Road Cycling Club?

Is there a road cycling club in Forest Hill and if not would anyone be keen to start one and have regular rides?

I’ve opted you into our special-interest category for cyclists so you’ll be able to see all of our cycling topics.

There have been one or two mentions of the following club, and @Taoschno is involved so may be able to advise:

http://lewishamcyclists.co.uk

Thanks

Lewisham Cyclists runs regular rides, but we’re not a road cycling club in the sense of something like Catford CC, Dulwich Paragon. They are competitive cycling clubs, with organised riding regimes. We’re a pretty laid back, much more inclusive bunch, ride at the speed of the slowest and run a range of rides aimed at all abilities. We don’t have a club kit, or anything like that. So it really depends on what kind of riding you do, or want to do, as to whether you’d be happy with us, or better placed with something like Paragon or Catford CC. The latter may sound pretty local but are based in Sevenoaks, Bromley Orpington area. Their name dates back to when there was actually a velodrome in Catford. Penge CC are probably the most local club and they are a good bunch of riders, a bit more inclusive than the Paragon. When I say inclusive, I mean in cycling terms, rather than anything else by the way. Penge are a good club to try if you don’t want something as loose and laid back as us, but not quite as full on competitive driven as Paragon. As far as Forest Hill itself is concerned, there isn’t a named club for the area as far as I know. So if that’s what you want, you would indeed have to start your own.

There’s a ride from Vaidas bikes on Honor Oak Park every Sunday at 8am. 2hr loop plus the odd after work ride too.

Contact the bike shop or FB page for more info:

Oh yes, I forgot about that. And I live right around the corner! However I’ve never been on the rides, so don’t know what they’re like, in terms of average speed, focus etc. Any idea, James?

I’d recommend checking out Penge CC as well. They’re a very friendly bunch and meet every Sunday offering a wide range of club rides at all speeds and distances - it takes me about 10 minutes to get down from FH to the SE20 Cycle shop which is where they meet up on Sundays. You can find more details here: http://pengecycleclub.org.uk/adults/sunday-morning-club-rides/.

This sounds great as a starter club! Thanks

The Sunday ride from Vaidas’ is about 45km. Average speed ~24-28km/h (with stops at the top of longer hills for the group to reform). No cake stops en-route but often a coffee/cake at Hopscotch after.

As Nomis46 said, the bigger clubs like Dulwich Paragon and Penge have a range of groups/rides for different abilities or speed.

This all sounds really great. Really useful information. Thanks for the post @Jonny_Wright, have thinking the exact thing myself recently!

Welcome to the forum @Jake_North-Brack and @JamesCosterton

I’ve opted you both into our specialist cycling category so you can see all our cycling discussions on SE23.life

I met Simon T, a member of the SE23.life Strava group, on a Penge CC ride last Sunday, although it seems he’s not a member of this Forum.

Anyway, Penge CC is a really good club to join - lots of different options. Go for it, and looking forward to meeting more SE23 lifers!

If anyone fancies helping to run a regular ride, we at Finches are very interested in supporting this. We’ll arranged a mountain bike ride in the Surrey Hills in August which was hard work ( all 4 hills ) but great fun. We could have our own SE23.life jersey!!!

Sounds good to me

Lewisham Cyclists do a Surrey Hills ride 4 times a year (may have posted this before, apologies if so). The summer one is the longest. It’s here if folk are interested. Rather more than 4 hills. What are the four you do? We do shorter ones with less climbs in spring, autumn and winter. https://ridewithgps.com/routes/15547672

Hi guys,

Moved less than a week ago to FH and I’m quite keen of starting to cycle again (stopped 4 years ago). Any advice?

Hi @Vitor_Almeida - welcome to Forest Hill and also to SE23.life!

I’ve opted you into our cyclists group, so you’ll now see the Cycling category, which has discussions on cycle routes, casual rides and organised events.

Join The Anerley (https://anerleybc.org).Or just come along for a ride into Surrey or Kent. Today we did 65 miles to a cafe at Four Elms and an ale or two at The Plough, Dormansland. What could be better? There are shorter or faster rides. But just ride. There are other alternatives. There is no excuse.