What do you do when you get home with 290k (181mi) on your trip distance display?

Say “hi” to your girl, grab a handful of sugary treats and head back outside to ride around until the bastard clock ticks over 300k (180mi) of course!!

Yes, my first ever 300k ride (I consider it one ride if it’s within 24hrs in the one pair of knicks) and it was done fixed on a bike I rarely ride, mostly at night, carrying a full bag!

I was wrecked, with a dangerously sore backside, although I’m feeling quite okay now that I’ve eaten everything in sight.. until I try to stand up that is 🙂

Last night I rode the Soma (with new 45×17, 69.6GI gearing versus last year’s 42×15, 73.6GI) into London Fields for the start of Dunwich Dynamo 16. Meeting the forum bunch we imbibed pre-ride drinks and talked the usual crap. Weather was looking good. Riders seemed to be mostly the same as last year, even with 3000 londonfgss.com members. Soft. Roberto was setting a standard even Cipo would fail to meet.. silver skinsuit with aero helmet and yellow overshoes! Nice one!

We set out later than last year (giving us loads of flashing red lights to chase) and kept the pace easy. Since we’d left later, there wasn’t the massive bunches this time which made sticking together a lot easier. I did the majority of the riding with someone I knew and only now and then went away alone. This helped with pacing, unlike my Polar HRM which seems to be dying on me – for the 2nd year running!

The weather was LOADS nicer this year, it was much lighter with the full moon actually visible and we saw the famous roadside candles left by a leading rider. We got a tiny bit of rain entering Lavenham. Lavenham also happened to be the location of the feed station (last year’s place was getting renovated) and it had stopped by the time we left so, no problemo!

What’s with the roads being SOOOO much nicer east than the goat tracks they have scattered around the Chilterns out west?? I thought richies lived out west? I guess they all own BMW X5’s so they don’t need to worry about dodgy road surfaces. Anyway, without the never-ending rain of last year I noticed the sweet roads out east – pity about all the knobs driving on them. Some of the people leaving pubs were a laugh though. 🙂

Bit of a rest at the feed station, some coffees and a soup and we eventually gathered enough steam to move out.

I spotted a hedgehog crossing the road. I think it’s the first one I’ve seen that wasn’t road kill. Stopped in front of it to stop it being hit while the lads tapped the little blighter until he ran away. Animal Welfare job done.

“Most Agressive Rider” award goes to Stompy and Sam:

Stompy really suffered last year and yet he exhibited top HTFU properties and came back for more, and this year he was really moving along. Top stuff.

Sam, with next to no training, joined me for the ride back to Ipswich. He was on 250k+ when I left him at Liverpool St. Well done mate! Proper ‘ard! 🙂

Thanks everyone for smiling, riding with me, putting up with me and making the whole thing fun for the second year. Nice to meet forumers Jacqui and Moose at various points during the ride. I also look forward to hearing about the stag do that started with DD16.. cough up you guys..

This is before I set off with Sam to add another 80k to the day.. :S

My lame phone pics of Dunwich Dynamo 16 here.

Tommy’s much funkier Dunwich photos.

DanDNA’s Dunwich photoset

Corny’s Dynamo photoset

LondonFGSS.com Dunwich Dynamo thread

Steve’s Dunwich Dynamo 2008 ITV video

Stompy’s Dunwich Dynamo 2008 report can be found here.

RPM’s Dunwich Dynamo 2008 report can be found on Rollapaluza here.