Report of some kind

I remembered I didn’t report on how my London to Brighton ride went, so I’ll write a brief description of what I found to be the most important points:

• I cycled 72 miles in total, instead of the usual 54. Why? Because I’m special and cycled to Clapham from where I lived then had to find a hotel to stay the night.
• Camelbak hydration packs, are useful but if your fucking valve drops out because it gets caught on your backpack, you get very wet, very fast.
• The south is hilly, much hillier than you think. In fact the gearing I have on my bike is totally inadequate for the hills along the route, whilst I could have done a few more and rode up many you get a lot of asshole weekend cyclists who stop right in front of you without any warning. I like that people are getting more into cycling and do this kind of thing, but if you’re slow stick to the left side of the road and don’t fucking stop without any attempt at warning other cyclists. Not only is it bad ettiquette but will lead to someone running into you when the roads are as congested as they were.
• Riding it on a fixed wheeled bike is not only fun, but also a great way to show the world what a complete masochist you are. Although I spotted one other guy (with more intelligently chosen gearing) riding fixed and a bunch of single-speeders.
• I completed the ride in 4.5 hours, slower than I wanted but with so many unknowns and it taking an hour just to get out of London thanks to bicycle caused traffic jams…it was to be expected.
• Roadie women are ruthless, or at least the really competitive kind which dropped their work team two hours ago and if they’re not going to wait for their workmates they won’t wait for a masochist they buddied up with for a good 10 miles or so.
• Most importantly, the BHF are somewhat retarded and Southern Rail are complete tossers. This doesn’t affect me personally but the BHF told everyone that folding bicycles would be allowed on trains, considering they’re just pieces of luggage once folded. What did Southern do? They hired fucking nazi stormtrooper bouncers, blocked off brighton train station and made it known that not even folding bikes would be allowed on. What did affect me was their decision to ban bikes on all their lines that day not just the London to Brighton line, which again is a massive case of corporate stupidity and probably caused a lot of inconvenience for people served by Southern nowhere near Brighton.

I’ll take part again next year, but this time I’ll use a bicycle with multipe gears and try and get my time closer to 2 hours.

Before I forget, riding downhill at 37mp/h and pedalling at a pace dictated to you by gravity is an interesting experience.