Your ride today.... (part 1)

[Cuchilo]

I had an eventful one today with my first fall and nearly getting run over
The forecast said nice in the morning and rain in the afternoon so I took the day off to do box hill . The forecast was a lie ! But by about mid day I decided to go for it anyway .

http://app.strava.com/activities/106974648

I had DL the route onto my Garmin that some one else local had ridden and I soon picked it up by Hampton court . By this time I had a wet bottom
I lost the course a few times and realised they had probably not done this route on road bikes as the course kept going off road but it really lost my by the time I got to Leatherhead high street . It seems they had gone shopping as after 5 laps of the one way system I decided they must have gone down the pedestrian area . It was while trying to work out where they had gone I had my fall . I stopped at a junction and hopped onto the pavement to have a good look at the road signs . I was slowly rolling forward and wallop . Suddenly im on my side with the bike on top of me .
I had rolled into a wide rain gutter that was full of mud and the wheels just slipped from under me . I didn't even know anything about it , one second I was upright , the next I wasn't . It must have looked funny Luckly I fell to my left so there is only a slight scuff on the bartape , everything else landed on me !
Any how back on track and heading up to box hill and the sun came out , it must have been about 2pm now and as it had been raining I had my lights on . A gazzilion watt flasher on the front and a clip on rear light . Heading down a main road I see a van pulling up out of a side road . I carry on and so did he
I noticed he hadn't come to a complete stop as I drew level with him so started to edge out into the road but he kept coming and speeding up . I was about central with the bonnet by this time and gave a harder kick to try and get away from going under the van but he must have seen me and hit the brakes . I have no idea how he didn't see me or how I didn't end up under the van . One of my nine lives used up I think ! I must be oweing someone a few of those
Onwards to box hill and the route went off road again but I was fed up with following that now so went where I wanted to go .
Box hill was very easy to climb I found even in the rain ( it had started raining again ) the trees provided a nice bit of cover and as it was during the week I pretty much had the road to myself . Very nice looking down through the trees as you climb up it though .
Once at the top I stopped for a photo and a banana

Im afraid I have no photo of the banana .

Coming back down the hill was just as nice but as the roads where wet and gritty I held back on my speed . I bet its great in the summer though .
As I got to Kingston I noticed I was at the 40 mile mark so decided to do a lap of Richmond park and then home to take it over the 50 mile mark .
All in all it was a great day out and the minor mishaps where over taken by the lovely English country side
The TCR was also a dream to ride , I had changed the saddle over for my Selle as I am used to that saddle and fitted the Fizik onto the Defy . I think I will leave it that way as the Selle is about half the weight and I don't think it looks out of place . Its also allowed me to raise the saddle by about 10mm as its not as bulky .

 

[potsy]

Unexpected day off work today so used the time to do a couple of jobs around the house I'd been putting off, luckily once that was done I had time for a few miles and had a ride to Tatton park.
Plan was a well used route of around 25 miles with a little sit down by the lake after 9 miles, somehow in getting the bike ready I forgot to attach my pump so had to do an out and back ride instead to save a potential long walk.

A few pics

Quiet in the park

Off roading on a road bike

Wildlife

Coffee stop view

 

[i hate hills]

My first ride out in ages. In fact my first one this year . Although no biking i have been out walking as the weather has been pretty rubbish of late. Today i experienced a new thing. We've all had a headwind, a tailwind well today i had no wind. Couldnt believe how still everything was .The roads were a bit messy with mud by i enjoyed my run. Climbing the hill at Stannochy there was a shooting party in a nearby wood ,a big one by the sound of things and it felt like i was cycling through a battle field. Another new one on me was just about being clipped by some nugget on a roadie, i mean we have all heard of car near misses but i thought we were all Jock Tamsons bairns out on two wheels under our own steam. If you were that cyclist give your fellow hill chaser more room next time you are out. Back into town and i stopped off at Semi chem to get mrs something for her sore throat, the shop assistant did well not to laugh at the sight of a sweating circus escapee clown ( on account of my BRIGHT attire). Hope this will kick start my cycling year, all the best, keep safe Mike.

 

[philtalksbx]

After falling out with grumpy teenager I thought I really needed to get out and get some air. Not much, just a gentle breather away from traffic to recharge the spirits.

I took the Cube and ended up doing more than 20 miles in great conditions by going down the Grand Union towpath, cut through Syon Park to the Thames and down to Richmond Bridge. If I've gone this far I might as well do a proper job so up tp the park, around the trail loop, back down to the river and along the Surrey bank to Kew Bridge, back through Brentford to pick up the canal and back home.

Lots of mud and puddles which made it all the better. There's nothing like a mountain bike to turn men of a certain age into very big kids. I came back splattered from head to toe, it felt great and set me back up for the day.

http://www.strava.com/activities/107189753

Drink stop, muddy, great fun.

Favourite drink stop after a loop of the park, looking down over the Thames past Twickenham

 

[booze and cake]

Before Chrimbo and fuelled by an abundance of beer I hit upon an idea. When I've sobered up there's a good chance I review pub ideas, laugh, and its canned before it starts. Well a few weeks have passed and I still had'nt kicked the plan into the long grass, so I decided to start it today.

I plan to do my own version of Harry Beck's famous tube map by cycling with a gps tracker the entire length of each London Underground tube line. I then want to try and plot them all on a map to show a geographically accurate representation of where each station is in relation to each other, that I hope to make into a poster to put on my wall, hopefully all colour coded the same as the original. London is not designed on a grid and I love the random nature of it, so I also want to have all the station names added but in a bit of a messy fashion to match the street layout. I want it to be London as it really is, not an easy on the eye version for tourists and commuters.

In order to 'draw' the tube lines by me riding my bike I will have to ride each line from end to end, and as many lines have branches I will have to go down those branches and back again before going down the next one. This means I'll be cycling longer than the actual network. I've mapped them all out on ridewithgps and it comes to about 428 miles just for the lines, not including any riding to the start from my house or returning home afterwards. The central line is the longest route at about 77 miles and the district, northern, piccadilly and metropolitan lines are all over 50miles each. And so with 11 lines and 379 stations it may take some time.

I've lived in London 20 years but there are whole tube lines I've never been on so I'm ashamed to say I don't know my way around as well as I should, so if nothing else it will improve my London geography. I don't have a garmin so will be using old fashioned hand scribed route notes so there's plenty of potential to get lost. So as today was super mild for the time of year, I thought I'd get cracking, I was in shorts all day which must be a first for me in January.

So after 4 hours sleep, which in my book is nowhere near enough, I was up at 5 and planned to leave at 6. As my geared bike has a long list of parts needed to get it roadworthy, the suffering would be increased by doing it all on my singlespeed. So as I live in Vauxhall I decided that today I'd try and do the Victoria line from Brixton to Walthamstow, then cycle to Epping to do the central line to West Ruislip and then the Bakerloo line back to civilisation and then home.

I did get lost a few times, especially on the final bakerloo line, as I was tired and it was dark, note to self do bigger writing on notes used in darkness. I also realise I need my eyes testing as even with the street lights I could hardly read the street names in the index of the A-Z when I did get lost which was a right pain. And I don't smoke anymore but I feel like I've smoked 40 fags and when I got back I was covered in a grime that makes me look like I've spent the day mining coal.

But those things aside I had a very enjoyable day with plenty of exploring new territory. It was a bit windy and it rained for about 20 minutes this morning but was otherwise dry all day. I had no mechanicals or punctures and the bits of Essex I was in were'nt as badly flooded as I expected. All in all I managed the furthest I've ever done on a singlespeed as the total mileage including 'transfers' was 141 miles and total time including stops was just over 12 hours, not bad for January. My right knee aches a bit but nothing major. Not sure I'll feel like doing any tomorrow, I have had a beer but I'm playing it cautious and not committing this time. I only took photos of the start and finsh stations which are dull so I'll spare you them and resolve to try and take some better ones on the next run.

And blimey its amazing how many times I've seen the tube map and not noticed things, like the fact the Metropolitan line starts in Amersham, which is no word of a lie north of Watford whose idea was that? The fact Watford itself is on the tube also came as a shock.

Victoria line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168039
Central line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168037
Bakerloo line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168035

 

[Rohloff_Brompton_Rider]

Out to the coast with @Pennine-Paul and spotted this dissatisfied bike owners way of getting rid...

Not a very special way of locking a bike.

 

[ianrauk]

Out to the coast with @Pennine-Paul and spotted this dissatisfied bike owners way of getting rid...

Not a very special way of locking a bike.

DOH!

 

[Stonechat]

Out to the coast with @Pennine-Paul and spotted this dissatisfied bike owners way of getting rid...

Not a very special way of locking a bike.

Even left his computer on.

 

[Stonechat]

Before Chrimbo and fuelled by an abundance of beer I hit upon an idea. When I've sobered up there's a good chance I review pub ideas, laugh, and its canned before it starts. Well a few weeks have passed and I still had'nt kicked the plan into the long grass, so I decided to start it today.

I plan to do my own version of Harry Beck's famous tube map by cycling with a gps tracker the entire length of each London Underground tube line. I then want to try and plot them all on a map to show a geographically accurate representation of where each station is in relation to each other, that I hope to make into a poster to put on my wall, hopefully all colour coded the same as the original. London is not designed on a grid and I love the random nature of it, so I also want to have all the station names added but in a bit of a messy fashion to match the street layout. I want it to be London as it really is, not an easy on the eye version for tourists and commuters.

In order to 'draw' the tube lines by me riding my bike I will have to ride each line from end to end, and as many lines have branches I will have to go down those branches and back again before going down the next one. This means I'll be cycling longer than the actual network. I've mapped them all out on ridewithgps and it comes to about 428 miles just for the lines, not including any riding to the start from my house or returning home afterwards. The central line is the longest route at about 77 miles and the district, northern, piccadilly and metropolitan lines are all over 50miles each. And so with 11 lines and 379 stations it may take some time.

I've lived in London 20 years but there are whole tube lines I've never been on so I'm ashamed to say I don't know my way around as well as I should, so if nothing else it will improve my London geography. I don't have a garmin so will be using old fashioned hand scribed route notes so there's plenty of potential to get lost. So as today was super mild for the time of year, I thought I'd get cracking, I was in shorts all day which must be a first for me in January.

So after 4 hours sleep, which in my book is nowhere near enough, I was up at 5 and planned to leave at 6. As my geared bike has a long list of parts needed to get it roadworthy, the suffering would be increased by doing it all on my singlespeed. So as I live in Vauxhall I decided that today I'd try and do the Victoria line from Brixton to Walthamstow, then cycle to Epping to do the central line to West Ruislip and then the Bakerloo line back to civilisation and then home.

I did get lost a few times, especially on the final bakerloo line, as I was tired and it was dark, note to self do bigger writing on notes used in darkness. I also realise I need my eyes testing as even with the street lights I could hardly read the street names in the index of the A-Z when I did get lost which was a right pain. And I don't smoke anymore but I feel like I've smoked 40 fags and when I got back I was covered in a grime that makes me look like I've spent the day mining coal.

But those things aside I had a very enjoyable day with plenty of exploring new territory. It was a bit windy and it rained for about 20 minutes this morning but was otherwise dry all day. I had no mechanicals or punctures and the bits of Essex I was in were'nt as badly flooded as I expected. All in all I managed the furthest I've ever done on a singlespeed as the total mileage including 'transfers' was 141 miles and total time including stops was just over 12 hours, not bad for January. My right knee aches a bit but nothing major. Not sure I'll feel like doing any tomorrow, I have had a beer but I'm playing it cautious and not committing this time. I only took photos of the start and finsh stations which are dull so I'll spare you them and resolve to try and take some better ones on the next run.

And blimey its amazing how many times I've seen the tube map and not noticed things, like the fact the Metropolitan line starts in Amersham, which is no word of a lie north of Watford whose idea was that? The fact Watford itself is on the tube also came as a shock.

Victoria line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168039
Central line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168037
Bakerloo line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168035

Central line used to go to Ongar
Lines have changed over the years
Interesting project- and without using a gps!!

 

[derrick]

43 miles today, a group of us went down to Regents Park to do a few laps of the outer circle, 5 laps, more or less 10 miles, was good fun, stopped for a drink and a bit of a feed then up through Hampstead to get home, got two punctures and one of the others lost a screw from her cleat, could not unclip her right foot, was a bit of messing about to get her shoe disengaged, we were soon on our way again, stopped at a pub at the end of the ride and had a well deserved beer, and spent the next hour discussing the ride, had a really good day.
http://app.strava.com/activities/107189313

 

[ColinJ]

Out to the coast with @Pennine-Paul and spotted this dissatisfied bike owners way of getting rid...

Not a very special way of locking a bike.

With bag and computer very nickable even if bike had been locked sensibly!

 

[Wayne Tully]

Took the MTB to my 5K run


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqIyF2LNSMA&feature=youtu.be

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

With bag and computer very nickable even if bike had been locked sensibly!

well you can't ride off with it because the lock is through the rear wheel, but you could still easily walk off with it!

 

[ColinJ]

well you can't ride off with it because the lock is through the rear wheel, but you could still easily walk off with it!

lndeed! As far as I am concerned, the function of a bike lock is to ...

• Deter casual bike thieves who are not equipped with tools to break locks.
• Persuade professional bike thieves to steal the unlocked bike(s) next to yours instead
• Meet the conditions set by your insurance company so you will get paid if/when it is stolen. Most/all companies will state that the bike must be securely locked to an immovable object, which the one in the picture clearly is not!

I had my bike stolen from school when I was 13 and do not want to experience that feeling again so I never leave my bike unlocked outdoors unless someone I trust stays with it.

 

[Wayne Tully]

Lovely 70KM with the club today, quite greasy but I almost had dry tyres by the time we got back.