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German cyclist Jens Voigt cycles during his attempt to break the one hour cycling world record at the velodrome Suisse in Grenchen, Switzerland, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2014.Peter Klaunzer

Famed for his willingness to suffer, retiring cyclist Jens Voigt closed out his career by taking on one of the most painful challenges of all.

In his final kick at pro racing, the fan favourite on Thursday added his name to a roll call of greats by setting a new hour record. One day after his 43rd birthday, the German rider averaged just more than 51 kilometres for an hour at a velodrome in Switzerland.

Although he was helped by changes to the rules governing the sort of equipment he could use, Voigt's face was still twisted by pain as he closed in on – and beat by about 1.4 kilometres – a record that had stood for nine years.

The current rules for the hour record are simple: You take a track-legal bicycle and race around a velodrome for 60 minutes, seeing how far you can go. But that simplicity hides how difficult it is to do this event. Riding hard in an aerodynamic hunch for an extended period has been described as akin to stretching yourself on the rack.

Eddy Merckx, the five-time Tour de France winner who set an hour record in 1972, said bluntly "I will never try it again."

Voigt had made a fetish of pain through his career. But the struggle was clear Thursday as he racked up the laps.

He needed to go around the 250-metre velodrome at least 199 times to break the record, and his grimace worsened as the hour went on. Occasionally he would rise from the saddle to extend his back before settling into a tight tuck. His face took on the rictus so familiar to fans who have watched his 18-year road-racing career.

But his speed increased as the event wore down. He did the last lap at close to 53 kilometres an hour.

"I gave everything in the last 20 minutes, knowing that it was the last in my career," he said. "Fifty-one kilometres is more than I imagined."

Once contested by the biggest names in the sport – stars such Jacques Anquetil and Miguel Indurain, both of whom won the Tour five times, Fausto Coppi and Francesco Moser – the hour record fell into obscurity. But Voigt's attempt has helped bring attention to the discipline and there are reports that several top pros, including Tour winner Bradley Wiggins, are considering an attempt.

"I think this is going to be the first of a whole raft of riders," Brian Cookson, the president of cycling's governing body, the UCI, said during a livestream of Voigt's attempt.

The hour record had fallen victim to an increasingly busy race calendar and repeated rule changes from the UCI.

The governing body had struggled with how to deal with the effect of evolving technology on the hour record. For some, the event was a way to race against cyclists of an earlier era. But others wanted to push the boundaries of bike manufacturing, meaning true comparisons wouldn't be possible.

The UCI tried to get around this by having two categories. The "athlete's hour" required the sort of bike that Merckx had used in 1972, an anachronism today. Czech rider Ondrej Sosenka had held that record since 2005 at 49.7 kilometres. The "absolute hour" gave bicycle manufacturers a freer hand, pushing the record in this category to more than 56 kilometres.

This year, the UCI returned to a single category, giving Sosenka the title and wiping all the faster results from the books. But it also decided to allow future contenders to use modern aerodynamic technology, giving Voigt a major advantage on his attempt.

A spokesman for Trek Factory Racing, Voigt's pro team, said Thursday the rider was curious this spring about the effect of the rule changes. He did initial velodrome testing in early June and had this final challenge in mind when he retired officially from racing in August. Less than a month later, he was racing the clock at the Velodrome Suisse in Grenchen, Switzerland.

"I am extremely proud to be joining all the iconic riders that have beaten this record before me," Voigt said after.

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