Birthday Royal Challenge

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Sam
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Sam »

Jubilee line strike now suspended so no fear of it over running http://www.aslef.org.uk/shared_asp_file ... eID=135314
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tractakid
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by tractakid »

Right, let's start route planning again...
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Going Underground »

Will look out if I remember :) Well we have a cold crisp windy day for this one, I have done full networks over Christmas with temperatures twice above today's!
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by greatkingrat »

Decent run so far. Andrew, glen and me all started on the same train from QRP but have split up now.
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Sam
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Sam »

Is the meet up point still Horse & Groom?
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by greatkingrat »

Yes still the horse and groom. I doubt anyone will be there until about 1730 at the earliest.
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tractakid
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by tractakid »

OK... Here are the results.

1st Glen Bryant 4:55:32 Queens Road Peckham to Queensbury
2nd Peter Smyth 4:58:01 Queens Road Peckham to Queensbury
3rd Iain MacNaughton 5:22:44 Queens Road Peckham to Barkingside
4th Andrew Chilcraft 5:22:55 Queens Road Peckham to Queensbury
5th Kevin Brown and Damian Cook 5:45:14 Park Royal to Queensway

Congratulations to Glen on holding the *World Record for this challenge

*definitely official GWR

Thanks for all the competitors, and to all the attendees at the pub(s) afterwards. Not sure marching around several pubs is a good idea after a rather exhausting challenge, though. I think the draw for the R15 was a particularly fun way of doing it, thanks to Berc Matthew and assistant Sam for doing that.

My route went mostly to plan... due to bad maths I thought my schedule was 5:10, it was actually 5:20... but with a 10 minutes longer than necessary between Hackney Central and Highbury and Islington. This meant when I missed my planned connection at Hackney Central, I arrived to schedule at Highbury and Islington. Bad planning that actually meant I knew what I was doing for the next few connections! Exhaustion however meant my running was too slow at Hanger Lane to Park Royal, which meant I was 10 minutes down on schedule. I managed to get back 7... meaning I caught my intended but late running Bakerloo Train after my Warwick Avenue run. Due to the late running of the train, I was unable to make my intended Northwick Park train, so finished 3 minutes down on schedule. Perhaps my route would have been closer to 5:10 if my GA train from Tottenham Hale wasn't 19 minutes late, meaning I diverted via Seven Sisters! But then again... I saw the train earlier leave Gallions Reach (with Peter and Glen on it), I saw my train from Hackney Central leave, I saw my train from Park Royal leave and I saw my train from Northwick Park leave! So if my running was better I may have made all of them anyway!

Particularly well done to all those that went sub 5 hours... very impressive stuff.
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Iain
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Iain »

Well that was a thoroughly enjoyable day out - as I said earlier it's a great challenge to plan, although I obviously missed some options as I was well off the winning time. I think everyone (5 teams) took a different route.

I threw in a bit of a curve ball by not joining Glen, Peter and Andrew on the 12:17, deciding instead to go for the 12:27 into London Bridge using a "same rails" justification - although some might argue that since my destination wasn't an LO station that it wasn't legit. I'd spoken to Tractakid about it earlier and he seemed happy and it was his challenge. When route planning I'd tried the same start with Victoria as the next scoring station off the 12:17 and had a long wait for a train at Blackhorse Road to Barking, and the 12:27 start could get me onto the same train with a later start, so ten minutes clawed back.

My most worrying changes were the first two from the London Bridge NR station to the underground, but I made this nicely, and had a quick change at Green Park leaving me a few minutes up at the Victoria double back. I gained further leaving me about seven minutes up after the Oxford Circus change heading towards Hanger Lane. I maintained this at HL which left me with a dilema - did a welly it (not good as my knee is playing up) and try to get a train ahead, or did I do a leisurely stroll? What I should have done is walk down on the side where I could catch a bus, but I took the underpass route at HL to cross for the shortest run and to be on the right side for Park Royal. Soon after I started a bus shot past, and I raised my pace to try to get a train up at Park Royal. This narrowly failed and as I got onto the overbridge I saw the train passing the end of the platform. Still - the next one was on my schedule, although I regretted not saving my energy for the North Ealing to Ealing Broadway run, which I knew was also tight. To make matters worse, the next Picc train was three minutes late, leaving only seven minutes for a run I'd tried and managed in just over nine. Out of sheer desperation I looked right shortly after leaving North Ealing and saw a bus - not in my plans but it was a last hope. I decided for some reason that the Ealing Broadway bus stop was not the right one and stayed on for another stop, which may just have cost me my 13:44 train into Paddington but probably not.

The next train was only 5 minutes later, and thanks to it seemingly arriving a few minutes early, the fact I'd factored in a long change at Paddington and some good running, I made it onto the train I'd originally planned to be on to Royal Oak. A mad dash then to Warwick Avenue and up to Queen's Park. Here I switched to an LO train to South Hampstead, where I tried a new run to Swiss Cottage. It worked, putting me ahead by about eight minutes of staying on and going via Kenton. Then a Queensbury double back. I'd looked at Queensbury for a finish, but my gut feeling was there was a relatively quick doubleback using the Met. The two fastest times came off a Q'bury finish, so maybe I need to look again.

From there, back to Wembley Park to switch to a Met, taking out KX before switching to the Vic to go up to H&I. Here I had a nightmare time - I rushed up from the undergrounf platforms with two ideas in mind. The first one was to get the Dalston Junction train and walk to Dalston Kingsland, which was the scheduled train, and to look out for a late DK train that allowed me to do a cheeky Hackney Central/Downs switch to get onto an earlier train from BHR. Sadly no DMI was to be seen on the overbridge, so when I saw a train in on the DJ platform I went straight for it, to avoid missing it. After a minute of waiting I saw a train to Stratford (and DK) on the DK platform. Did I get off and gamble, possibly missing it and the DJ train? I decided to gamble, sprinted over and got caught up in a swarm of passengers off the train coming up. In spite of a lot of "excuse mes" I misxsed the train and then sprinted back over to the DJ train that was still waiting, and continued to wait with no explanation for a further five minutes. Although I had some time to spare to get my planned BHR train, this put it in doubt. Fortunately it came off by a couple of minutes, so after a DJ to DK run and a double back I was on the Vic up to BHR. This linked up nicely and I was on my way to Barking!

From Barking to West Ham, then one stop on the Jub to Canning Town with a switch to the DLR. I'd vowed to take the first one to come but I was fine for my planned one from the top deck down to King George V where I doubled back ~(-10 seconds according to the WTTs) but I had a back up plan of running to Gallions. I saw the northbound DLR train pulling in as we arrived, then realised we weren't going to stop level with it so I pulled off a mad sprint down half the length of the platform to make it. This left me with sixteen minutes to run from London City Airport to Prince Albert on the opposite side of the dock> My knee was really playing up by now so that was tougher than expected. I made it though, still on schedule. Then back to CT to switch to the Jub up to Stratford and a switch to finish at Barkingside. This was where things broke down, and I had to wait longer than expected, meaning I finished nearly five minutes over schedule with 5:22:44 instead of 5:18. I cursed missing the DK train as this could have saved something like fifteen minutes, although as it turned out it wouldn't have made any difference to the finishing positions - my route just wasn't fast enough.

All in all it was an exhausting challenge - quite long and with quite a few runs. Great fun though - think I'll try a Queensbury finish next year!
Full Network: Three completions, Best time: 17:18:18 - thanks Glen, Andrew and Rhys!
Former DLR 45 station record holder (with Glen, Andi and Stevo) - 2h:08m:57s
All lines: 46:11 (6th equal)
Zone One 2:52:51 (thanks Glen)
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Sam
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Sam »

There are platform information screens for ELL trains so no need to explain why it was waiting, it's called observing the timetable ;)
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Iain
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Iain »

If it was observing the timetable it would have left at 15:25 and not about 15:35!
Full Network: Three completions, Best time: 17:18:18 - thanks Glen, Andrew and Rhys!
Former DLR 45 station record holder (with Glen, Andi and Stevo) - 2h:08m:57s
All lines: 46:11 (6th equal)
Zone One 2:52:51 (thanks Glen)
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Sam
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Sam »

or was having a poo
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Iain
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Iain »

Sam wrote:or was having a poo
that's a lengthy poo :lol:
Full Network: Three completions, Best time: 17:18:18 - thanks Glen, Andrew and Rhys!
Former DLR 45 station record holder (with Glen, Andi and Stevo) - 2h:08m:57s
All lines: 46:11 (6th equal)
Zone One 2:52:51 (thanks Glen)
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greatkingrat
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by greatkingrat »

I think Iain may have got confused by the platforms at Highbury. There are in fact three platforms that can get you to Dalston.

The 1525 to Crystal Palace left from platform 1 at 1524.
http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/L20099/2013/04/03

Iain must have got on the 1532 to Clapham Junction which was on platform 2 and left on time.
http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/L21590/2013/04/03

Meanwhile you also had the 1522 to Stratford from platform 8 which left at 1527 which Iain tried and failed to catch.
http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/L74622/2013/04/03

Don't listen to these train drivers with their stories about poo and Tesco - they don't know what they're talking about :D
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Iain
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Iain »

Thanks Peter - I think that's highly likely. My inbound tube got in at 23 mins past so I probably missed it if it left early at 24 mins past. I must confess I just did a quick scout and hadn't realised there were two platforms for the DJ trains.

Yes I heard about the qrp incident, nasty stuff :(
Full Network: Three completions, Best time: 17:18:18 - thanks Glen, Andrew and Rhys!
Former DLR 45 station record holder (with Glen, Andi and Stevo) - 2h:08m:57s
All lines: 46:11 (6th equal)
Zone One 2:52:51 (thanks Glen)
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Iain
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Re: Birthday Royal Challenge

Post by Iain »

Ah that would explain why I didn't spot them - and the fact I was in a rush. A next train indicator would be useful :)
Full Network: Three completions, Best time: 17:18:18 - thanks Glen, Andrew and Rhys!
Former DLR 45 station record holder (with Glen, Andi and Stevo) - 2h:08m:57s
All lines: 46:11 (6th equal)
Zone One 2:52:51 (thanks Glen)
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