See you in six months, dear, I'm just going to cycle around the world: Pedal-pusher braves floods, gales and deserts as he smashes speed record




An intrepid Vin Cox kissed his wife goodbye and told her he’d see her in about six months. He then gave his trusty bike a final check and began to head East – very East, as it turned out.



For the next 20 weeks or so, Vin pedalled his way across six continents, through more than 20 countries, up mountains, through forests and across deserts.



And he also cycled into the record books – after his trip around the globe was confirmed as the fastest circumnavigation by bicycle.





The 35-year-old IT worker and cycling instructor cycled 18,225 miles in just 163 days, six hours and 58 minutes, smashing the previous record by more than a month.



He encountered floods, gale force winds, 10ft snow drifts and roads closed by an earthquake; survived dysentery, being chased by wild dogs, and being detained by police in Indonesia.



Yesterday at his home in Cornwall, he was reunited with 33-year-old wife Helen – and was already back on his bike, ‘trying to get some strength back’ after his marathon journey.



Vin (it’s short for Vincent) planned his own route for the trip primarily as an adventure, then added a record attempt and charity fund-raiser for the Geoff Thomas Foundation, which works with Leukaemia and Lymphoma Research.



Guinness World Records set the ground rules including satellite tracking evidence and signed statements from witnesses along the route.



Including boat trips and plane flights, he travelled a total of 36,860 miles.

As you bike it: Vin Cox on day 3 of his epic quest (left), which would see him battle snow drifts, dysentery and wild dogs; posing by the Hoover Dam in Colorado, US (right)



Those he met on his travels mostly asked one question after he revealed what he was doing: ‘Why?’



‘Trying to explain to them where I’d come from, where I was going and what I was doing it for was actually more difficult than getting them to sign my book,’ Vin told me yesterday.



So why did he? ‘My mother and father met while they were potholing,’ Vin said. ‘I guess some of that rubbed off.



‘I think there’s also a belief that we’re defined to a certain extent by what we do – and I like to do a lot.’



His companion for the journey was a standard bicycle with hub gears (to keep out sand and grit) and a sturdy rear rack.



The front wheel boasted a hub dynamo, which charged his mobile phone and all electrical equipment. He also took a tent and sleeping bag.



The scenery of the Sinai Peninsula was one of the high points while a low point was contracting dysentery in Libya – the only stage of the trip at which he considered giving up.

