Let's hear it for the early morning commute...
Yesterday was baselayer-cold but bright and sunny around 0630. After a brisk wiggle down to Hammersmith I picked up speed up Hammersmith Road and on into Kensington High Street. Up at the end I did have the misfortune to be scalped by someone with two (full) panniers which rather deflated me. But no matter, I took him on the drag up to the Albert Hall where I did notice his S-Works helmet and Van Nicholas titanium bike! He got me again in Hyde Park along South Carriage Drive, but I dug deep and hit 25mph on the hill up to Hyde Park Corner to get him again, and then of course stood panting at the road junction desparately hoping he wasn't going my way. Then a nice rumble along Piccadilly, Clerkenwell Road and Old Street where all the lights turned to green. The result of this great ride? A new personal best into the office of under 33mins for 9 miles (not bad with 75 sets of lights in the way) with the endorphins flowing and setting me up for a long day nicely.
Returning home (I take a different route) I saw no other cyclist stop at red lights (everyone, and I do mean everyone, I saw going in my direction jumped them), had an idiot taxi driver beeping me for taking primary in the bus lane even though I was being held up by a taxi in front, has three close calls with motorbikes doing around 50mph as they 'made progress' along the Euston Road, and was undertaken by at least 4 scooters pulling away from traffic lights. The crowning glory was a moronic taxi driver who, when I jocularly said "close enough for you mate?" when he pulled up a few cm from me then proceeded to swear at me, telling me that he had already had to "swerve around me" as I wasn't cycling in the gutter.
And finally on the last stretch towards home, my route up a road with only room for one vehicle (cars both sides) was tormented by cretinous car drivers who were not prepared to wait a couple of seconds, insisting that I move out of primary across the potholes (it must be the most potholed road in London) so that their 2 tonnes of steel could hurtle by at 30mph within inches of my elbow. The last few got a shout of "next time, wait!" but I was a bubbling cauldron of hate by the time I got home.
So let's hear it for the joys of early morning cycling, and let's try to forget the horrors of the evening rush hour, particularly in the first week after the summer holidays.
EC
Yesterday was baselayer-cold but bright and sunny around 0630. After a brisk wiggle down to Hammersmith I picked up speed up Hammersmith Road and on into Kensington High Street. Up at the end I did have the misfortune to be scalped by someone with two (full) panniers which rather deflated me. But no matter, I took him on the drag up to the Albert Hall where I did notice his S-Works helmet and Van Nicholas titanium bike! He got me again in Hyde Park along South Carriage Drive, but I dug deep and hit 25mph on the hill up to Hyde Park Corner to get him again, and then of course stood panting at the road junction desparately hoping he wasn't going my way. Then a nice rumble along Piccadilly, Clerkenwell Road and Old Street where all the lights turned to green. The result of this great ride? A new personal best into the office of under 33mins for 9 miles (not bad with 75 sets of lights in the way) with the endorphins flowing and setting me up for a long day nicely.
Returning home (I take a different route) I saw no other cyclist stop at red lights (everyone, and I do mean everyone, I saw going in my direction jumped them), had an idiot taxi driver beeping me for taking primary in the bus lane even though I was being held up by a taxi in front, has three close calls with motorbikes doing around 50mph as they 'made progress' along the Euston Road, and was undertaken by at least 4 scooters pulling away from traffic lights. The crowning glory was a moronic taxi driver who, when I jocularly said "close enough for you mate?" when he pulled up a few cm from me then proceeded to swear at me, telling me that he had already had to "swerve around me" as I wasn't cycling in the gutter.
And finally on the last stretch towards home, my route up a road with only room for one vehicle (cars both sides) was tormented by cretinous car drivers who were not prepared to wait a couple of seconds, insisting that I move out of primary across the potholes (it must be the most potholed road in London) so that their 2 tonnes of steel could hurtle by at 30mph within inches of my elbow. The last few got a shout of "next time, wait!" but I was a bubbling cauldron of hate by the time I got home.
So let's hear it for the joys of early morning cycling, and let's try to forget the horrors of the evening rush hour, particularly in the first week after the summer holidays.
EC
