He raced the Pony Express across America on a bicycle — and beat the horses by nearly 20 hours

Australian cyclist Lachlan Morton rode 3,217 kilometres across the western half of America, rolling into Sacramento at 11:19 p.m. after six days, 21 hours and 15 minutes — 19 hours and 45 minutes ahead of the horseback relay that carried Abraham Lincoln's inaugural address from Missouri to California in 1861. Those riders swapped among roughly 197 horses; Morton did it himself, through Wyoming headwinds, Nevada mud flats and 2 a.m. starts, with a quiver of bikes and a support crew. 'I had an amazing time,' he said. 'I wasn't desperate for it to end.'