The Loooong Commute

A pretty standard 7 days of cycling last week ended with taking a spin to work but not to do any work!

I wanted to see what commuting to work would be like on bicycle for me personally. It is a pretty straight forward route using the A41 from Hemel to central London. Conditions were perfect and I was quite excited by the interesting challenge of pedalling to the place I spend most of my waking life. I had in mind it would take about 2 hours and be close to 30 miles.

Not many eventful things on route to point out. A few golf courses, reservoirs, shopping centres, farms but then I hit (not literally) the National Grid Elstree and the London school of flying at Elstree Aerodrome located right next to each other. Probably not the best thought process to have these two so close together. Further spinning got me to the ULO (University of London Observatory) and the outskirts of London town.

Having had a great average speed and good continuous movement up to this point I knew that would all be halted by the number of impending traffic lights, roundabouts and crossroads ahead. I wasn’t wrong…stop, start and chudder chudder through Brent Cross, Swiss Cottage and St Johns Wood and I was on the edge of regents park. With Maple House and the amazing BT Tower now in eye line I wondered why I had actually taken this journey as I should be switching off from work at the weekends.

With plans to go out that evening I decided not to cycle back in order to get home quickly and I jumped on the train home as I usually do on a week day but this time having to lug the bike on board.

Here were the stats:-

Distance: 26.67 mi

Time: 1:39:39

Moving Time: 1:34:05, Elapsed Time: 1:39:39

Avg Speed: 16.1 mph, Avg Moving Speed: 17.0 mph

Max Speed: 34.0 mph
Elevation Gain: 817 ft

The final training plan is still hills hills hills from here on in......