About 290 miles into his 304-mile ride through eight states, Sam Westby could see the sun rising over the waves as he pedaled on Route 1A along the Atlantic shore in North Hampton, New Hampshire. The “epic view” of the sunburst horizon at Fox Hill Point on an early summer morning gave the Northeastern University Ph.D. student a boost on his way to setting a Guinness World Record for the number of states cycled in one day. Westby rode through eight states in less than 24 hours, finishing on Aug. 11 in Kittery, Maine, and smashing the previous record of six states.
“It was a great way to cap off the ride,” Westby says of the shoreline stretch. “This road was already one of my favorite roads in New England, but sunrise took it to another level. It was better than finishing. Finishing is rarely the payoff moment for me. “When I do big feats like this, the best parts are nestled into the experience. Sometimes it’s a ‘it can’t get better than this’ feeling like sunrise on 1A, other times it’s during a fun conversation getting to tell people the story after. There hasn’t been a ride I regretted, so there’s always some type of payoff when you do crazy things like this.”
