Dunwich Dynamo 2016

[PeteXXX]

As it is getting ever more popular (a mate and I did this years dun-run for the first time) will the authorities want to start getting involved soon? The roads around from London Fields and pretty much up to Epping, were totally clogged up. After that, it thinned out a bit.
Hopefully it won't become a victim of its own success!

 

[mjr]

It would be pretty sick of the authorities to get involved. The roads are clogged with motorists often enough and they don't want to stop them.

 

[Andrew_Culture]

As it is getting ever more popular (a mate and I did this years dun-run for the first time) will the authorities want to start getting involved soon? The roads around from London Fields and pretty much up to Epping, were totally clogged up. After that, it thinned out a bit.
Hopefully it won't become a victim of its own success!

Not wishing to be too annoying, but they are some of the bits that are the most fun! A highlight of that part of the journey on my first Dun Run was a fella in a Merc winding down his window and saying to about a thousand cyclists 'can you all move out of my way please'.

 

[PeteXXX]

It would be pretty sick of the authorities to get involved. The roads are clogged with motorists often enough and they don't want to stop them.

Sadly, It's what 'Authorities' feel the need to do!

 

[PeteXXX]

Not wishing to be too annoying, but they are some of the bits that are the most fun! A highlight of that part of the journey on my first Dun Run was a fella in a Merc winding down his window and saying to about a thousand cyclists 'can you all move out of my way please'.

I don't disagree.. It all adds to the joy of the ride! Several car-bound folk were asking what the ferk was going on, in a questioning way, rather than aggressively, and were happy to be part of the experience when we told them what we were doing..

 

[Trickedem]

The beauty of the DunRun is that it isn't organised. As a result it would be difficult for 'the authorities' to get involved.
I had a great time this year and the support along the way, from pop up refreshment stands was magnificent.
There were a few impatient motorists near Epping, but after that it was very quiet on the roads. There were also a few twunts on bikes, but as there are thousands of riders this is not surprising.

 

[jefmcg]

According to the London School of Cycling, DD was a paid event for most of the 90s. That's something that the authorities could probably have put a stop to, but as it is now I doubt it could be stopped without some weird anti-terrorist style kettling. There is nothing to ban at the start, except making some bylaw to make it an unlawful assembly or stopping selling of the maps - but if they did, that wouldn't change much, as most people use GPS or follow each other these days. "They" could ban the buses and lorries, but which "they" would that be? I can't imagine the people of Dunwich minding much that 1,500 very tired and hungry people spend an hour or 2 in their town, mostly sleeping or queueing to buy food. And London would find it difficult to ban the buses that start in Dunwich. What would they have to do, set up road blocks at M25 crossings? The railways have already done all they can to stop it

And sadly, someone has already been killed on it, but no one tried to stop it then, so I doubt a H&S argument would hold water.

 

[mjr]

I've posted this before, but a couple of years ago Strava decided to do a heat map of a typical Saturday. They thought is was broken because they got some funny data. Turns out it was the night of the DunRun. Sadly it ends a midnight.

Anyway, zoom into Essex then move the slider to right to see the DunRun

http://www.strava.com/saturday-heatmap#0|23|8|51.87060|-0.12647

I can see what looks like a dun run in the early hours too, with the first to head home using the A1152/Wilford Bridge and then the old A12 (now partly A1214) into Ipswich and later people using the coast route and ferries. Did some people do it a day early or is something odd going on?

 

[Flying Dodo]

I can see what looks like a dun run in the early hours too, with the first to head home using the A1152/Wilford Bridge and then the old A12 (now partly A1214) into Ipswich and later people using the coast route and ferries. Did some people do it a day early or is something odd going on?

Probably the Dulwich Paragon & London Dynamo team(s), having won their race to the finish, then zooming off to Ipswich.

 

[jefmcg]

I can see what looks like a dun run in the early hours too, with the first to head home using the A1152/Wilford Bridge and then the old A12 (now partly A1214) into Ipswich and later people using the coast route and ferries. Did some people do it a day early or is something odd going on?

You're right, and that's very weird. The blog post http://labs.strava.com/blog/a-saturday-mapped/ might help.

It's clearly done using local time for each area, Melbourne people hitting the beach road shows up as 6am. So either they extracted different data for each time zone OR they got a 24 hours over a fixed UTC and just mapped them on to the local time. So Sunday 3am becomes Saturday 3am.

That's what it must be. There are as many cyclists heading into Dunwich at 3am on Saturday morning as are on the roads at 11pm - judging by brightness of the line. Unless there were another 1000+ riders heading out 24 hours early without leaving any trace on blogs.

This is what it was like between 11pm & midnight

and this is what it looked like "23 hours earlier"

Cool, you can watch the whole DunRun.

But the thing you really learn from this? In 2013, no one liked strava as much as the British! (Greenland, not so much)

 

[redflightuk]

This time last year I was starting to plan rides for 2015, the Dun run went straight into the diary. I hadn't dun it(sorry) for a couple of years, anyway February arrived and there's rumblings about bike bans or booked only bikes so I decided against the ride.
Fast forward to the day which had been a very nice one I had a mad moment at about 5pm and decided to go to the seaside, I fed Red and turned him out in his field then packed some food and drinks and set off for Great Dunmow. I joined the route and settled into a steady pace, I wasn't out to beat a time I just wanted to get there, everyone seemed to be having fun and I love the way people along the route are out clapping and cheering everyone along. The pop up food stalls are a very welcome sight at silly o'clock on a Sunday morning. The villages flashed by and all of a sudden I was on the beach. There was already a long queue for breakfast but it was worth the wait. After watching the sun rise I mounted the bike again and retraced the route all the way home which meant I was able to see some of the villages in daylight. I arrived home with 222.9 miles on the clock, tired /hungry and very happy.

Roll on 2016

 

[RoubaixCube]

If there are any londoners here doing the ride - me and a friend of mine are trying to hire a van or a car we can fit a bike rack on to take us home after we're done. My mate who will be the driver can drive anything apart from a military tank so if there are a quite a few of us that are going to be needing a lift home, hiring out a small mini bus to get us all back home isnt a far fetched idea providing that all vehicle hire costs are covered.

Currently. Its just the driver me and another friend who are planning it so we are taking a small car with a bike rack to keep costs down.

We would like to get vehicle hire sorted out as early as possible as it works out a little cheaper for us. If youre from london and youre interested then feel free to PM me so i can start making the arrangements.

 

[rb58]

If there are any londoners here doing the ride - me and a friend of mine are trying to hire a van or a car we can fit a bike rack on to take us home after we're done. My mate who will be the driver can drive anything apart from a military tank so if there are a quite a few of us that are going to be needing a lift home, hiring out a small mini bus to get us all back home isnt a far fetched idea providing that all vehicle hire costs are covered.

Currently. Its just the driver me and another friend who are planning it so we are taking a small car with a bike rack to keep costs down.

We would like to get vehicle hire sorted out as early as possible as it works out a little cheaper for us. If youre from london and youre interested then feel free to PM me so i can start making the arrangements.

Presumably your mate the driver is not actually doing the ride? Driving home after cycling all night is really not a good idea.

 

[RoubaixCube]

Presumably your mate the driver is not actually doing the ride? Driving home after cycling all night is really not a good idea.

Nah, Cycling is not his thing. Given his chunky barsteward prowess I dont think he'd enjoy it very much

Hes going to be driving to the finishing point and waiting for us to arrive... 'if' we ever arrive

 

[Andrew_Culture]

Presumably your mate the driver is not actually doing the ride? Driving home after cycling all night is really not a good idea.

I was wondering about that. I can barely walk straight after the Dun Run let alone pilot an automobile