New to Camberwell SE5 as of January and I was thinking of trying to link up with some local shops social roadie rides but not really seeing much in SE London? I’d like something similar to Giro in Esher or Bristol Dropouts, where it’s a decent paced social ride with a coffee rather than fast club run really. Anyone ride regularly from South or SE london?

plenty of clubs and groups ride from crystal palace which is the main route to the hills, there are 3 cafes there, cafe st germain used to be the main one but Cadence a cycle specific cafe is now the favoured departure point.
clubs like brixton (affiliated/run by brixton cycles) also do led rides the other option is to head to richmond park for rides heading to surrey. BC website has a list of local clubs.

the good thing about your location is by heading south you are on decent roads by the time you reach west wickham. it’s one of the few areas inside the m25 with good riding.
part of the reason i moved to crystal palace 😀

Have a look at Brixton Cycles. They have a club ride most weekends AFAIK. London wheelers also used to have a lot of riders based in the SE. There is also Dulwich Paragon Cycling club or Herne Hill cycling club which are more purist roadie clubs.

Brixton Cycles are the most fun club in SE London 🙂

Good riders, lots of great routes out into Kent and North Downs, and not averse to beer either…

Cafe St German in Crystal Palace, 8:30 Sundays for the regular club run. Take a look at their website an email the club secretary for more info

the coffee at CSG is grim.

Coffee could deal tbh… Not sure I could cope with cafe st germain.

Cadence looks good. I’ll enquire…

I live in Bromley so we see most of the SE London Roadie clubs passing through at weekends.

Dulwich CC + Catford cycle club are regulars.

Catford CC also has a Skoda Octavia ‘team car’ which has a pro-team style roofrack.
Not sure what they do with it though – I only ever see it parked up behind the Café in Farnborough Village (where I live)

Farnborough Village

Most club runs also go through Downe village. Which is fun if you like trying to speak to Nigel Farage (he lives there). He ran away when we tried to speak to him 🙂

Rapha also run rides out from both their London shops (Soho and Spitalfields) although obviously there’s a bit more town to get through. They often “park-jump” through Hyde Park, Richmond Park & Bushy Park to get out round Windsor (via Windsor Great Park) from the Soho shop.

Otherwise, as mentioned, just head up to Crystal Palace one Sunday morning and there will be hundreds of riders from Dulwich Paragon, Brixton Cycles, London Phoenix and maybe a scattering of others, just see if you can join in with one of them – just check how quick they’re going to be cos they’ll split into fast, medium & slow groups or sometimes set off together then split into long, medium, short routes.

brooess – Member

Farnborough Village

Most club runs also go through Downe village. Which is fun if you like trying to speak to Nigel Farage (he lives there). He ran away when we tried to speak to him

My wife used to work in Downe and saw him a few times – usually being hassled by reporters/photographers.

I ride through Downe quite a bit as I’m basically at the other end of High Elms road.
Often see club groups around there.

Couple of nice pubs and a posh cake shop in Downe.. 😀