Ride London 100

My godamn helmet is on wonky in all the photographs- why can I never get it to sit on my head straight?

Couple of me on the Mall head down, looking totally fucked.

my Mall ones aren't great either, the road surface is so buzzy! what's weird is that when I went through the arch, I saw the finish line. then I rode up the Mall seemingly entirely by myself. I didn't register going through the finish at all, I didn't realise until I saw a marshall waving at me to slow down! bit strange that.

I wasn't very good at stats at school, but here are the finish times by % and number (to quarter of an hour). I've combined the male and female times.

ridelondon men women by M.J.S., on Flickr

Not sure I want to spend £25 for a dozen photos of me. Maybe if I was prettier.

C'mon lets have a giggle at each others pics, I'm rider no. 15593.

Oliver, is that a valid use of "i.e."? It feels wrong.

'I.e.' means 'that is' (id est), but to clarify meaning. While not particularly elegant, you can certainly use it in the way you did. I wouldn't use it to indicate that something included something else. Better to say something like: '70,000 was the number taking part in all events this weekend, and it included those doing the Freecycle.'

'E.g.' means 'for example' (exempli gratia, literally 'for the sake of (an) example').

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_phrases_%28I%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_phrases_%28E%29

I'm afraid bothwell's explanation below is completely wrong. She left out a couple of full stops to boot, and I don't understand the logic of her last sentence, either. :)

use i.e. when there's only one option, and e.g. when there could be more than one

"I saw Boris doing a Savile on the ride, i.e. cheating like fuck"

"I saw Boris doing what Boris does best on the ride, e.g. looking like a belmer"

Yes, I am being Oliver today, as maybe he will be less hungover and tired.

I finished in 5hrs 15mins - pretty happy considering the lack of training and the excess of beer recently, thought it was going to take me 7hrs+. Best part was getting in a fast group for about 10 miles which was an amazing experience as I usually ride by myself, sadly it also meant that when I got dropped the last 6 or 7 miles were agony, thought about quitting a couple of times on the lead up to Westminster but ate about 4 gels instead and pushed through.

Great day out though, raised a grand for charity and looking forward to next time.

Thanks for the links to the photos and times....not sure I'm very photogenic on a bike

While not particularly elegant, you can certainly use it in the way you did. I wouldn't use it to indicate that something included something else. Better to say something like: '70,000 was the number taking part in all events this weekend, and it included those doing the Freecycle.'

Yep, couldn't think of a reason I shouldn't be used, it just read wrong.

oooooof!! I thought I was doing well with a 5.28!! Still first century and was aiming for sub 6 so thats good.

Thought I rode past one of you guys, blue pinarello - ladies jersey, but turns out that is a combination of Doctor Cake and Jazzythumper so glad I didn't say anything!

good day all round I thought, closed roads were excellent.

Highlights for me:

Chain ganging the first 35miles on closed roads and feeling like a pro, hand signals and everything
getting rid of the devil within at one of the water stops, felt a million bucks after laying that stank down
The long, awesome decent after Leith hill
The extraordinarily happy man just after the long awesome Box Hill decent ringing double bells constantly
Seeing the faaamily half way up wimbledon hill
hitting 40 mile an hour down Putney high street and bossing the hell out of the last 6 miles, like a boss, bossing his boss. believe.

:)

all in all a good ride! Waaay too much sugar consumed though, if I don't have an ulcer now I'll be very surprised!

Not sure I want to spend £25 for a dozen photos of me. Maybe if I was prettier.

C'mon lets have a giggle at each others pics, I'm rider no. 15593.

hey m.o.n. I totally recognise you!

Noddergeddon.

Freecycle was indeed a noddergeddon. Good to see families out on bikes though, etc, etc.

It was also funny seeing blokes on full crabon, TT bikes, aero wom woms, taking it far to seriously. I saw one such MAMIL fall to the ground as the children infront of him were going to slowly, he wobbled, didn't unclip and fell off.

I went for the world record thing with the Mrs: Most cyclists in a single file line or something. Which we didn't get. I think half the problem was that some less experienced riders and children couldn't keep with in 2 bike lengths distance from the person in front.

17337 for photos if anyone fancies a butchers. Only have a couple up though.

I was very surprised at just how fast fat, middle aged men can actually ride. It gives me a ray of hope in this grey bleak world.

4505 - it's not pretty.....

looking at the official times (Bacci search your number - I couldn't find my surname, they'd put me under my middle name) it seems the Men 14793 and Women 4414 are the starting numbers. When you display results it shows Men 12150 and Women 2900 finishing times.

Yeah, I've searched my number, and don't have a middle name: nowt. I do exist on the Pru results page though - so browsed round my time on the google doc and still nothing. Google doc could be missing (more) people, potentially...?

Enjoyed your write-up, hoefla.

I was drafting with a cheery mancunian with a pace that matched mine well from mile 25 but he thought he was a celebrity and insisted on waving and shouting 'THANKS! thank you! yep! thanks! thanks a lot!' at every single person on the side of the road so I dropped him on leith hill to get some piece and quiet and had a more sane second half.

6698. I echo styleovercontent's reflections.

Well, I did the ride at a rather more sedate pace than the rest of the forum it seems. My moving time was around 6h (I need to get better at stopping and starting my garmin) and finished the whole thing in under 7 hours.

I rode pretty much on my own until Hampton Court Palace, where I had a long stop to remove my pump from my frame because it was causing a friction burn on the inside of my left leg. Then I rode along with some ladies from Redhill CC, a lovely bunch.

Found jazzythumper at the Newham Corner Hub and we more or less rode together for the rest of the day. Blasted pass BoJo on my way up Box Hill, and then was almost taken out by him as he pulled out of a drinks stop without looking (I had stopped for some pics at the top of Box Hill as I've never done that climb before).

DAS'ed middleofnowhere but didn't see anyone else from the forum unfortunately.

Probably one of the highlights of the day was going through Dorking with all the barriers up and people cheering us on. That felt quite lovely.

Pics to follow.

tl,dr:
Ride was a lot better than I had expected!

Blasted pass BoJo on my way up Box Hill, and then was almost taken out by him as he pulled out of a drinks stop without looking

The man needs cycle training.

An epic day. At risk of sounding like a moany twat it seems so obvious it's a wonder they hadn't thought of this before. Boris calling it 'like a marathon' got it spot on - not for the athletic endeavour, but for the atmosphere and participation. I actually think they could expand it so the amateur lycra bandits can have their full on race, and the mamils their time, and the diving suited tandem bucket rattlers theirs.

My time was shite compared to a real cyclist, but still better than I was expecting. I was at a wedding in Brighton the day before and only got back for 2am. Alarms set for 4 and then forced to navigate (Marshall 1: The guy up there will direct you...Marshall 2: No idea mate, sorry - and that was the last of the 'help' we had, which made for an anxioius start) from the official drop off bit in Dalston through the mean streets of East London.

After the start - I thought the tannoy guy was pretty good doing a thankless task - Saw one guy have a fully pringled wheel around 6:45ish even before he passed the timing mat (definitely on the east A road section)...which was an upsetting start!

The Richmond park view of the sea of riders was pretty special as mentioned.

Leith was a little tricky, tho caught up with Boris at the top, decided against telling him what I really thought of him, and then proceeded to enjoy arguably the greatest stretch of road there, where the road side banks up over head height and the trees complete the canopy. Real 'wow' stuff (and soon appearing in a road porn thread). Managed 'the dreaded' Box Hill in one which really should remove it from any sense of anyone's fear of it for next time, and tbh will write to the national Trust to get them to rename it 'Box False Flat'.

16023 if you want to see some classic "head down" cycling on the Mall.

At that point I really wanted it to be over.

that really is a lot of head down-ing, although I like the hands on the tops "I'm just cruising here" Box Hill shots.
I'm going to buy mine for this one :)

Rider 5526 :)

Tut tut Dammit. What are you a triathlete or something?

I'm rider 7253, even a couple of pics of jazzy and me together.

haha!!
Dammit - tell me you had a wobble trying to turn your Garmin off while riding over the timing matt!! That would have been a brilliant photo.

looking good DC!

I think this one really conveys how much effort was being put in! Proper left right nodding going on!

Impressive collection of air pumps from Doctor Cake