2011-04-10 Sun - The London Classic

And I has suncream. Always.

#responsiblemother

Boarding the 7.26 to CP. Gets in just after 8 so see you at CSG about 8.15

Jenny J, I'll see you at CSG probably just after 8am. Hmm helmet or not? No mention of helmet required in any of the emails I received, so I'll be helmet-free.

allergy-tastic sunscreen or a bit of skin burn?
I think I'm going with the latter. expect to see me looking a bit pink (and walking up hills) in the afternoon :(
but overall :D

How the he'll did I miss this... Sitting here hungover aching for a ride to blow out the cobwebs and I'm late. Bah!

What an awesome little ride we had today. Great weather and a good bunch of forumites to roll around with. I had a very good time, mostly thanks to the equally agreeable company. In my opinion the route was even better than last year, with more cobbles south of the river and a more pleasant route to the southern hills. Well done to everyone who made the bleary-eyed early sunday morning start and finished by lunchtime.

/blowingtrumpetmode Much to my delight, this year I managed to get up all the 'lungbusters' which I mostly walked last year on the same bike...despite having to stop for a little stretch at the top of Westwood hill. Meh. It enabled me to slug it up Gypsy hill in relative comfort. Which Tiswas very kindly led me up ;) /blowingtrumpetmode

Paris-Roubaix wasn't too shabby either.

Het cobblebot

This was my first ride of this kind today, and it was great fun. Good to feel like part of a community and I didn't even get any abuse for not making it up a couple of the hills.

Look forward to more rides like this in the future!

Yes today was indeed awesome. Good people, good weather, good route. I really enjoy riding over the cobbles, does that make me weird..?

As Jenny said the route was surprisingly quiet and nice on the whole, very enjoyable.

Racing Damo up Canonbie was um, 'fun'..! And props to dropout for getting home at 3.30, still being there at 8.30 and leaving me struggling to keep up on Gypsy Hill, still not sure if he's a man or a machine...

Great day guys, thanks to Dave, Tricky, Gordan, Simon, Lincoln, Judith, Garreth, Risa,Yasu and everyone else who organised or participated in the bumpy hilly gloriousness...

We had a great time, bit intimidated by all the pro-looking riders and the look of that route! But we got a lot of great comments about our old tandem - the organisers were very friendly too, looking forward to seeing the pics when they get posted!

Simon and Amy

Was a good day ....
My Highlight was the Tea Hut on Blackheath....
Lowlight......the Lung Bursting Hills...!!!!
Still room for improvement next year (me)
Not the organisers as it was a Brilliant Route,well signed too....
Think stopping at LMNH's caused me to slow after taking on board too much Cake!!!
Roll on the next one.

Classic. Chapeau to everyone that helped organise and to everyone that took part. Great effort from the guys zig-zagging up Canonbie on fixed. I was on gears and managed to nearly run out, so again, hat!

Dropout is a machine. Powering up Eliot Bank and Gypsy Hill to win his tyres.

Great day for it. Thanks to my two early companions and my co-pilot from LMNH to the finish. We did 98% of the course due to a few wrong turns in East London. I really need to get over my active dislike of hills as I failed on Maze and Canonbie Hills and I missed out on Gypsy HIll somehow, but at the point I really didn't care :-).

Next year.

That was all kinds of win from the start the the finish. Perfect day for an excellent ride. Props to the man on the hefty mountain bike who kept up round the cobbles.

I even enjoyed the hills...

Lovely cheering at the telly in the pub, and great to ride home with drop out, his n hers tyres over our shoulders.

really really good fun. The first time my two friends and I had ever done anything like it and will definitely be looking for more.

Amazing weather and i didn't know London had hills like that. The view from the top of Canonbie, in both directions, was spectacular.

Thanks to Het Cobblemonster and all the others who helped organise it, brilliant work.

:(
Glad you all had fun. Not glad missed it. Later saw my pal who was taking photos, who said it was an excellent event.

i got the colnago out for this and had one of my favourite days this year on a bike.

hoonin round town with jenny j, gus, digger, 6pt for a while and others along the way was pure unadulterated fun.

the alma afterwards was lovely too. great atmosphere.

big up the london classic team.

at the back all day - leaving the Alma after a bacon bap, stopping in LMNH for milkshake and muffin, an ice cream on Maze Hill... perfect day for it! pleased we made it (inc plenty of walking) apart from the Canonbie loop (we just went straight up Honor Oak), particularly as my partner's training consisted of two extremely short rides in the last week - don't think he's been cycling apart from that in at least a year(!). mtb ftw on the cobbles and downhills, not so great slugging up :) the other half got precious about the cobblestones after puncturing on east london's fields of glass and started tiptoing through it all. highlight for me was the cobbled section in Deptford, just beautiful. and all the other little hidden corners I never knew existed. london's famous london always has more to reveal.

thanks to great organisation and a brilliant day.

Anyone seen any photos yet?

That was a tip top day! Really, really enjoyed it and was well nice to do something bike-y with my brother....we're going to try and do more riding together even though I'm in the smoke and he's in Cheltenham.

Totally conquered my fear of hills on my single speed too. Getting a round of applause from a bunch of lycra clad, geared up boys at the top of Honor Oak Park really made my day. Only made it as far as that 1st turn on Canobie Road though. Was well impressed with the view at the top, even more at those who made it to the top!

Lovely, lovely atmosphere too amongst the riders. Was feeling a bit intimidated by some of the head to toe lycra types fiddling with VERY fancy looking bikes at the start but it really was a ride for all! Will deffo be back next. Thanks to the Cobblemonster and everyone else involved!

Anyone seen any photos yet?

So far there are a fair few on Flickr under 'The London Classic 2011'.

Pleased you all enjoyed it :)

Dave

Is this chap ^^ on here? We had a little chortle about being all pleased with our distinct lack of technical wear (although I sneakily had some lycra padded shorts under my shorts!) whilst he was trying to hide from the sun.

Is this chap ^^ on here? We had a little chortle about being all pleased with our distinct lack of technical wear (although I sneakily had some lycra padded shorts under my shorts!) whilst he was trying to hide from the sun.

thats joe smiff.

There's 2 pickshures of me racing after Spybot and Fox.
Effort. Intensity. Denim cutoffs.