My wife is going to London for work for a little over a week in late March and I am going to be tagging along with her. Wanted to see if I could hook up with some folks to ride with or perhaps get some info on local group rides? Not sure yet if I am going to bring a bike or try to rent one there… so if anyone has any info about bike rental that would be cool too. I ride a size 54 if somebody has an extra sitting around and want to make a lil cash
Also planning on catching a train over to watch the Tour or Flanders before we head back to the states… lucked out with timing there!!
She will be working at the Royal Marsden Hospital in Chelsea, and the hotel they are providing is supposedly a “5 minute walk”. Only info I have so far.
You’d be very welcome to guest ride with London Phoenix - we ride out from all over London but the main 4 weekend rides of varying paces to suit start from Whetstone in the mornings. We ride north out to Herts or Essex.
There are South London members who go out to Kent / Surrey and I’d be happy to hook you up, but there’s likely more clubs that go South more often than us.
Drop me a DM if interested, or go via the website and there’s contact details there.
There’s not that many organised group rides that are open to anybody. Mainly because the roads in and around London simply don’t lend themselves to large groups so group rides tend to be fairly small (quite rare to see groups of 10 or more) and are usually club rides or groups of friends. Worth having a look at GFTL (OUR STORY — GFTL.CC) as think their Tuesday morning rides in Regents Park are open. Richmond Park is good for laps and there’ll be lots of cyclists there. If heading further afield from Chelsea area maybe contact Cafe Giro in Esher as that’s a good starting point for rides in the Surrey Hills and they put on a lot of rides (https://www.girocycles.com/). Could also contact local clubs and enquire about joining their rides, London Dynamo are one of the biggest in SW London area.
I will be working in the afternoon/evening due to the time difference, so I expect to be riding mostly everyday and primarily in the morning. I am definitely fine with riding on my own but just wanted to see if I could hook up with some locals if possible. Would prefer to ride with another person or a very small group. But I think my wife would love for us to get in on a proper weekend group ride while there as well.
I’m guessing that I’m going to want to bring my rain gear? I’ve ridden in Belgium a few times but this is my first trip to the UK, seems like wet weather riding is inevitable…
March is likely to be 15c average and changeable, so a decent layer with a rainproof outer / packable shell will be the way to go depending on your tolerance for being wet. You never can tell these days though!
In and around chelsea the traffic is pretty bad so the best options are likely to be heading down to Richmond park and do a few laps on the quiet roads or there is a staff shuttle bus to the sutton site and from here you are on the edge of the countryside. So can do a good loop in the surrey hills easily enough.
Does you wife by any chance work in IT and coming over for the go live of a project?
If you don’t manage to catch a group ride, check out the Rapha store between soho square and Piccadilly Circus. Just by the entrance there’s a massive wall full of route cards grouped by discipline (road, gravel and such). Each card has a QR code which takes you to a komoot.
I lived in London for a few years and the center isn’t very bike friendly. The nearest central area for laps would be Richmond park.
This for sure, from Chelsea its quite a way out to the Surrey Hills (probably an 40-60 mins or so). Richmond Park is great for getting laps in, plus there’s the Richmond Park Pretzel (route available online). It won’t be the most exciting ride if you’re repeating it day in day out but its safe and traffic flows are restricted in the park which makes riding much more enjoyable.
Haha they have quite a bad reputation in London. Richmond park has all sorts of riders, from serious singletons to families and folks out for easy chats. They expect everyone to get out of their way and pass way too close without warning.
