antibes - 6 Day Race
Photograph by on Flickr.
These became known antibes as the Astley Belt races and cash prizes were offered. Weston won the fourth, setting a record of 550 miles and Rowell won the final three antibes Jardin botanique de la Villa Thuret races to permanently keep the Astley Belt.
By the early 1890 s the 6 day races were in decline and antibes no longer drawing the public or offering large prizes. O Leary won the first two and was thwarted by Charles Rowell in his quest for three in a row.
It wasn t until Don Choi hosted a 6 Day race in 1980 in California that interest began to antibes grow again. Briton Mike Newton became the first man to cover 500 miles /800km in a modern 6 day race at Nottingham in November 1981. In 1874 Weston walked his first 6 day race and was challenged by Daniel O Leary who completed 500 miles in 153 hours.
In antibes 2001 Cunningham set a new Women s road best of 510 miles. . In 1982, Tom O’Reilly took the 6 day total to 576 miles/927km.
In 1880, Fred Hitchborn set a new record of 565 miles earning $17,000 dollars. A fortune at the time.
The 6 Day antibes Race became a standard distance in the 1870s and was a popular form of entertainment where up to 70,000 paying visitors, in 1877, came to watch the Pedestrians battle it out. Edward Payson Weston in 1867 walked from Portland, Maine to Chicago,IL, in 25 days, a distance of 1,326 miles earning antibes him $10,000 and national fame. In 1984 Yiannis Kouros twice ran over 1022 km setting a new world record that would stand until 2005 when he broke his own record again with 1036 km at the Cliff Young Australian 6-day race in Colac, Australia. The women s world record was broken by Australia s Dipali Cunningham in 1998 when she covered 504 miles at the Sri Chinmoy 6 Day race on Wards Island in New York in very wet conditions.
In a re-match in 1877 O Leary was victorious again and the excitement created enough interest for Sir John Dugdale Astley, a British Member of Parliament, to inaugurate a series of 6 day races to determine the Long distance Champion of The World .
