Tales from today's commute....

[apb]

Nice ride at lunch, did a lap of Arthur's Seat. Meet a guy trailing an Eddy Merckx carbon jobby. I scalped him up the hill and then he scalped me back when it flatten out, so i just stayed on his back wheel as he was doing a good speed.

We had a little chat after the AS Circuit, he really liked the bike and was probably going to buy it. It looked the business. (if it was only steel).

 

[fimm]

Nice bit of SCR this morning.... was on my big bike, and running a bit late, and had tried to hoof it into a headwind. Caught up with a couple of roadies who didn't seem to be going very fast; but when I went past them they then stuck with me and after I'd failed to drop them they then came past again and I had to draft like mad to keep up thanked them for the draft when we went our separate ways... was about 5 minutes faster than I'd probably have been otherwise...

 

[donnydave]

Are you expecting empathy?

Nope, I had a nice ride in thinking about what I would have done only 4 or so years ago before I realised that cycling 12 miles won't kill me. What a chump I used to be.

 

[kevin_cambs_uk]

Managed to catch a guy on the busway, but could not go past him, but started chatting and he was on a lovely Peugeot bike with Reynolds 531 tubing and proper gear shifters on the down tube. Brought back many memories of my old Raleigh Elan, ironically I was wearing my cycling jersey that I bought at 18 ! not bad value at being over 26 years old for a jersey!

 

[nilling]

BSO wanted to race alongside me on a busy shared path, just slowed right down till he passed me :-\

 

[Deleted member 1258]

My timing was out today for some reason, I had a minor smidsy of the couldn't give a toss variety this morning and a couple of very close passes tonight, normally I would have these covered and they either wouldn't have happened or I'd have dealt with them before they caused any problems, but today it seems I was having an off day.

 

[Biscuit]

So today I decided to take the full susser on a rather lengthy but lots of fun, off road route from my place to work. It's a bit of a trek but left plenty of time.
Anyhow, one section is a new route on bridleway, past some houses, with a bit of a river crossing. So tonight on my way home I did the same route in reverse. Except this time I missed the turn for the bridleway, and went down the track parallel to it by mistake.
The short of it was, I rode around some woods, on a mowed track? Odd I thought. Turned out I was in some chaps back garden. * cough *
Eventually I found him on top of his sit on mower. After explaining my mistake, he told me to 'f**k off out of my garden' - Apologies given I returned to the track, where upon I met his daughter coming out of the house. Conversation went like this..

'Yes' she said, 'this is our driveway, there's the track over there'.
'Yeah I know' I replied, 'I've just spoken to your father - he's very angry'.
'That's not my father, it's my husband'
'Really.. damn sorry'
'That's fine, you can trespass any time you like ;-)'
'Err I'd better go'

Gotta love biking eh?

 

[srw]

Yesterday - 30 miles from home into central London along the A404. Completely uneventful.
Today - 33 miles from central London out to Guildford via Richmond Park and Cobham. Almost completely uneventful.

The only events of note -
1. Overtaking a roadie in Surbiton (I was on my flat-barred purple galaxy conversion with a bar bag and a saddlebag.
2. Getting dazzled by a nobber in Richmond Park. It was 5:30pm. I was squinting directly into the sun, which was shining brightly. But you had a light on your handlebars bright enough and badly adjusted enough to dazzle me. Why? Imagine what it would do to an impatient 4x4 driver!

The route to Guildford is mostly a good one, but the section between Esher and Cobham could do with a diversion, both for the filthy A309 roundabout with fast feeder lanes and for the horrible road surface.

 

[TheSpence]

Loving my commutes at the minute.

I have the absolute pleasure of covering the night shifts this week (YAY!) However that means that on my way in I get to see lovely sunsets, and on the way home I get to see the sun rise!
Loving it.

Although I have noticed it is getting a lot darker earlier - new lights purchased!

 

[Twelve Spokes]

Waterloo via Three Bridges again,London Bridge+Blackfriars Bridge+Westminster Bridge,waiting for my workmate at Bow for ride to sarf lunnon I was amazed to see him disappear up Bromley High Street,apparently he had trouble with his front mudguard.He had texted me about this but im not really a great fan of mobile phones so I didn't know.

 

[HLaB]

An uneventful commute last night, and a pretty short one as I wanted back to see fhe Tic game and do a local TT. To see the end of the game, I had to forego meeting my mates, I shouldn't have bothered but the self warm up seemed to be ideal with me knocking over a minute off last weeks time. 27.56 mins.secs is not too bad for a TT without tri bars.

 

[Gez73]

Massive recycling plant fire played havoc with morning commute today. Roads closed and police and fire service all over the place! Been going since about 9 last night apparently. Still got to stay on the bike for longer at end of my journey!

 

[MisterStan]

Too many beers drunk at a wedding we attended on Sunday - hard work this morning and it shouldn't have been.

 

[MickL]

Did the triple hill today, first time Ive done it and to think this time last year I wouldn't of been able to manage it. I love my Subway I do

 

[potsy]

Massive recycling plant fire played havoc with morning commute today. Roads closed and police and fire service all over the place! Been going since about 9 last night apparently. Still got to stay on the bike for longer at end of my journey!

Came out of work at 10pm last night just up the road from it, roads were starting to be shut then.
Not urprised there was still chaos this morning, though it did look a very big blaze.