2012-06-23 Sat - The Maths Geek Ride 0001.5 - London to Bletchley to London

leaving in 5, see you on warwick.

Leaving at 9:30 sharp, hope a few more faces appear...

Job done squire.

Thank you Em and everybody. I really enjoyed that. On the way back I somehow got lost between Laurel and Hardy and Starsky and Hutch. When I had a look at navigation I was well off route. Then the batteries died on the Garmin between Bletchley and Whipsnade. Rode to Hemel Hampstead and took the train.

Brilliant run, Thanks Object for organising (and all the brixton cycles crew) for encouragement

happy birthday and rip alan turing

Thanks also to the tunisian keep smiling bloke:

Appreciated the free fruit

Lovely riding with the leisurely group and seeing everyone at the pub:

And proof we made it:

Will post more pics when i get a chance.

Thanks all for a lovely ride - glad I came along after all and enjoyed meeting everybody. Can only apologise for my lack of communication, ears stuffed up after a cold do not a chatty bothwell make. Kudos to everybody who thought they'd get more miles in after the pub stop (nutters)

Not many more for the MK tour...

I had a lovely day, cheers Object. And all of us who came out today! x

Sounds like it was a lovely day, even more gutted I couldn't make it.

Next time.

Oooh and the whitebait were goood.

Thanks object for organising and an even bigger thanks to zander for riding into the wind all day for me and matt! U beast!

Thank you to everybody, especially Em! Was a cracking day out! Next year's ride sounds great, I'm definitely up for that!

On the way back I somehow got lost between Laurel and Hardy and Starsky and Hutch.

We had mechanicals but managed to catch the other two, who had mechanicals, and then we all managed to speed back to London.

Thanks to Alex (zander) for his tireless work into the wind and Alex (Airtime) for his wheel. On the return leg, thanks to Tom and Nic for making sure we kept the pace up and made it back to London in no time. A special thanks to science/maths for 'slipstreaming' / 'wheelsucking', otherwise I'd have been a lone ranger on this!

So was the fabled 20mph average achieved?

Thread lurkers need to know, but also for a maths ride this thread is currently somewhat statless...

6pt said they avereaged over 20mph. when the faster group caught up with the slower group they were a blur as the passed apart from a very clear 'bird finger directed at object.

Here are some more pictures
http://www.flickr.com/photos/david-dansky/sets/72157630261587846/

I was hoping to see you all returning from Bletchley, but we didn't cross paths. I set off much later than planned.

My ride was a tail wind nearly the whole way there, which was nice.

So was the fabled 20mph average achieved?

Thread lurkers need to know, but also for a maths ride this thread is currently somewhat statless...

I havent looked at splitting out the actual time garmin log, which included the return trip, but the slow part of the fast group were << 3 hours (BRT tells me it's more like 55 miles than 60 though), including a few minor detours here and there.. I was running my garmin on a TCX paced at 30kph, and we trounced the little triangle man somewhere around finsbury and kept him there the whole way - so I'd guess we were close to 20mph, but not quite there. probably about 19.

Think 6pt and Friday finished circa ten minutes in front of us - so based on a 55 mile route and our speed = 19mph would have broken the 20 target, but perhaps only just.

Job done squire.

20.4mph

So, this was a really nice ride. I hadn't been on a proper ride in ages and it was wonderful to get going again. The speed of the group was just right for me, and I loved the stop in St Alban's, with complimentary fruit from Bellaccino's and being buzzed by 6pt and Friday just after we had got going again, in St Alban's town centre.

The way out of London that Object had chosen I thought was much superior to the long, straight slog along the A1000 that I'd done so many times before. Hillier, yes, more up and down and less steadily rising, but much more varied and interesting. It got us out of built-up areas much more quickly, too.

There were eight of us at the start: Object, skydancer, Skully, vunugu, bothwell, fussballclub, habbi, and I. We met ian (conker) at the top of Hendon Wood Lane, and femtonatt joined us just after St Alban's after catching up--she'd been slightly late to the start--, so there were ten.

As mentioned, in St Alban's the two fastmen overtook us after we'd had a half-hour break, and the other three from the fast 'group', AirTime, mountaingoatmatt, and zanda, caught up with us on Gaddesden Row, asking 'how far ahead are they?', proceeding to set off in pursuit.

Gaddesden Lane and Gaddesden Row was just one of several continuous sections of lanes which gave the ride structure and ambience. The others were some of the lanes we used to get out of London, and especially the Brickhill Lane area. A really well-researched route that makes me feel I know the area up there much better now. The only bit I didn't enjoy was the descent of Bison Hill, but that was because my brakes were worn down and I need to readjust them.

Riding into Bletchley, Skully first demonstrated his local knowledge/traumatic memories by refusing to take any risks on the Lakes Estate. We arrived at the pub, the Eight Belles, about an hour and a quarter (I think) later than 6pt and Friday, and had a nice session there. Some then rode back, while quite a few went to the entrance to Bletchley Park, only to learn that there was now a £12 charge for admission, when three years ago we had gone around the grounds for free.

A nice volunteer back then had explained to us that up to that point it had only been volunteers working on maintaining the estate, and there wasn't enough money, so that they were aiming to put Bletchley Park on a better economic footing. This had now clearly begun.

Following this, all except for Skully, Object, vunugu, ian (conker), and I took the train back to London from Bletchley, while the four of us followed Skully around Milton Keynes on a trip down memory lane with the specific intention of exploring the 'cityscape'.

I've attempted to map our route here:

http://www.bikemap.net/route/1664202

This may not be completely accurate, and corrections would be appreciated.

Needless to say, it was very interesting to visit a failed experiment in urban development. I could go on about it forever. Suffice to say that, as much as I'd read about it, I hadn't expected it to be quite so low-density and wasteful, but I found all other assessments in the literature confirmed. The 'network' of Redways was pitiful; as footpaths many sections were quite attractive and sheltered away from roads, but for transportation purposes all of it was absolutely useless. (This is obviously widely known and not exactly a new finding.) The parklands were nice, and especially the Peace Pagoda, beautifully situated, where I could have stayed for longer.

I found Skully's story of people's attempts to have pagan ceremonies, and parallel disruption of them by Christians, very interesting. Whatever you may think of specific religious ideas, right in the centre of a supposedly ultra-modern city, people still found ways of more or less indirect protest against the ideas behind their surroundings. Not the most articulate protest, to be sure, but I suppose there's only so much you can do. :)

Shortly after we left the parklands and went through the centre of Milton Keynes on our way to the station, we saw a fresh car crash (no-one seemed injured, just slight damage to the cars). Even there, there wasn't really any evidence of a city apart from levels of motor traffic. All development turned away from streets and access was only possible by entering specific estates, e.g. shopping centres. As is well known, it all looked more like a silly science fiction vision of a spaceport, and it was depressing to see firsthand what awful 'visions' modernist city planners had at the time.

Thankfully, these are now thoroughly obsolete in many parts of the world, but there is still development activity which repeats these mistakes in aspirational countries which will only understand them through their own experience in the future. We'll also be stuck with Milton Keynes as it is now for the foreseeable future, and it will take a long time to change it--if that ever happens.

Cities can't be 'planned' on the drawing-board. They must grow organically, over a long time, or fail to acquire any character or distinctively urban qualities of their own. Too rapid a rate of development only causes problems and results in environments devoid of the qualities we need.

I enjoyed all of it immensely, hence the long ride report. Thanks to all for great company, and I look forward to doing this ride again!

You've somehow managed to write more words about town planning than about the actual ride. Even the bits that ARE about the ride have got town planning bits about "structure" in them!

Nice write up Oliver
All was great apart from the lack of a logo for this ride

;)

math is inexcusable.

maths or fuck off.

http://image.spreadshirt.net/image-server/image/composition/10212635/view/1/producttypecolor/248/type/png/width/280/height/280/maths-geek_design.png

Delicately put smiff
I suspect Oliver will think that a ride logo is inexcusable whatever it says
http://www.lfgss.com/post2970502-41.html

Logo rides are no-go for me.

Skully's spectacles rival even the internet itself in the 'serious business' stakes.

You've somehow managed to write more words about town planning than about the actual ride. Even the bits that ARE about the ride have got town planning bits about "structure" in them!

Can you tell that I'm obsessed by it?

I'm actually going to write a longer essay about it, too. You got off lightly. :)