Commuting Anniversary

dyrlac

A bit more than a year ago, my new ortho told me that I needed a six month break from running; a real shame as my old Dr feelgood had always just patched me up with cortisone shots. Having only recently managed to reverse my slide into fat bastardry, I needed to find some cardio that didn't involve elliptical machines. So, despite not having ridden a bike outside centre parcs since uni, I bought a CAADX the very next day; mostly on the basis of availability at my local Evans. My first ride was inauspicious, as I couldn't figure out how to downshift (thank god for 46T cyclocross gearing and a pan flat neighborhood). Strava tells me my first commute (a Sunday test run into the office) was on 27 October 2013, 19.5 km in 1:05:20 elapsed, which appears to have included a breather halfway up Wimbledon hill.

Some stats of interest for the past 12 months (probably only to me)

• Total distance: 8,518.7 km
• N: 3, not counting boris bikes
• S: 4
• FCN: 2 - 6
• PF Visitations: 5
• Clipless moments: 1
• Longest ride: 166.3 km (a KW sunday run to which I added 25 km in RP to hit the imperial century)
• Laps of Richmond Park: 60+ (anticlockwise); 45+ (clockwise, being the correct direction)
• Northbound Millbank sprints: 159
• KOMs: 1 http://www.strava.com/segments/7254180
• Kg lost: 4
• Months lost to injury: 1 (ice is slippery, even on foot)
• Net commuting savings (Train fare avoided - cost of bikes and bike bits): -£1,755 :oops:

Sincere thanks to the SCR community. Every day with the prospect of a scalp is a good one, no matter the weather or what's waiting for me at my desk.

rower63

+++

dhope

That's very good work for year 1.
My year 4 has been pretty dire after a good year 3 (though my running has improved). Roll on year 5.

EKE_38BPM

dhope wrote:

That's very good work for year 1.
My year 4 has been pretty dire after a good year 3 (though my running has improved). Roll on year 5.

Running?!? Burn the witch!

rhodrich

Likewise, I started commuting almost exactly a year ago - on the day of the St Jude's Day storm, when I found that there were no trains.

Since then, I've done 5,987.4 miles by bike (plus some where I wasn't recording with Strava), the vast majority of which has been commuting......

I still however have my season ticket - should never have renewed it last December!

surrey_commuter

Great idea that got me checking - my first commute was on April 17th so only half a year for and still remember my sense of wonder when I made it to work!!! Interestingly my first ride in took 1:24 and my PB is still only 1:10 which is quite depressing.

In that time I have done 5,200kms and 37 ACW of Richmond Park - I wasn't aware there was another way.

dyrlac

Well, at least you already had the bikes judging by your signature (unless you've gone mad on ebay). This is by far the most expensive cheap method of commuting known to man unless you have unnatural self restraint.

CitizenLee

Impressive stats!

I only started commuting on 23-10-14 so will be interesting to see where I stand after my first year. My journey to work is very short though (2.2 miles each way – don’t laugh!), so I doubt I'll clock up anywhere near as many miles unless I include riding my MTB. I just love the fact I never need to get the bus as it was a ten minute walk to the stop, a 5-20 minute wait for the bus and then 15-20 minutes for it to crawl through traffic... vs 10 minutes door to door on the bike!

The Rookie

First commute was 20/05/09, since then I've managed 4678 miles (travelling overseas looses me about 100 commutable days a year which hammers my numbers a bit!) Saving is £1608.26, costs are £471.25 (commuting bikes/parts only), although I'm about to add £50 to that for new wheels (bought off my MTB which is getting all new wheels!).

daddy0

I've been commuting for a little over 2 years now, but it was about 2 years ago to this day (almost) that I got my road bike and started using Strava. Since then I have covered over 20,000km - most of which has been commuting.

Total distance: 20,219 km + probably about 1000km not recorded.
N: 2 - one hybrid and one road bike
PF Visitations: lots
Longest ride: 251.6km (at an average speed of 32kph http://www.strava.com/activities/131527164)
KOMs: currently I have 69 DUDE! At one point I had almost 100, at which point I gave up caring as people were stealing them quicker than I could get them
Kg lost: about 20
Weeks lost to family: 3 - I was super fit and then we had our second child...
Net commuting savings (Train fare avoided - cost of bikes and bike bits): Lots - lots = not very much.

dyrlac

Surrey Commuter wrote:

In that time I have done 5,200kms and 37 ACW of Richmond Park - I wasn't aware there was another way.

Rower63's analysis of an ACW lap of Richmond Park (http://www.slidingseat.net/cycling/cycling.html) is a service to all humanity and forms the basis of what I Believe to be True about cycling. but it has the fundamental flaw of modelling an ACW lap. While it is no doubt true that ACW results in a cleaner run due to the roundabouts, going up Dark Hill is no match for Broomfield, and Sawyers is over before you know it compared to the long slog that is Queen's Road. (Go ahead non-Londoners and laugh ) Also, I don't like the adverse camber on Broomfield in the wet.

Daddy0 wrote:

KOMs: currently I have 69 DUDE! At one point I had almost 100, at which point I gave up caring as people were stealing them quicker than I could get them

Nice work DaddyO. I'd like to think my KOM count was artificially deflated by the fact that 90% of my riding is on segments covered by ride london, the olympic road race and the TdF (not to mention certain denizens of this forum), but in truth, that's just wishful thinking. :?

surrey_commuter

Dyrlac wrote:

Surrey Commuter wrote:

In that time I have done 5,200kms and 37 ACW of Richmond Park - I wasn't aware there was another way.

Rower63's analysis of an ACW lap of Richmond Park (http://www.slidingseat.net/cycling/cycling.html) is a service to all humanity and forms the basis of what I Believe to be True about cycling. but it has the fundamental flaw of modelling an ACW lap. While it is no doubt true that ACW results in a cleaner run due to the roundabouts, going up Dark Hill is no match for Broomfield, and Sawyers is over before you know it compared to the long slog that is Queen's Road. (Go ahead non-Londoners and laugh ) Also, I don't like the adverse camber on Broomfield in the wet.

Daddy0 wrote:

KOMs: currently I have 69 DUDE! At one point I had almost 100, at which point I gave up caring as people were stealing them quicker than I could get them

Nice work DaddyO. I'd like to think my KOM count was artificially deflated by the fact that 90% of my riding is on segments covered by ride london, the olympic road race and the TdF (not to mention certain denizens of this forum), but in truth, that's just wishful thinking. :?

I have never ridden past Ham Cross to Richmond Gate and never down Sawyers --- though if Rower has not mapped CW then it is probably not safe to go that way. I notice that in his exhaustive analysis he does not allow for the turbo charged effect of an enraged cyclist chasing down a Dynamo chaingang