Abandoned FNC attempt, 24/11/2025

[nick468]

Hi,

Just to report I attempted a full network completion on Monday, November 24, last, and sadly abandoned my attempt as it became clear i wasn't going to get anywhere near the 272.

I'm sharing this in the hope it might help with some information for other people attempting. I started from Heathrow Terminal 4 at 05:02 with the intention of winding up at either Chesham or Amersham. Again, not looking for anything like a spectacular time, just wanting to get 'on the board'.

It all began so well. I managed to catch the 05:09 train from T23 to T5, thus putting me on course to knock out Kensington Olympia/Earls Court early on, which I did, at 06:22. I actually missed the 06:10 by about three minutes, but you can't have everything.

Interestingly, an additional service from Kensington Olympia was advertised on the Monday morning, which had I missed that vital first train from HT23 would have given me an additional service and kept me on course.

WhatsApp Image 2025-12-02 at 23.45.41.jpeg

It all went well up to the journey between Wimbledon and Bayswater when the driver announced the entire Circle Line had been suspended. So I continued onto Edgware Road, and headed east towards Barking then Upminister. It was my intention to do the Circle Line anti-clockwise in the evening-time. At this point, I was still ahead of schedule but the knowledge I had to complete a load of Circle Line stations in the evening hang like a metaphorical noose around my neck.

Sadly, the rest of the day didn't really go to plan. Earlier in the day, when travelling between Earls Court and Cockfosters, the train passed through Covent Garden, but the station was closed and the doors did not open. This was because early in the morning, the station was closed due to lack of staff. So I went and redid that again, as I felt that because it was an unscheduled closure, my initial pass through wouldn't have counted. Perhaps someone can clarify this for me?

I had a bit of a nightmarish experience at Woodford, with an Epping Central Line service taking more than 11 to 12 minutes to arrive. Then at the other end of the line, something I have experienced before, a long wait for an Ealing Broadway train.

Being honest, I knew in my heart of hearts having only gotten out of Epping by after 4pm, that I wasn't going to do the full network completion. Had I not had the Circle Line to do in the evening, I might have stood half a chance.

But I ploughed on for a few hours, until around 8.30pm, when, after a Piccadilly Line train from Rayners Lane to Ealing Common did not come on time, gave up, and went for a scarcely deserved beer or two.

I felt really despondent in the immediate aftermath. I guess getting an FNC always requires some luck doesn't it? And there were parts of the day where my luck really wasn't in. I'm fortunate to have had seven successful attempts, but a fail still hurts.

My big thing is the re-doing of stations in Central London. I need to find a way of cutting this out.

In January, I am hoping to try again for all 272 stations. But this time, I am going to try a route from Upminster to Amersham or Chesham, as it appears to avoid some re-doing, and also knocks a lot of Central London stations out early in the day. But even running that through, there's only about one hours' room for error.

The morning after my challenge, I was staying near Heathrow and had an early start as I was getting a Flixbus from Victoria. So I tried to see if I was able to connect to the first HT23 train into HT5 once more. I was able to - in fact, this time, I was left waiting on the platform for the first train to come. I also went down to Kensington Olympia. Alas, on this occasion, there was no extra train after the 06:22.

Anyway, there you go. Hope some of this may have helped people. Has anyone done an Upminster to Chesham/Amersham in recent times, and got any top tips? If this doesn't work, I'm going to try some other options, including a start at Kenny O on the 05:49 to knock that out early - and maybe a Friday attempt to give the safety net of the night tube. Which I know isn't really in the spirit of things, but let's see. At the very least, I might end up top of the league for the slowest FNC!

Take care,

Nick

[al]

Unlucky Nick. A non completion always sucks, but they do happen so don't be too despondent. I think your pass through of Covent Garden would have been fine, whilst using the night tube is totally fine, it just tends to have limited usefulness.

[Golf]

How did u manage to get a photo on here mine wont let me!

[tubeguru]

He appears to have used the "[REDACTED]" HTML code, which I didn't even know was a thing. I deliberately prevented photos from being posted on the forum years ago, because they take up loads of space, and people were abusing it.

It seems a workaround has been found ...