From 250 lb Gamer to Ultracyclist  – Matt Sant

For decades, Matt Sant refined what he called his “read, research, execute” methodology through gaming. Once he chose a goal, he went into sponge mode, absorbing everything he could find – manuals, writeups, forum threads, videos, commentaries – until he understood his adversary completely. Then he’d execute with surgical precision until the job was done.

“My criteria for a worthwhile goal were simple: it had to be hard, with a high failure rate. It had to be obscure, with little external reward. Finally, it had to provoke that ‘Why on earth would someone do that?’ reaction when people heard about it.”

Eventually he realised this pattern wasn’t limited to gaming. The same approach worked for almost anything: A copper-pipe, water-cooled computer build; building an arcade machine; power-carving a wooden chaise lounge; smelting, forging, and knifemaking.

One day, when he was looking in the mirror, he didn’t like what he saw, and he realized he needed to do something. So, instead of applying his methodology to external objects, he decided to focus it on himself. It was time to make a real change.

So Long, Potato Chips

Matt’s approach to gaming was always the min/max powergamer approach, and so he took the same scalpel to his diet; he completely cut out the bad stuff, researched what was good, and focused on calories in/calories out. He began applying his methodology to his diet, obsessively tracking calories and uncovering some glaring issues that needed fixing. 

“I think the biggest issue was that I wasn’t paying attention or tracking what I ate at all. If I felt hungry, or bored, then I ate. The biggest being potato chips and full sugar soft drinks, both of which I’d frequently eat late into the night as my family slept and I stayed up gaming.” 

Jogging In the Dark

He added a few 6 am strength classes at the gym each week and soon started walking the 2 km there and back. “It feels almost unbelievable now that in early 2024 walking alone left me sore the next day.”

Those 6 am classes meant walking to the gym at 5:30 am in the dark, when nobody was watching. That gave him the courage to try jogging. At first, he could barely manage 100 meters before his lungs burned, and he had to stop. “But I kept at it. I still remember proudly telling my wife one morning, “I ran the whole way WITHOUT stopping!””

He took his newly discovered ability to run 2 km WITHOUT stopping and… well… ran with it. “Over the next few months, I built up to my first 5km, then my first 10km.”

Fractured, but Not Fallen

By June 2024, he was eyeing a half-marathon. “One Sunday I went out and ran 22km.”

Elated, he kept running through the week and repeated the half-marathon every Sunday for the next month. 

“I was all in, loving it, until a stress fracture in my right leg brought everything to a sudden, world-shattering halt.”

“It was a classic “zero to hero” injury.” It started as some pain in his right ankle.  He remembers on a weekly 5 km jog around the neighbourhood having to stop and limp home. Matt would rest for a few days and think it’d be okay, only for it to hurt when he started running. “Annoyingly, I went to several physio appointments, they checked a number of things and gave me exercises, but nothing seemed to make a difference.”

Finally out of frustration he went to the doctor and asked for an x-ray, “Just to make sure that nothing mechanically looks wrong.” That’s when he got the result back – that he’d been trying to run on a stress fracture. 

Discovering Zwift and a Passion for Endurance

The stress fracture was incredibly frustrating and depressing. Just as Matt connected with this ability to push himself, getting fitter and knocking over increasingly longer distances, it was gone.

Luckily, Matt met coworker Myles Bagley, who became a mentor who spoke his language – data. He didn’t just give Matt “hope” in a vague sense; Myles gave him a system. He introduced Matt to Zwift, which allowed him to gamify his fitness. “It changed my life.”

He was tentative at first – he hadn’t owned a bike since he was a kid and didn’t know the first thing about cycling. “I needed something to fill the gap though, so took the plunge and bought both a bike and a virtual trainer.”

At first, even 30-minute rides exhausted him. “I remember something Myles said that stuck with me: consistency matters. I pushed myself and kept at it every day, and consistency did what consistency does. I found that as months progressed, I was able to push out the ride duration and frequency – hitting a 120-day cycling streak going into 2025.”

Building Toward Something: Riding 500k in a Single Day

A friend told him about a challenge event called the Rapha Festive 500 that happens during the last week of the year. The goal? Ride a total of 500 km over that period.

He did some quick calculations and realized that he would have to ride 60-70 km per day, which he felt was way beyond his ability. “Instead, I set myself the goal of doing my first 100km ride – it was tough and I was sore afterward, but I managed to do it.”

In the weeks after that, as he maintained the consistency, he started to formulate an ambitious training goal: “At the end of 2025 I would not only participate in the Rapha Festive 500, but I would do the 500km in a single ride.”

Come December 2025, Matt did indeed achieve his goal, riding 500 km in a single day. Given where he had come from, this was an incredible achievement for him in so many ways.

(You can read Matt’s journal of the ride at the end of this article. It really is quite amazing!)

Reflection: “It’s all in your head.”

“Reflecting back, a persistent companion on this journey has been this ‘spectre of doubt.’ I was always pushing myself to prove “them” wrong, in my head it was all the people out there that didn’t believe in me. That didn’t believe I could do it.”

Matt remembers his wife one day telling him, “You do know they’re not out there, right? That they’re all in your head?”

“That was a sobering moment! I guess in retrospect I did always know that. I think where I once needed the feeling of proving ‘those people’ wrong to motivate me, to keep me going, I’ve since found the discipline to keep pushing regardless.”

Ride on, Matt! And on, and on, and on, and on!

You can follow Matt on Zwift at: Matthew Sant
Follow Matt on Strava >

Matt’s Rapha 500km Journal

3:15AM – My alarm sounds and I jump out of bed. It’s 3:15AM on the 26th December, 2025 – Boxing Day. The air feels special – as if the festive period has cast a spell and the world now slumbers deeply; it feels extra quiet, still. I’m not up by chance – I’ve spent 600 hours this year training for today, and now it’s finally here. I’m about to spend the next 16 hours riding over 500km on a bike in my garage.

6:00AM – 60KM – By 4am I was away, and the first few hours have been a mental struggle. I can’t stop my brain from reminding me “Hey you know you’re going to be here a LONG LONG time right?”. Thanks brain, yeah I actually do know.

The hundreds of hours training I’ve put into the last year remind me that this is always what my head does, regardless of it being a 2-hour ride or a 12-hour ride. I push on.

8:00AM – 120KM – The mental noise quietens as it always does and I start to feel settled in, enjoying the grind. I’m in a pacer group riding at 1.8w/kg (31km/h, 120w) which is a comfortable ‘all day’ pace. I’m starting to see the familiar names of friends in the ‘virtual pack’ which helps. I’m allowing myself only one 3-minute break per hour to hop off, stretch my legs, and refill my water. Things are working well.

Suzie and the girls are awake and have come down to say hello and chat which is a great mood booster. They bring me a coffee and a banana smoothie which is a great change to the gels and carb/water drink.

10:00AM – 180KM – I’d originally planned to do this ride on the 28th December, but brought it forward because the 26th was going to be a much nicer temperature (20°C versus 28°C). Right now the temperature in the garage is 16°C and with a powerful fan on I’m feeling cold, if anything. A good problem to have!

Mentally I’m in an ideal flow state – present but not present –just existing, feeling, but losing myself and losing time which is what you want on a day like today. I’ve planned for an actual lunch break since this ride will be so long, something I don’t usually do.

I want to hit 250KM before lunch. The biggest psychological challenges will come later in the day, and breaking the back of the ride will be a meaningful mental milestone.

12:10PM – 260KM – Lunch! I stop for the first and only proper break I’ll have on the ride today. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to optimize the break today. I’ve moved a hammock from the upstairs balcony to the garage next to the bike, right in collapsing distance!

I have a quick shower which feels great, and change into fresh riding gear which also feels amazing. I get stuck into some solid fast food – a double quarter pounder meal, 2 Large Fries, 10 Nuggets, and an Iced Matcha. I get it all down and chill out in the hammock.

After an hour’s break I’m underway again. The break and the shower have been the only real change in usual routine so I’m a little anxious about how my body is going to cope with the extended break. So far so good.

3:10PM – 320KM – Some time around here I hit the peak mental challenge of the day. I’m somewhere in the 300’s kilometre-wise and just not feeling it. I consider what it might mean to not hit my goal, how I might feel, if one day I’d come back and try it again.

I always knew this would be a long shot and that at some point I might face this moment.

What to do? Suddenly, miraculously, some kind of switch flips in my head; a bolt of lightning, a eureka moment. A surge of adrenaline comes from somewhere deep down and suddenly I’m grinning from ear to ear. I have no idea what just happened, but I’m now absolutely certain that nothing is going to stop me achieving my goal today.

6:10PM – 410KM – I’ve sailed past my previous longest distance of 366km and am feeling amazing. There’s so much positivity and good vibes coming from the people I’m virtually riding with, strangers are keeping track of how far I am and calling out different milestones as I hit them with notes of encouragement.

8:50PM – 500KM – Mission Accomplished! Suzie and the girls are by my side for the final couple of kilometres and cheer me on. I’m overwhelmed and incredibly happy to have achieved one of the most ambitious goals of my life.

Compared to some of the 300km training rides I did throughout the year this is night and day, I feel like I could keep going. As I’ve been celebrating and cooling down, continuing to pedal, I’ve clicked over to 501km. Suzie informs me “Well now it’s an odd number, you can’t stop on an odd number!” I grin, and sprint one more kilometer, ending the day at 502km after 15 hours and 50 minutes of riding.