M5 Recumbents » Races and records


Bram Moens challenges the pro teams solo during Pro-Tour	June 19th, 2005
Preceding the time trial for teams of the UCI ProTour races in Eindhoven (Netherlands), Bram Moens challenged the six person formations of the best racing cyclists in the world in a fast solo race. Only the twenty best teams can participate in the ProTour (Rabobank, Fassa Bortolo, Gerolsteiner, Credit Agricole, T-Mobile Team, Discovery Cycling Team and others). It is considered the last test before the Tour de France. Bram took with his 57 minutes an average position in the classification, leaving behind him a lot of professional racing teams! Quite remarkable, since Bram is at least two times older with his almost 50 years. Also he did the race completely solo, so he didn't have the 10 to 15 percent speed advantage which is normally taken when racing in a team. The covered distance was 48 km, which Bram did with an average of 50.52 km/h. Bram participated with his M5 Carbon Low Racer. If the pro's would use such a record machine, speeds of 60 km/h and more would be possible during a race like this one. It was good that the UCI gave the opportunity to show the potential of the recumbent. Let's hope there will be more possibilities to combine the recumbent with other UCI events. Several teams of different companies also participated in the races. Bram was ten minutes faster dan the fastest of these teams, while riding solo! Bram also took more than eight minutes on the individal racers. These weren't exactly recreative riders: participation was only possible after proving you were able to do at least 45 km/h.

Bram Moens challenges the pro teams solo during Pro-Tour