Originally Posted by coasting

It was semi organized which means it was arranged, time and place but there were no signs, no support, no marshalls, nothing. It was like one giant group ride. that's what made it scary. If you break down at 3 am in the middle of nowhere, you are Fed. i saw a lot of people broken down by the roadside and I felt so sorry for them. there was excellent arranged return journey by bus and our bikes were taken care of. I reckon there were more than about 700 cyclists. last year there were 1000 cyclists. You could see blinkeys for miles and miles strung out along the road and groups huddling around a strong headlight. at each pub huge peletons of people would take off after having a drink.

it was one of thse things that started off as an anarchic hipster thing and then became mainstream and just exploded. it was even blogged by the Guardian newspaper so thats how mainstream it got. what with the cycling revolution we are supposed to be going through, the media got more interested i think.