SLAM

[TubeDude]

Hi everyone. Over the last year or so I've tried a few mini-challenges with myself (All Lines etc) but it wasn't until yesterday that I decided to have a look round the internet having vaguely heard about "The Tube Challenge". I was delighted to find this fantastic community and have been reading through plenty of threads before I decided to sign up for myself. I'm very new to this and in the past only ever did routes slowly for fun, but planning transport routes and long-distance running have always been interests of mine so I think perhaps this is something I'd like to try against the clock.

I was reading through a list of challenges here - http://www.explorerticket.co.uk/tubechallenge/ - and the SLAM challenge piqued my interest as it states that no-one has ever tried it before (is this still the case?!). Obviously I would work up to it by trying All Lines/Zone 1 against the clock but having had a quick look at the map it looks as though it might be feasible.

Route 1: Morden - Clapham North - Clapham High Street - Clapham Junction - Vauxhall - Brixton - Clapham High Street (on foot) - Rotherhithe - Canada Water - London Bridge - Oval - Elephant&Castle - Waterloo - Southwark - Waterloo East - Woolwich Arsenal - Greenwich - Lewisham - New Cross - Surrey Quays - West Croydon - Reeves Corner - Elmers End - Harrington Road - Beckenham Junction - Sandilands - New Addington - Wimbledon - East Putney - Putney - Richmond - Kew Gardens

I have no idea how effective this route would be so please forgive me if it's dreadful, any advice/info on this route or tube challenging in general would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

[DrainBrain]

Hello, and welcome to the board.

I've been thinking about doing SLAM but have never quite got round to it. Your route looks generally reasonable, but you are missing several stations:

Cutty Sark - suggest add Greenwich -> Cutty Sark -> Lewisham
Crystal Palace - Sydenham -> Crystal Palace -> Sydenham, or Sydenham -> Crystal Palace -> run to Penge West.
North Greenwich - easy to miss, maybe Canada Water -> North Greenwich -> London Bridge.
Woolwich Arsenal - the visit on a National Rail train won't count. You need to take a DLR service at least as far as King George V.

At the start you could consider Morden -> Stockwell -> Brixton -> Vauxhall -> Clapham Junction -> Rotherhithe. That cuts out the Brixton/Clapham run.

To adopt a term from Bridge (the card game) I will call the above a Small SLAM. The purists among us would also define SLAM to include Battersea Park (not on the map, but on the Overground timetable) and Emirates Greenwich Peninsula (and hence you need to go on the cable car). I would call this a Grand SLAM.

Personally, I think it's reasonable to have records for both since we have Overground records with and without Battersea Park.

As for tips, there really is no substitute for experience. To the extent that your circumstances permit, just get out there and try different challenges or practice partial routes. Attempting the South London challenge (i.e. just the tube parts) might be worthwhile, for example.

[TubeDude]

Cheers for the advice mate.

Yeah, I meant to go from Greenwich to Cutty Sark (either by foot or DLR depending on times) and then back to Lewisham. Crystal Palace I forgot to write down (honest ) but yeah it would be a run to Penge West or a doubleback depending on times. North Greenwich could be easily added to the Canada Water section as you say. I forgot about having to be on a DLR train that's true, could I get on at King George V and start the clock when the train arrived at Woolwich Arsenal? I think I'd probably give the one service from Battersea Park a miss but your suggested change to the Morden section would be faster, so thanks for all your help.

But yes, I would definitely attempt other challenges before trying this and the South London one would be perfect.

[The Orange One]

Here's a route for the Grand SLAM, but it requires you to be at Earl's Court for the 05:21 down to Richmond (Battersea Park pretty much fixes the start time here):

Kew Gardens Richmond (District) Clapham Junction (SWT) Battersea Park (SN) Wandsworth Road (LO) Clapham Junction (LO) Putney (SWT) East Putney (run/37/337 buses if convenient) Wimbledon (District) Vauxhall (SWT) Brixton (Victoria) Stockwell (Victoria) Borough (Northern) Elephant and Castle (Northern) Waterloo (Bakerloo) North Greenwich (Jubilee) Emirates Greenwich Peninsula (run) Emirates Royal Docks (cable car) West Silvertown (run/474 bus if convenient) Woolwich Arsenal (DLR) Greenwich (SEN) Cutty Sark (DLR) Lewisham (DLR) New Cross (SEN) Rotherhithe (LO) Canada Water (LO) London Bridge (Jubilee) East Croydon (SN/Thameslink) West Croydon (Tramlink) Penge West (LO) Crystal Palace (run) New Cross Gate (LO/SN) Queens Road Peckham (buses/run) Clapham High Street (LO) Clapham North (run) Morden (Northern) Morden Road (run/93 bus) Dundonald Road (Tramlink) New Addington (Tramlink) Sandilands (Tramlink) Elmers End (Tramlink) Harrington Road (Tramlink) Beckenham Junction (Tramlink)

For the evening services to Battersea Park, other routes are possible (or you could reverse this one). I prefer morning routes (and thus the morning train) myself because it's less time for the service to go bust but evening routes are of course doable too.

[TubeDude]

A premilinary schedule has my (simple) route at 6hrs 57 minutes. Going from Waterloo - Canning Town - Woolwich Arsenal instead of by SEN as it turned out 15 minutes quicker.

[tangy]

I can confirm, the SLAM challenge has yet to be attempted, as mentioned on the Explorer Ticket website which I administer.