Wild was looking forward to a fast ride on his first country train journey in many years. In the early days of his youth, in the 1930s, railways were always pushing to achieve an average speed of 60 miles per hour (97 km/h). He had grown up "when speed was regarded as the essential thing on the railway". But disappointment in his trip came when he realised that despite the train's much-publicised but very brief dash at 160 km/h, the journey, over all, had the leisurely features of a branch-line train. ... In the end, the journey took 4 hours and 37 minutes – 20 minutes longer than scheduled, at an average speed of 70.6 kilometres per hour. I was absolutely appalled by the whole thing. After I flew home that night, I looked up an old reference book. I learned that if the train had completed the run in an even four hours – a schedule that was soon to be introduced – it would have travelled at the same average speed of 81.6 km/h as the London to Bristol Express in 1851.