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Dunwich Dynamo - London to Dunwich bike ride, 8/9 July 2006

han

han

love is the answer
This year's Dunwich Dynamo is on 8/9 July.....anyone thinking of doing it?

I'm thinking about it. It sounds ace. Linky here .

Very hard work on the ol' legs I'm sure (as well as the stamina) but that would be offset by the community spirit and seeing the sunrise at the beach :)
 
:D

God I'd love to do that 'Cycle to the Sun' ride.....me and the Janster went there last year..twas beautiful..
 
Yeah I'm going to give it a bash.

Long way though innit, I'd better start getting some proper miles in at the weekends...
 
Dunno if anyone's up for going along as an urbanites posse?

Though we may all have different paces...

I guess that's what's nice about it, it's the kind of thing that loads of peeps go to on their own and meet new peeps! :cool:
 
Trying to work out whether I need to get some big fuck-off lights or not actually, most of the ride is going to be unlit save for (hopefully) the moonlight, and LEDs aren't going to be much use... hmmm.
 
richtea said:
Trying to work out whether I need to get some big fuck-off lights or not actually, most of the ride is going to be unlit save for (hopefully) the moonlight, and LEDs aren't going to be much use... hmmm.
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You'll be fine with LEDs. Make sure the batteries are fresh though!
 
han said:
Sometimes it's easier to see by the light of the moon in the counryside....
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Heh, not much moon last year :) There's loads of people though, you'll be in a convoy for the first three or four hours, and your eyes adjust to the dark pretty well. The roads are all pretty reasonable too. And then it starts to get light!
 
i've never heard of this before and it sounds like a wicked idea. i was a bit :eek: when i realised it was 120 miles overnight ...the most i've done is about 65 miles in a day between london and oxford, tho now i'm thinking about it, that was off road and through fields etc, so i guess a ride wholly on tarmac would be much easier. tempted. very tempted! I love the idea of getting to the beach as the sun rises and jumping in the sea :cool:

i'll defo think about it...an urban cycling posse to dunwich would be great!
 
Sounds like something I'd need to train for - but it sounds very nice and romantic :)
 
I read that as the Dulwich Dynamo, and couldn't for the life of me work out wht cycling from Dulwich to London would be such hard work.

Stupid drug addled brane :rolleyes:
 
Is it really a year since the last one? :eek:

Me & a couple of mates nearly did it last year but I didn't in the end cos I didn't have a proper bike (only a BMX) and I didn't feel I was fit enough.

I said I'd do it this year but I've still only got a BMX (and no money to buy the hybrid I want) and I'm certainly no fitter. :mad: :(
 
lighterthief said:
Yup, I'll be doing the Dunwich Dynamo this year. Did it for the first time last year - tough, but very enjoyable.
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how fit were you, did you do much preparation?

i do 12 miles a day atm which is a piece of piss, but i've never done more than about 65 in a day. i remember getting an ache/soreness in my knee after about 40 miles of the the second day (i'd done about 35/40 on the first day) so i guess i'd be worried about developing something like this that would leave me stranded and unable to cycle in the middle of suffolk at 4am :eek: but i guess maybe i'm a fit young lad and shouldn't complain! a few long rides in prep would be best i suppose
 
Definitely stock up on batteries. It's v dark in places and we were reading our map by cycle light.

Mind the cattle grids in Essex. No, honestly!! It was a moment of "why is that person in front of me jigging up and...ggoggoggooggoogogg" Oh that's why!!

Take plenty of sarnies. The third energy bar or piece of flapjack gets a bit tiresome when all you want is a Marmite sandwich or a packet of mini cheddars (which is what saved himself when he bonked). I also packed a small Thermos of super duper strength espresso coffee which gave us a nice jolt in the early hours.

If you're going with a partner, ensure your relationship is strong or you may return single :D I was fing and blinding at himself when we were but 2 and a half miles from the beach and he piddled off down some hill. I didn't have the strength to give him a full blast but he certainly got earful!

Apart from my initial panic when we set off and my eyes just wouldn't adjust, the worst bit I think was when we returned to Derby on the coach and realised we had a 2 mile ride home. Compared with what we'd just done, it was nothing but we were so sore and achey it was agony.

Bloody fantastic feeling to have done it though :D
 
Mogden said:
Bloody fantastic feeling to have done it though :D
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Sounds ace.....thanx for all the tips Mogden :)

Apparently, Southwark Cyclists are organising several coaches back from Dunwich that you can dump yer bike in (see the link in the first post).

Brixton Hatter - sounds like you'd be fit enough to do it already, methinks.

By the way - what route did you take when you cycled from London to Oxford? Was it mainly cycle path/canal or wot? Sounds like a nice thing to do...

Well I reckon it'd be great if we had a little urban posse...we could take flasks of soup and coffee and batteries and have a right ol' ball ;) :D

I'm gonna get training for this I think - as at the moment I only do 2hrs a day of cycling max, so need to up it with some day-long cycling at the weekend methinks....
 
Flashman was jibbering to himself when we got to the beach. Sleep deprivation and huge amounts of exercise does strange things to him it seems. He bought a hip flask of some sort of alcoholic liquor but he was in too much of a state to drink it.

I literally hoovered up the fish and chips and peas from the cafe on the beach. We arrived too late for brekkie. Squash in a towel if you can for a swim and have some change for the cafe breakfast.

Even 2 years later, I still can't quite believe I did it.
 
here's a tip - the coaches back don't leave Dunwich till about midday or even 1pm. We didn't realise this and last year we ended up at the beach at about 5.30 am.

We didn't fancy 7 hours hanging around on a cold, windswept beach so we cycled to the nearest station where we found loads of other half asleep cyclists. The train guard did his best to accomodate everyone but it was a bit of a squeeze.

The ride itself is not that hard - there aren't any hills to speak of. It would be minging in the wet though.
 
I might well be up for this... a long, flat road ride sounds like just the ticket....

might need a bit of training though.... ;)
 
Mogden said:
I literally hoovered up the fish and chips and peas from the cafe on the beach. We arrived too late for brekkie. Squash in a towel if you can for a swim and have some change for the cafe breakfast.

Even 2 years later, I still can't quite believe I did it.
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Woohoo! Did you do any training?
 
robotsimon said:
here's a tip - the coaches back don't leave Dunwich till about midday or even 1pm. We didn't realise this and last year we ended up at the beach at about 5.30 am.

We didn't fancy 7 hours hanging around on a cold, windswept beach so we cycled to the nearest station where we found loads of other half asleep cyclists. The train guard did his best to accomodate everyone but it was a bit of a squeeze.

The ride itself is not that hard - there aren't any hills to speak of. It would be minging in the wet though.
Click to expand...

Sounds like taking gear for all weathers is essential then! :D Did you go on your own or with a mate?
 
han said:
Woohoo! Did you do any training?
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Not so much training but for most of the weekends beforehand we did 40 or 50 milers and I was commuting to work every day on the bike. It's not so much a question of how many miles we'd done before, although that helped, it was just maintaining that motion for umpteen hours and being confident on the bike in the pitch black. It is the weirdest sensation going up a hill or even a small incline in the dark.

I'm just recalling some of the more humourous moments like Flashy chucking the fresh spare batteries in a bin cos his sleepy brain told him they were dead :rolleyes: And I got us lost for about 3 miles so we had to turn back :rolleyes: :rolleyes:
 
Oh yes. It gets quite nippy in the early hours but I made do with a pair of arm warmers and some Ron Hills over my shorts but then I'm a human boiler. Rarely cold me.
 
Was gonna do this last year, but couldn't due to a dates clash.. but this year seems free, so yep, well up for it!

Might do London to Paris ride as well at some point.
 
Ahh - so the key thing is to do some weekend 50 milers to prepare the ol' knees and peeps will be ok! :)

Mogden said:
then I'm a human boiler. Rarely cold me.
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:D Me too. I'm wearing a t-shirt, even outdoors at the moment....

*yay*, glad some peeps seem upferrit this year!

The nice thing about the Dunwich Dynamo, is that is seems like you can go on your own and meet up with peeps of the same pace... :)
 
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