advice for tube challenge starting at cockfosters?

I've not done the challenge (I have done a couple of dry runs of the all line challenge (travel at least one stop on each line - the record is under 45 minutes but I've come nowhere near that)

However, reading other peoples' accounts (usually not fully detailed - they do not want to give away their trade secrets!) I believe Cockfosters - High Barnet is a popular between-line "run" on the challenge because of the relatively short distance and direct bus route, so few challengers for the record would waste that easy switch by starting or finishing there. Favoured start and finish points are those at the end of long branches remote (geographically as well as topologically) from any other - Chesham and Heathrow are favourites - because of the way the T4 loop works, it is easier to do Haethow at the end)

(Stanmore/Edgware and Morden/Wimbledon are other easy loose ends to tie together, and Upminster has a quick fix by returning to the City by C2C. Epping is best done as an out and back so you can do the Hainault loop as well as the direct route via Snaresbrook, although Leytonstone is a good jumping-off point to get to Walthamstow)

The challenge has of course become more difficult since the Olympia branch lost its regular weekday service. A purist complying with the Guinness rules also has to do the challenge on a weekday - this was originally because certain stations, such as Aldwych, Cannon Street and Shoreditch, were not open at weekends - but engineering works would usually make the full tour impossible anyway.

What gets me about the Tube Challenge is that the network seems to be constantly expanding so how can you beat the time set by someone who did it say prior to the T5 extension?

If the first attempt was before the closures of Aldwych and Epping-Ongar:
1) How can you now replicate the attempt?
2) What was the most common approach for factoring in the likes of Shoreditch, Aldwych, Epping-Ongar, Kensington Olympia and Chehsham?

Has there ever been a London Overground, Tramlink or DLR challenge?

I have done the Emirates one but...

I did the Met Line challenge on Saturday, unfortunately I think a fair few other ppl did it in the same time as me

And if we had not stopped for lunch at Amersham, the sneaky use of the North Curve and the warp speeds we achieved on a couple of the runs would have taken some beating! ;D

I believe The Rules say that you must arrive or depart (or both) by a London Underground service, which rules out passing through Olympia on the Overground. (Visiting T4 by Heathrow Express is also verboten)

The only exceptions are when the Overground operates part of the same service (north of Queens Park, south of Gunnersbury.

You also have to call at all stations, so no using fast trains on the Met - so sadly I suspect the "Met Challenge" attempt on Saturday would have been disqualified!

ok... so would my run be considered "complete" if olympia is not being served on the 2 days i do the network and i was to visit every other station?? if pushed i could just about do it in 1... but tiredness and irritability would set in and thats not conducive to co-operation (if this strikes anybody as being of an autistic nature, thats because i was diagnosed as aspergers at the age of 14... i'm "on the spectrum" to use the medical term)

Why is this?

The rule is you must arrive/depart by LU train.

I did see a query as to the T4 position by someone who's penultimate move was to T4 by Heathrow Connect/Express, for an Underground departure - what time counted (to end his challenge): arrival on the platform (not by train), when he got on the (LU) train, or when it departed.

More generally: if you are doing the tube challenge just for fun/self satisfaction you can modify the rules to suit yourself. But if you are doing the 'tube challenge', and don't get to Olympia, I would say you haven't done it. Without studying timetables, etc., I would suggest that allowing two days, you will have adequate time to include it.

Or you could go for the 'London Rail challenge', to do LU, LO, DLR and Tramlink (Mike Brown's Empire) - for which an LO train through Olympia will do.

I think you have to arrive OR depart by LU train.

Your best bet for info on the tube challenge can be found at
www.tubeforum.co.uk/forum

If you look for the tread for last years children in need challenge This can be found on the second page of Tube Challenge Chat as we went from High Barnet to Cockfosters which would be your route but reversed. hope this helps

thanks for the above advice...