Oh Cheers

beak would only be up at 5AM in East London with people he doesn’t know if a) he had one too many Monster Munch, or b) he is meeting fellow cyclists to ride the marathon course.

Riding the marathon course after organisers have closed the roads, and before the runners have set off is one of the greatest things, let alone rides, I’ve done. It is a unique, guerrilla opportunity to cane around the best of the capitals streets. Traffic-free.

Or it used to be a unique opportunity.

In 2008 ten people dragged their asses out of bed to see if it would be as much fun as they thought it would be. It was. Last year 150 people amassed at Blackheath for the same ride, the morning passed incident free and a few of the front runners made it across the finish line. Both rides were amazing experiences, equally intensified by the number of participants.

This year London Marathon organisers have communicated with an Internet forum where discussion is underway about the same ride. They’ve politely asked for the thread to be pulled and for riders not to attempt cycling the route, rightly citing insurance and the health and safety of staff that will still be on the roads setting up the course.

In hindsight there was no need to use a public, yet niche, Internet forum to rally the troops. Given the scale of last years event, it was only natural that it was going to happen again even without the forum. But people are keen, really keen to do this ride and they want to promote it.

The trouble with the Internet (along with the stupendous amounts of porn it offers) is that it is easy to forget sometimes that the wider world is watching, the authorities probably had an eye on the forum immediately after the 2010 ride. They had to do something about their potential problem, actively, rather than reactively.

The forum in question is now at a junction, it could chose to encourage the ride (keep it real), or work with the marathon organisers with a view to making the ride an official part of the day (sell out).

It remains to be seen how many people will now turn up on Sunday 17th April 2011. Head over to Blackheath and have a look. Get there early.