London - Glastonbury

Cycling to Glastonbury for summer solstice sunrise from Glastonbury Tor

[@paulcraddock2196]

Thank you for sharing this adventure, and have to say the view from the Tor was amazing, must have been really magic being there.

[@londoncenturies]

Hey thanks Paul, thanks for watching! Yes, that sunrise was totally magical, very happy I got to see it. I've got another ride coming up soon, so hopefully there's going to be a video in due course. Cheers and happy riding.

[@crazypedaller]

Thoroughly enjoyed that. Thanks for sharing.👍

[@londoncenturies]

Glad you liked it, thanks for watching!

[@thefairweathercyclist6521]

Always enjoy these jaunts. Looked like the effort was worth it with that sunrise

[@londoncenturies]

Hey thanks, glad that you enjoy them, so do I!! 😀 Cheers for watching, happy riding yourself...

[@Ballacks101]

Fabulous ride. My daughter is at Glastonbury so it was a lovely thing to see the videos she sent of the mayhem and partying and then the peace of your ride and sunrise. Thanks.

[@londoncenturies]

Glad you liked it and hope your daughter's having a great time at the festival. Two quite different worlds almost next to each other! Happy riding,

[@odetocycling]

What a great idea! Thanks for taking us along with you

[@londoncenturies]

Hey thanks for watching!

[@TheLongstaffaudaxer]

Well done. Beautiful end 👏🏾💪🏽🚴🏿‍♂️

[@londoncenturies]

Glad you liked it and thanks. Yes, that was a fabulous way to end. Happy riding!

[@MP-th4nx]

Another quality video .... I love following your journeys ... thank you for sharing

[@londoncenturies]

Thanks for watching again - much appreciated!

[@kaffeemitcola6506]

Thanks for sharing this beautyful ride. The end or the time after the brake to fill up caffein was definitely more the kind of ride I like than all the traffic and I hope you will always get healthy through this trafficmess. Liebe Grüße🙋‍♀

[@londoncenturies]

Thanks (again) for your kind wishes!! :) Maybe I'm just used to it, or maybe it looks worse on the camera than in reality but I find the traffic in London not so bad, really. At least they're moving slowly! It's when I get out of the city I start to get scared because they're driving at 80kmh when they should be doing 40... Yes, that sunrise from the tor was really lovely. Birdsong, mist, gentle wind - there's so much beauty around us. Thank you for watching and I hope you're having some good rides yourself.

[@WanderingJay]

what a sunrise! I just love the way you go "Im off to glastonbury" and off you toodle, lol. really enjoyed that, quality content...ATB WJ

[@londoncenturies]

Thanks WJ! Not sure if I've said so before but I appreciate your footage of Dartmoor, I was there a few weeks back not with the bike, just scrambling around Hound Tor. Fantastic area.

[@philtucker856]

Great stuff. Glasto Tor is beautiful at that time. Stunning views.

[@londoncenturies]

Glad you liked it, Phil. Yes, awesome spot for a sunrise. Thanks for watching again, happy riding!

[@philtucker856]

@@londoncenturies yea great content. You must have been knackered filming that sunrise after work and then a ride. Very sensible getting train back 👍

[@londoncenturies]

@@philtucker856 Yes I was Phil. I didn't say so in the video but I wanted to have a go at a late night start to a ride to see how it went, to help with another ride I've got coming up in a few weeks. Turns out it's ok for the one night but murder the next morning!!

[@NathanielHill-d3d]

Top man Top cyclist 🚴🏻‍♀️ 🇬🇧

[@londoncenturies]

😃cheers! Thanks for watching Nathaniel, thanks for commenting.

[@oisin_lol]

That was lovely ❤What a beautiful spot at Glastonbury Tor 🏰Ah yes, the boy racer exhaust pipers! We have lots of them in Belfast. At least they know how to overtake. I find the non-licensed boy motor bike scramblers the most unpleasant - sometimes ripping by me at top speed pulling a wheely. Its the wild west here at times!! 🤠 Looking forward to the next one ☀

[@londoncenturies]

Oh dear, they've spread across the Irish Sea to Belfast, have they? Actually, I'm always looking for new places to ride and Belfast is sort of on the list, although it may take me a very long time to pull it off. Is the Antrim Coast any good? Thanks for watching and glad you liked it.

[@oisin_lol]

@@londoncenturies Greetings. I've cycled from Belfast up the Antrim coast and all the way along the coast (give or take) around to Galway. Amazing trip over 4 days: Donegal and Mayo the highlights. But yes, the Antrim coast road is stunning. Belfast - Torr - Ballycastle - Giants causway for example. It can get quite busy and very popular with motor bike racing enthusiasts. As mentioned before, there is also the wee boat from Campbelstown to Ballycastle which opens up some interesting possibilities. Your're inspiring me to go explore! But for now i'm somewhat stuck here as I look for a new job.

[@themoodyteam]

Magnificent view at the end there, chapeau!

[@londoncenturies]

Cheers, glad you liked it. So did I!

[@marklepine1]

Great ride. Half expected you to pitch a tent with the masses.

[@londoncenturies]

:) not this time Mark! Thanks for watching!

[@wjp555]

Great video. I don't know why you don't have 100K+ subscribers.

[@londoncenturies]

Wow, thanks, great compliment. Nor do I! :)

[@themoodyteam]

8:13 After 2 bottles of cold coffee and a vat of grapefruit juice, they’ll not be the only ones ‘testing their exhaust pipes’ 😂 💨💨💨

[@londoncenturies]

Good thing I wasn't riding in a peloton! 😳

[@robmartin1792]

Another fantastic episode 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👍🏼 What you won't do for some excellent content for your peeps 😉 That sunrise... What a wonderful way to start the day and finish your journey!!!! Thanks for sharing your adventure with us. ✌🏼#everyrideisepic

[@londoncenturies]

:) cheers for this, Rob! Glad you liked it, hope you get some good riding in this weekend!

[@WheelersAtLarge]

Nicely done Sir, a great idea, well done for getting out there. I planned a route around the border of my home county of Dorset. Didn't do it, maybe one day 😁🚴 Lowestoft, Ness Point. Been there at the end of a coast to coast from StDavids....

[@londoncenturies]

You did St David's to Ness Point - that's so cool! And the Dorset plan sounds great, too. Your county nearly killed me earlier this year but I hope to get back at some point, and live to tell the tale. Thanks for watching!

[@WheelersAtLarge]

@@londoncenturies You should definitely ride the longest coast to coast, it took 4 1/2 days (100ish per day). I should've taken a better route out of Wales to miss Cardiff and Swansea maybe go further north across the Midlands. I went south as a ride across the bridge was too tempting. Anyway, enjoying your adventures, epic stuff👍

[@londoncenturies]

@@WheelersAtLarge Totally fantastic idea. Nice one. It's now officially on the list of Things To Do. Hang on, isn't Land's End - Lowestoft further? What about Aberdaron - Flamborough Head? Oh heck, you've got me looking at the map now... :)

[@WheelersAtLarge]

@@londoncenturiessorry senior moment, StDavids to Ness is the widest point. ( Not tallest or furthest or diagonal)

[@londoncenturies]

@@WheelersAtLarge No worries, I love looking at the map - they all look like great routes. Happy riding!

[@jiji1946]

somehow even more impressive than usual..... whether due to the spontaneity, or the fact that you set out at evening (hence largely a dark ride), or due to the objective sunrise from the Tor.... i don't know. emotionally moving, actually! thank you!

[@londoncenturies]

Wow, thanks for this, glad you liked it. And what you say in your other comment, too. I find those long night rides quite draining because it takes me a while to catch up with sleep but the upside is that there's nothing like it for making you a bit dislocated from normal life, and then to pop up in a new place (like that tor) feeling a bit spacey is just awesome. Thanks for watching and commenting, much appreciated.

[@TheYohtube]

Great ride..

[@londoncenturies]

Thanks, glad you liked it. Cheers for watching and commenting.

[@TheDreamHustle]

I am still trying to process the fact in my mind that you finished the ride with such impressive timing while totally captured the essence of PBP ride on your Gopro (if I am not wrong), Sir. Quite a refreshing video and thoroughly enjoyed watching. It's quite inspiring to be honest. Thank you so much. Also, would be grateful if you could kindly share the information about how you trained yourself for this ride or for long distance rides like these. Thank you once again! Cheers. Love and respect all the way from Bharat (India)!

[@londoncenturies]

Hey, thanks for the comment and thanks for watching all the way from India! Training? Well, at my age (54) I think I lose speed/strength very quickly but endurance seems to stay a lot longer. Therefore, I try to do as much base training (zone 2) plus long rides but NOT too many of them - they require too much recovery time. Most of my longer rides are up on the channel. But in between them, I try to do a lot of shorter, harder efforts (z4, z5 and above). Living in London, most of these are done on the turbo, especially in winter. It's really boring! :) Happy riding to you!

[@matthewjohnson9073]

Great stuff. Love your videos they are inspiring. So much so that I'm going to have ago at C2C2C. Hartlepool to Maryport and back its about 220 miles. 70 miles more than my longest ride. Any advice?

[@londoncenturies]

Brilliant!! Advice? Err, nothing you won't know already: don't go off too fast, eat before you're hungry etc. 70 miles is a long way. Just had a brief look at possible route: it won't be flat but I guess you know that! Good luck with it, let us know how it goes!!

[@alanwalters9970]

Another great video. One question for you but when you did Glastonbury how did you get home and how do you get home from your other century rides?

[@londoncenturies]

I took the train back from that one, and some of the others, too. I try to get a ride in whenever I have to visit somewhere (family, work etc) but the train is always there as a fallback. Thanks for watching!

[@DIY-DaddyO]

Once again blown away by your efforts. Would it be possible to have a link to the route on Strava or something?

[@londoncenturies]

Sure thing, here you go, but this one comes with a health warning, it's a bit of a crap route, I reckon there must be much better ways of getting there. Having said that, the second half was ok, I'd say if you're going to ride it yourself, find a better way to Reading/Newbury. Oh yes, and the Strava version includes the end bit (I went down to Yeovil to a truck stop cafe that opens at 7am, they do a mean cooked breakfast :) Happy riding! www.strava.com/activities/9317984164

[@DIY-DaddyO]

@@londoncenturies Cheers, more for curiosity than anything. I'm way off tackling anything like this at the moment, especially on my single speed mountain bike. However it's a good excuse to get a new bike 😬😬😬

[@lewiswalker7803]

Good work. I live in Frome, 16 miles from Pilton. You wouldn’t recommend the route to London then? Ive always fancied it from Frome.

[@londoncenturies]

Not the one I took! It was a rushed job, I'm sure there's a better way of getting there. If I do it again, I'd probably keep roughly the same route west of Reading (ie, North Wessex Downs) but perhaps heading through Marlborough, but then look for a better way of getting into London than the one I took. My tried and tested option from the west would likely be Chertsey, towards Walton, then up the river to Hampton Court and Richmond Park. What do you reckon? Cheers for watching,

[@lewiswalker7803]

@@londoncenturies that sounds a decent route to be fair. Thanks for the entertaining videos. 👏🏽

[@drmajharrison]

I have just stumbled across this channel and am enjoying dipping into these videos. Any chance you could do a brief review of your kit? I am considering buying a Brooks saddle - is that what you have? I'd be interested in your views as I tend to find anything over 50 miles can be a little painful on my rear even with padded shorts!

[@londoncenturies]

Hi! Well, you're in luck, because I just posted a video about this stuff a couple of weeks ago. Here's a link: kzbin.info/www/bejne/pKmWZn2Ji5hgf7M Saddles: Call me a cynic and I know some people swear by certain saddles and I suppose I find some a bit better than others but generally I think cycling's a pretty habitual sort of activity and as long as the equipment isn't terrible, I reckon we mostly adapt to what we've got, just by virtue of spending hours riding on it. I'm happy with this rubber Brooks Cambium thing at the moment but am also trying out another older one I had in my shed (and which I might use in a few weeks for Paris-Brest-Paris ) because I don't really trust the strength of the Cambium one for carrying a heavy saddle bag. Your comment about comfort: have you tried measuring rides not by distance but duration, then increasing by no more than 10% at a time? Thanks for watching!

[@drmajharrison]

@@londoncenturies Thanks for the reply - I feel a bit of a wally as I hadn't spotted that episode! I'll check it out. TBH I normally do a mix of cycling and running but for the last 6 few months I have been training for a marathon so have only just got back into cycling. You are probably right - I should be more grown up and increase distance / duration more gradually. I did a few 10 mile trips in / out of work and then did my usual weekend route and it was this longer ride that caused a bit of discomfort. Impressed with your London --> Milan effort! Great filming too 👍

[@londoncenturies]

No worries! If you can run marathon training durations, my guess is it’s just muscular-skeletal adaptations to do the same on the bike. But they can be HARD. I used to run (a very long time ago) and when I tried to go back to it from cycling I found my Achilles are now so shortened it was agony. Wouldn’t be surprised if a similar thing works in reverse.

[@jiji1946]

on another note..... interesting that all those thousands gathered at Glastonbury, not in the spirit of sunrise and ancient mystery, but surrounding themselves with noise and light (and probably mud)..... strokes for folks, i know, but I also know which I would choose.

[@londoncenturies]

Yes, me too! I find it kind of fascinating to ride past and see them all there but I’d much rather be up on the hill watching the sunrise in peace and quiet….