of the year, and I knew that if I wanted to see the very first rays of sunrise and the last ray of sunset over the horizon – I’d need to start and finish by the coast. My ponderings put the ideal parameters in place, and that set a challenge I wanted to go and experience. I wanted to see if I could achieve it as just an average cyclist. How far could I go in one day?
Chasing the sun for the very first time: “We failed in the first year… we got ourselves into a bit of a pickle to be honest!”
With the parameters in place – the longest day, sunrise to sunset, starting and finishing by the sea – I got a couple of mates to come with me. I dragged them along under slightly false pretences… I wasn’t entirely forthcoming about how far it was that we were planning on riding. I just told them it was a little bit longer than the Dunwich Dynamo (120 miles from London to Suffolk) which they’d done in the past. I didn’t tell them it was more than 50% longer! We tried, and we failed in that first year. One of the guys Al got as far as about 160 miles, and myself and my mate Ted carried on cycling past dark. We got ourselves into a bit of a pickle to be honest! Stupidly, we had no lights because the concept that we would set off, not achieve it (arriving by sunset) but would still want (or need) to carry on pedalling, just hadn’t really occurred to me. As it got dark, we were miles from anywhere – neither a train station nor the finish line, and so we had to keep riding. That wasn’t a scenario I’d planned for. We rode over the Mendips in the dark country lanes in a torrential thunderstorm, stopping and pulling up onto the verge every time a car came along. Eventually we got to our finish line and saw an amazing lightning storm over the pier at Weston-Super-Mare. That was our first finish… 3 hours after sunset, almost in the middle of the night. You might be thinking: “Well, that was crazy – why would you do that again?” … and it did seem like a bad idea at the time when we got there. Initially it felt more a relief than an achievement.
It’s true that still the most common thing (now that the event has grown) for participants to say when they cross the finish line is: “never again!”. But then they reconsider and many of them do come back. And that was exactly what I did after that first year.
“I enjoyed having a goal… it wasn’t just about motivation, I enjoyed the feeling of experiencing time in the broadest sense.”
After that first attempt, I reflected on what I’d enjoyed about it. It was certainly an adventure, and I think I really enjoyed having a goal and a reason to pedal. But it wasn’t just about the motivation. It was also about putting myself out there, and opening up to the sensations and the experience of the longest day. I enjoyed the feeling of experiencing time in the broadest sense: the movement of the sun and the planets. Observing the ebb and the flow of the day in terms of light and the weather. The changes in your own body and in your feelings: your motivation and your energy levels.
I enjoyed the discovery of the route and the variety of places and people you encounter along the way. The route was intentionally a cross-section of the country. From the very rural areas to the seaside towns. From historical landmarks, roman roads or an ancient castle, to your quintessential little pubs and village greens. We rode through some areas of central London to experience the urban landmarks and the cyclists’ roundabout that is Richmond Park. All of these things play into quite an interesting narrative, which you have time to focus on as you cycle through.
I had a growing appreciation for savouring an environment or a landscape, rather than simply riding through it. I think this comes in part from my admiration of an artist called Richard Long who’s from my hometown of Bristol. He creates these long walks through landscapes and he records them through photographs and a selection of words which represent his experience, and puts on the page to go in the gallery. But for me, it’s not so much the thing that gets put up on the wall, but the value in the experience and the walk itself as the artistic endeavour. And I feel a similar kind of merit – or artistic endeavour – of moving through a landscape and attuning to it, in this case, on a bicycle. Keeping your senses open, as if you’re a canvas. Allowing the experience of the day – the weather, the time – to paint a picture into your senses. Being alive to that and savouring that is what I really enjoyed.
The bicycle is a really great tool for that experience. It’s a beautifully efficient way to connect the physical effort and the mindfulness – the stimulation you can get visually and emotionally as you ride through places. It’s almost a meditative experience when I’m riding really long distances. It’s definitely not about being competitive for me. Even in subsequent years when I did manage to chase the sun and complete the route before sunset – it wasn’t about the speed I was going, it was the attitude that I took to the day.
We talk about Chase The Sun as an ‘annual physical, navigational and motivational’ challenge to endure and savour on the year’s longest day.’ Really that motivational part – the mindset, is paramount. You can be the fittest person in the world or the very best navigator… but you’ve got to have your mentality right, and that’s what I find most rewarding about really long cycling challenges.
“It was a community really, before it was an event. I just wanted to share the idea. I never set out to create an event.”
In terms of Chase the Sun becoming the event it is now – I didn’t really seek that out. It kind of came to me. Probably because I tried once and failed, I then went back the next year and brought a few more mates with me. We failed again that year, but tantalisingly so that time – missing sunset by only by about 7 minutes. The third year, the mates I’d planned to ride with dropped out but I decided to go and do it myself anyway. When I arrived on the west coast an hour before sunset, I realised then that it was achievable.
What started as personal challenge started to gain a bit of a following, a community really, for some time before it became an ‘event’. People would ask me about where I’d ridden and why. They seemed intrigued, or interested and would ask if I was going to do it again, and if they could come with me. I said ‘okay then’, and word started slowly to get around. This was around 2008-2009, and it was a cycling world in the UK before the term “sportive” was really widely recognised. Before the plethora of organised events and manufactured ways to ride your bicycle existed. Most people were just riding around on their own, so to have some goals or a narrative to hang their cycling on – that brought people together.
I created a Chase the Sun website mainly to just explain what I was doing, and an email address so that I could invite people along. Over the years, the interest and following built up slowly. Some more well-known people started to show an interest. Chrissie Wellington OBE (former pro triathlete and four time Ironman world champion) heard about it, rode with us, and tweeted about it which got a lot more people interested. The audience started to grow and then Chase the Sun became ‘organised’. It was a ‘happening’ – an annual gathering. I was still reluctant to call it an event or anything that formal.
I just wanted to share the idea, I never set out to create an event. People saw value and inspiration in the idea that I’d created, so I felt I wanted to share that with as many people as possible. To enable them to explore and experience the feeling and motivation of Chasing the Sun for themselves.
“I still feel inspired by the new people who come to it and what riders get out of it… if someone’s got that much out of what started as just an idea, it’s got to be worth persevering with.”
Organising Chase the Sun and keeping it going year on year is increasingly a challenge. It’s had to become a more formal event. But I feel a sense of duty to everyone who’s chased the sun in the past – to all of the people over the years who’ve followed it and ridden it. I still feel inspired by the new people who come to Chase the Sun, and what riders (and supporters) get out of it. There’s so many amazing stories and reasons that people take part, things that I could never have imagined. People are doing it for charity, or for loved ones. All sorts of causes be it personal, spiritual or to raise money or goodwill for others. There was a guy a few years ago who’d had to undergo life threatening surgery. When he was in that low period, he’d latched on to this idea of having a challenge and he used Chase the Sun as a motivational goal to help him make his recovery. He got back on his bike and he achieved it: he chased the sun. Stories like that just make me think, if you’ve offered that to someone and someone’s got that much out of what started as just an idea, it’s got to be worth persevering with.
But it is increasingly a challenge. I have a young family and a job, I don’t get out riding my bike willy nilly across the countryside anymore! It’s had to become a more formal event. The more people get involved the more expectations there are. And as best as you try to mitigate and manage it, there are risks and responsibilities involved. Eventually, reluctantly, we had to start charging entry fees to be able to bring in some funding so that we could balance the various costs and commitments we have throughout the year and on the event day itself so that we have some certainty and sustainability to be able to keep delivering it for people.
All of this is layers of complication that we need to sift through and balance while maintaining the ultimate essence of what we’re trying to do. Which is: to enable people to enjoy that initial vision and idea, to get out on their bike and experience something which is both extraordinary and accessible.
“It’s the extraordinary for the everyday cyclist… It’s for anyone and everyone. As long as you have the right mindset, anyone determined enough can chase the sun.”
Chase The Sun is aspirational, but achievable at the same time. If you want to do it, then you can do it. It’s the extraordinary, for the everyday cyclists. It’s for anyone and everyone. As long as you have the right mindset, anyone determined enough can chase the sun. The types of riders we’ve had participate over the years backs this up. We’ve had everything from elite athletes and seasoned club teams, to cycle couriers and people who typically just join their weekly club rides. All the way to the person who’s bought their first road bike that year and, prior to training for Chase the Sun, has only ever completed a 30-40 mile ride. It seems like an incredible goal… and they make it. Even people who don’t make it on their first attempt – (like me!) – will say “wow I’ve just ridden 100 miles today but I’ve really enjoyed it and I’ll come back.”
After our first failed attempt that first year, my friend summed up the ethos of Chase The Sun when he said: “This is a ride, not a race.” That speaks to the value of the ride, as opposed to it being a competitive experience. It’s about valuing the riding, the unique experience. And the fact that you’re not doing it alone – you’re doing it together with a group of likeminded people. It’s a collective, who come together with this shared goal. There’s a beauty in the idea of these different sunrise locations dotted around nationally and internationally. People are together, but apart. They share a motivational goal. They all set off, and they might be riding next to a group of people they chat to on the day, but they’re also surrounded by this wider community of people out there sharing the experience and the idea to ride.
“It’s a ride, not a race.”
This notion that it’s a ride, not a race, sums up the unique experience of what Chase the Sun is and has become. That’s what I’m trying to nurture and savour as we continue to evolve and move forward to work out a way to keep this event growing and giving more people the opportunity to experience it.
The riders who are Chasing the Sun and go through the jeopardy of “will I make it or not?” are the people I identify with achieving the most. They’re the real champions of the day. I’ve ridden it 10 times or more in various locations, and that experience of being on tenterhooks is when I’ve got the most out of it. When it’s the last couple of hours and you’re coming down a gorge or a mountain descent, knowing it’s right in the balance as to whether you’re going to make sunset or not. Experiencing that comes with a real sense of achievement when you’ve managed to get yourself and your ride mates over the line just in time for sunset. There was one year when we finished in Italy and we zipped up this ramp and made it to the sea wall just in time to see the very last seconds of the sun dropping into the horizon. It was just that last very thin line before it disappears into the sea. We were there to see that while we were still catching our breath. That’s an experience that will stay with me forever.
Those are the people who get the most out of that Chase the Sun challenge, the people for whom that challenge of making it in time for sunset is in the balance for all or part of the day. Or even if you just fail – like I did the second year, by only 7 minutes – there’s no better motivation to come back. People that go through that I think have the richest experience. They challenge themselves the most and in those moments learn the most about themselves.
“If 200 miles seems a bit much for your legs or your backside, you can take it on with your mates!”
In recent years, we’ve formalised another way of entering the event which is by entering as part of a relay team. If 200 miles seems a bit much for your legs (or your backside!), you can Chase the Sun with your mates – as a team of 3 or 4 riders. That means you can take a support vehicle and have a couple of you riding while the other drives, so you can tag team the distance through the day. You can get the experience of the event, while riding in bite-sized chunks which makes it feel more achievable. 35 miles here, 60 miles there, with a rest in between, split throughout the day. You’ll never have to ride on your own because you’ve always got your team mates with you.
The relay team option is a really accessible way to get involved with the Chase the Sun event. Alongside being put off by the full distance, other constraints that commonly come up are people being concerned about having transport and support. The relay team option solves these dilemmas. It’s a really inclusive way of getting involved that makes the event accessible for any level of cyclist. If you’ve got a motivated, organised team then together you can Chase the Sun.
“On all the routes, I’ve purposefully sought out the best cycling roads I could find… but I guess if I had to choose a favourite route it would have to be Italy.”
The original Chase the Sun route, that first year just me and my mates, was a product of circumstance and location. But since then on all the routes I’ve subsequently planned (UK South, UK North, Ireland and Italy) I’ve purposefully sought out the best cycling roads I could find having done quite a bit of research into the areas. Each route is very different – it’s not a case of doing one Chase the Sun route and saying, “okay well I’ve done that, I’ve ticked the whole concept off.” They all contrast and complement each other.
I think if you get the weather, the Scottish route (UK North) is just sensational. Both the landscapes, and the feeling of space and solace that you get on those empty roads. You get these amazing, rolling views that really give you a sense of the space and the wildness out there. It’s completely different to the South route. You can ride all afternoon and barely see one car.
The Irish route is all about the challenging terrain, the topography and the wild Atlantic coast, with the rugged dramatic cliffs that you see on your way out of Belfast. But I guess if I had to choose a favourite Chase the Sun route, it would have to be Italy. What a romantic idea to ride across a country with so much history of cycling. You’ve got beautiful weather and landscapes. The most amazing, enthusiastic people who offer incredible hospitality. The route is brilliant: you climb up out of Cesenatico – the hometown of Marco Pantani. You ride up over the Appenine mountains and descend down into Florence, out into the Tuscan vineyards and through Vinci, birthplace of Leonardo. You’ve got the sunkissed landscapes rolling down towards Pisa, pass the landmark tower, and then you finish on the beach so you can go for a swim at the end of a long day in the saddle. That’s hard to beat!
Whichever route you choose, Chase the Sun is all about creating an extraordinary experience and making that accessible to the everyday cyclist. If you’re feeling inspired, get yourself registered. Come and be part of our community of adventurous cyclists and Chase the Sun with us on 24th June 2023.
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Ready to Chase the Sun? Head over to their website to find out more about the routes, the entry packages and how you can enter with your Herd to take part as a relay team. Don’t forget to check out the Stolen Goat x Chase the Sun kit collection too – bringing you all the comfort and performance you need to make the most of a long, epic day in the saddle!