Long Distance Competition/Ultracycling, Randonneuring and Endurance Cycling - Racer boys and randonneuring

There has been some innuendo here and on the randon Google group that randonneurs with fast finish times are not only hurting the sport of randonneuring but also somehow impacting the individual performances and "fun" of slower riders. I want to air an alternative view of the front of the pack -- written by someone who actually rides at the front of the pack -- especially for the benefit of the lurkers and future readers who might see these discussions and conclude that randonneurs are an unwelcoming crowd when it comes to the faster folks. I think it's a big randonneuring tent and there's room for guys and gals who "ride fast" or come into the sport from a racing background just as there's room for the fast tourers and lanterns rouge. Both are randonneurs. I can report that the spirit of randonneuring is alive and well at the front and anyone who likes to "go fast" who is interested in doing long rides should come join us.

First, I'm one of the "racer boys" (a pejorative term that no doubt no one would use to my face, so why cast it about loosely on the internet?). I have a drawer full of medals and a shelf full of trophies from racing bikes. I train weekly with pros, ex-pros, members of the U23 team, and have ridden with guys wearing national team jerseys (yes, real ones).

I'm also a randonneur. This is my fifth season of it, and God willing I plan to be that guy who does long rides until the day he dies. My heroes in the sport are durable guys like Ken Bonner who has turned in dozens of 1200s and especially those PBP veterans who are out there looking for their 8th, 9th, or 10th finish. Bon courage!

I can hardly tell a story like Jan Heine's view from the front (http://www.rusa.org/newsletter/10-04-19.html) -- 50 hours at PBP in the '07 monsoon? Hell, I'm fast but I ain't that fast. His account is great reading but it's probably something that most randonneurs can't even begin to relate to. So here's another view from the front, gathered from a few years' experience of riding brevets at a frisky pace all over the U.S.:

There's etiquette and order in the lead group. You get a sense of this from Jan's article (mostly in the breach rather than the observance). A lot of it is safety related. If you're riding quickly in close proximity to others and you don't know what you're doing, then you might hurt yourself or others. In addition to safety, riding orderly means the group can move faster, which is what everyone up there wants anyway. What this all means is that the lead group is an incredibly cooperative, team-oriented and un-selfish group of riders. If it's not, then the group tends to break up pretty quickly into smaller, more efficient (i.e., cooperative) groups.

We're all in it together. In addition to riding cooperatively, the lead group plans its controls in advance. What do people need to do at the stop? How much time is needed? Those with crew frequently offer their support to the crewless members of the group (assuming the group is small) to keep the group together and moving as fast and efficiently as possible. Those who move through the control most quickly will usually "dog it" so that they can be caught by the rest of the group, especially if there are stronger riders only a few minutes behind -- no sense exerting effort solo or in a gruppetto if you're going to get caught anyway. Outside the controls there is liberal conversation about what people's needs are and how to meet them. Restroom stops are negotiated (side of the road only; not everyone can master whizzing on the fly, and groups with women always wait for the women to complete their business). Water and food are often shared. In smaller groups, the whole group will often stop for flats and minor mechanicals, especially on the longer brevets. The time to help change someone else's tire is more than made up for by the time and effort saved by working together in the larger group.

This collective outlook is found not just in randonneuring, but even in races (where drafting is legal). I've been in lead or chase groups where we have all stopped to render assistance or for the bathroom. There's an agreement, usually unspoken but sometimes explicit, that we'll "sort it out" in the end -- perhaps some hill a mile or two from the finish. Until then, we're all better off together. Taking advantage of a wreck, a mechanical, or the inability to get the whole group through an intersection on a non-closed course is a serious party foul, even in races. I've never seen someone try that kind of nonsense on a brevet.

Assistance is offered to those outside the group. On out-and-back routes you do see the other riders (and it's a lot of fun getting to see the whole field). I've never seen a fast group not inquire of a rider stopped by the side of the road if he or she was ok or needed assistance, or fail to render assistance if needed or requested. I was in the lead group on a 300K where we stopped to help a rider who was clearly having trouble (it was a very hot day and he had exhausted himself); we gave him food and water and information on how far up the road the next town was. We didn't leave until we were sure he was ok. For those with concerns about fast riders being more interested in their brevet finish times than in helping others in need, please do share your own personal observations of this. I've only been randonneuring for five seasons, but I have never, ever seen this. Have you? Please tell us about it.

Up front, everyone knows, or knows of, everyone else. Part of the reason you don't see a lot of jackassery among the fast riders is that it's a small tent. If you act like a jerk, ride dangerously, shirk you duty at the front, or commit other sins (usually based in being dangerous, selfish, inconsiderate) then word is going to get out and you're not going to be welcome. The reality is that there are very, very few people who can time-trial off the front of the lead group in any distance event. (Jan ought to have an R-60/70/80 award for those who forsake drafting -- that would be an accomplishment!) You have to work cooperatively with others for almost all of the ride to achieve a "fast" time. Like in the rest of life, no one in bike racing wants to work with a jerk. The flip side of this is equally true: Anyone and eveyone is welcome, so long as they are able to and interested in contributing their efforts to the group. If all that's lacking is an understanding of the etiquette and rules, then folks are more than happy to give an on-the-fly tutorial.

Just about none of what I just wrote applied at the start of PBP (or once we began to catch the 90-hour riders, where things once again became chaotic at times). PBP is it's own animal in a number of ways, including in how the fast groups acted at times. The lead group was enormous at the start and just as Jan noted in writing about the 80-hour group, the leading edge of the 84-hour group was quite unsafe and there were several tense, dangerous hours of riding until the riders thinned out and groups of managable size were established. (I would imagine the same was true at the front of all of the waves of the 90-hour start.) Once order was established, pretty much everything I wrote above applied, at least to my ride. Early on, I was in a group of 4 (3 Swedes and me) and we all stopped when I needed to adjust my Super C bag, which had come loose to the point where it was interfering badly with my riding and I couldn't fix it on the fly. They could have left me, but didn't. We were faster together. I was later in a group of French (six guys from the same club and me). Despite the language barrier, we coordinated two controls so that we kept our little group together. Throughout the ride, innumerable brief stops were coordinated to put on and remove rain gear (not everyone can pull this off while riding). To a person, everyone I met was nice and kind and caring and quite interested in helping each other accomplish the task of finishing PBP. And on Day 1, these were all folks who were riding a sub-60-hour pace.

If a lot of what I've written above sounds familiar, it should. The way that we ride at the front is pretty much the way that the back-of-the-packers ride, too. I know this from having done brevets at the back of the pack: I have several wonderful, 12+ hour 200Ks to my credit (and one 200K permanent done with others that took us 13:10!). I haven't seen any greater number of jerks up front than in back. Truthfully, people ride pretty much exactly the same, and conduct themselves pretty much the same, no matter how fast or slow they're riding. They look out for each other. They give encouragement to each other and aid to those in need. Only the finish times are different. All are randonneurs.

well-written, and i couldn't agree more. (although i'm usually found somewhere in between the front and back of the pack, i'll have to take your word for most of it)

from the little that i have experienced at the front (or close to it) in organized groups, those are the times i feel the true camaraderie of rando rides as opposed to when solo riding.

here's where i do have a question though:

Those with crew frequently offer their support to the crewless members of the group (assuming the group is small) to keep the group together and moving as fast and efficiently as possible.

this baffles me; and i've heard (from Jan's report) that everyone he rode with up front at PBP had some kind of support, which also baffles me.

i'm not saying you use support on rides, but i can't fathom how anyone calling themselves a "randonneur" or "randonneuse" would use some kind of external support, even if it's the only way to stick with a lead group. i mean how is that "unsupported long distance riding"?

there is the nuance of course of only using a support crew at controls, which is legal. but then there are rumors of some fast PBPers breaking this rule.

i think this is the only instance that the "racer boys/girls" do deserve a little flak, and probably what makes some randos sneer at who they consider to be going for a fast finish time at the expense of the foundations of randonneuring.

i don't mean to imply that anyone finishing fast is using external support, but i do wish to shame those who do. =]

Octopus - I didn't get the impression that anyone thought less of the faster riders' actions on the road. What I did sense was some concern that there might have been some lobbying by the faster riders (in general), to shorten the allowed times for the rides. Whether there's any truth to this, or whether it comes from paranoia, or misreading cues, I have no way of knowing.

The way you and Jan describe completing these rides is inspiring, and makes it sound like it's the easiest thing there is. I aspire to it - but I have a long, long way to go. For some of us (newbs to the scene, who don't have that many shots at riding PBP left in us), there's a bit of fear that a significant life goal - to which an appreciable physical and psychological investment is being made - may slip out of reach because of rules getting changed in the middle of the game.

this baffles me; and i've heard (from Jan's report) that everyone he rode with up front at PBP had some kind of support, which also baffles me.

It's impossible for most riders to stay with a large lead group without some kind support. Finishing with the leaders on PBP probably requires crew. The controls would be just too time-consuming to navigate otherwise. My hat's off, big-time, to anyone who can do that unassisted.

All that said, I saw a ton of people of all paces at PBP with crew support. You also see crew on U.S. 1200Ks (and even some shorter rides), and again it's not exclusive to the fast riders. The rules permit crew, so long as support is only rendered at the controls. I've never seen someone violate this rule.


i'm not saying you use support on rides, but i can't fathom how anyone calling themselves a "randonneur" or "randonneuse" would use some kind of external support, even if it's the only way to stick with a lead group. i mean how is that "unsupported long distance riding"?

I've never used crew on a randonneuring event myself, although I have accepted assistance from others' crew at controls, and I have used neutral support between controls (including a PBP official who insisted on pumping up the tire I had just changed despite my protestations that I was ok without help). I do use drop bags when they're offered; they make a huge difference in how fast I can travel through a control and how much (little!) I can get away with carrying on the bike, which makes me a lot faster on the road.

Outside support is expressly permitted in the randonneuring rules, including support from individuals who aren't on the ride, including support from people who wouldn't be at the control but for you doing the ride (i.e., your crew), so long as it's rendered under certain conditions: support at the control and nowhere else, period. Can something within the rules of randonneuring violate the spirit of randonneuring?

Philosophically, I don't see a distinction between support from a crew and support from anyone else at a control: shopkeepers, hoteliers, bike shops, etc. Randonneuring has no neutral support rule except between controls, when support to the riders is permitted so long as it is available to all participants equally. (On the Shen 1200 last year, several DNF riders after dropping out provided rolling, neutral support to those of us who remained. Now that's the spirit of randonneuring!) How is crew any different in quality than drop bags, which most rides offer and all rides permit and many riders of all speeds use?

One rider's crew might help him attain a faster finish time, but another rider's crew might enable that rider to finish where, without the crew, the rider would be DNF for being outside a control closing time. Should that back-of-pack rider be chastised for violating the spirit of randonneuring because she used a crew to the same extent as the rider at the front of the pack? Let's say both improved their finish times by the same amount of time because of crew assistance -- what's the difference? Couldn't one argue that the slower rider is actually more outside the randonneuring purity zone, since but for the crew, she would be DNF whereas the faster rider would have still finished (which is all that counts in randonneuring) but would have just done so more slowly?

I'm personally disinclined to pass judgment or raise eyebrows or issue flak to anyone who follows the rules. For those who don't, they deserve a DQ and a lashing with the wet noodle. Everyone else, take a seat under the big tent.

First, I'm one of the "racer boys" (a pejorative term that no doubt no one would use to my face, so why cast it about loosely on the internet?).

So what's so pejorative about the term? It's funny when I use similar terms on the forums and some riders get offended. If someone races, I figure they are racerdudes. So what!
I'm a recreational rider. Am I supposed to get upset when another calls me a recrider? Pfft!

I've ran into all sorts of riders. I've called several of them racerdudes to their face. None have beat me up yet!:rolleyes:

Why would a racer take offense? If they don't want to be known as racerboys, why do they wear a full race team kit while riding down to the local convenience store!:p

thanks for posting that, Octopus, I think that it's a perspective that's worth raising and it's nice to see it posted in a way that isn't particularly confrontational. For my part, I am not a particularly fast rider -- my personal best 200k time is still only 9:22, but in the New England club, I have never been treated with anything less than courtesy by our fastest regulars. We all get along well, and are happy to hear each other's stories in the end.

With that said, I think that part of what feeds the tension of 'racers v. tourists' is threefold.

One is that while dedicated randonneurs tend to be, for the most, kind and civil to each other, one does see a lot of casual participation from club riders and racers on the 200k and 300k who aren't quite as aware of the 'code of ethics' and tend to give fast riders a bad name.

I can think of, for example, my first year on D2R2 where, navigating a fairly narrow, tricky section of gravel, our group was passed by a squad of five racers trying to get to the head of the pack. One of them wound up touching wheels with a guy and sending him down, but the fellow didn't even stop to inquire or apologize and just kept going. Nobody knows who those guys were, and they're likely just guys using the brevet as a training event for a cyclocross race later in the season, but the foul taste still lingers on the mouth.

The second is that, as you say, different positions in the brevet crowd have different priorities, and tension emerges on the edges. People chasing after a fast 200k operate in a different way than people out for a 13 hour bike ride. I think that, on the course, this is normally fine; but it can lead to stress when different priorities mix. Brevet groups tend to start together, with fast and slow riders mixed in company until the terrain and distance sorts out everyone. So, somebody who would like to be fast, but probably runs or moves slower than other prefer, gets left behind some faster guys at a controle and thinks that people are being rude for abandoning him. Or someone is looking to take their time, but then gets a slower rider who's still looking to post a personal best and harasses folks about picking up the pace. In general, I think that we're all better off if everybody rides their own ride and welcomes company but doesn't take it personally if they wind up solo'ing.

Finally, I've seen that feathers get ruffled when any discussion of time as a metric of performance comes into randonneuring. On the New England list, there was a brief kerfuffle when one of our riders succeeded at being the first guy to finish the Shenandoah 1200k. A lot of his peers and friends in the fast pack were posting their hoorays and congratulations, and some other folks chided them with the sentiment of 'you'd better congratulate the last guy as much as you congratulated the first one."

I think it's only human for us to have awe over people who are able to complete a difficult course with an astonishing time. It's also correct to say that, in this sport, we are all equals if we finish a course and we should be accorded equal respect. It gets to be a little churlish when we have to keep lecturing each other over this.

Of course, it doesn't help diffuse matters when rules or awards are put in place that seems to elevate one group over the other. I think that's a source for the controversy around the R80/70/60's, and folks prefer if recognition in randonneuring were focused solely on the number of courses and kilometres completed, and time was left off things entirely.

In my other life, I am a middling rock climber, but I am drawn to it for the same sense of unofficial collaboration and non-competitiveness that is a hallmark of randonneuring. Within rock climbing, while there are some competition formats that look at speed, the focus is largely on being able to climb increasingly difficult routes with a minimal amount of mistakes. If Person A can finish a 5.8 route in three minutes but keeps falling on a 5.9, and Person B need five minutes to do a 5.8, but can finish a 5.9 cleanly, then Person B is accorded more respect amongst his/her peers. I sort of wish that difficulty grades could be assigned to brevet routes, so that people can be given challenges on bases of more than just speed.

... I sort of wish that difficulty grades could be assigned to brevet routes, so that people can be given challenges on bases of more than just speed.

Sort of along the lines of how golf courses are rated? (If you're familiar with that).

To me, that sounds like an intriguing concept - although I'd think that environmental factors (temp, wind, etc) would need to be considered as much as topographic ones (distance, elevation, steepness, etc).

Sorry for the little digression. :o

Man o' man, has the current generation of cyclists also lost the spirit and meaning of randonneering? It occurred to me a while back that many people these days are just transferring their automobile mentality onto cycling and their bicycles.

It's impossible for most riders to stay with a large lead group without some kind support. Finishing with the leaders on PBP probably requires crew. The controls would be just too time-consuming to navigate otherwise. My hat's off, big-time, to anyone who can do that unassisted.

the fact that it's impossible to stay with a large lead group without some kind of support is exactly why i think it's wrong. it gives an advantage (fair or unfair) to those riders that have external support..

what if a rider was too broke to have support? why should that exclude them from hanging with a certain group? (assuming their abilities are good enough to ride with them).


All that said, I saw a ton of people of all paces at PBP with crew support. You also see crew on U.S. 1200Ks (and even some shorter rides), and again it's not exclusive to the fast riders. The rules permit crew, so long as support is only rendered at the controls. I've never seen someone violate this rule.

i guess when i got into randonneuring, i thought i'd never see the words "crew" and "brevet" in the same sentence... i thought UMCA/RAAM does crewed-rides, and we do the unsupported ones.

so perhaps the rando tent is indeed bigger than i thought?


Outside support is expressly permitted in the randonneuring rules, including support from individuals who aren't on the ride, including support from people who wouldn't be at the control but for you doing the ride (i.e., your crew), so long as it's rendered under certain conditions: support at the control and nowhere else, period. Can something within the rules of randonneuring violate the spirit of randonneuring?

yes this is a good point; i guess they aren't breaking rules, but it sure as hell isn't "unsupported long distance riding" either. i wonder if those that actually use support crews think of themselves as riding unsupported?

i'll be damned if having a crew follow you from control to control is riding unsupported. i thought randos had to carry everything (except for drop bags) on their bike, and that was part of the extra challenge.

i thought randos had to handle their own issues when they got to a control and were too tired to think/walk/eat.

i thought this was (a small part of) what separates us from the Pros that have a car following them with spare bikes/wheels.

but perhaps it really is a bigger tent than i thought...


Philosophically, I don't see a distinction between support from a crew and support from anyone else at a control: shopkeepers, hoteliers, bike shops, etc. Randonneuring has no neutral support rule except between controls, when support to the riders is permitted so long as it is available to all participants equally. (On the Shen 1200 last year, several DNF riders after dropping out provided rolling, neutral support to those of us who remained. Now that's the spirit of randonneuring!) How is crew any different in quality than drop bags, which most rides offer and all rides permit and many riders of all speeds use?

i do see a big distinction between a rider-specific support crew and a convenience store. i doubt said store will be carrying the brand of Heed (for instance) this riders uses, or carries long-stem tubes for their aero wheels.

also, how is a support crew "available to all participants equally," if it only follows their rider around the course? having your friends stay at a control to meet you, and then stay afterwards to help everyone else out is one thing. but that's not the case, i'm guessing, with personal support.


One rider's crew might help him attain a faster finish time, but another rider's crew might enable that rider to finish where, without the crew, the rider would be DNF for being outside a control closing time. Should that back-of-pack rider be chastised for violating the spirit of randonneuring because she used a crew to the same extent as the rider at the front of the pack? Let's say both improved their finish times by the same amount of time because of crew assistance -- what's the difference? Couldn't one argue that the slower rider is actually more outside the randonneuring purity zone, since but for the crew, she would be DNF whereas the faster rider would have still finished (which is all that counts in randonneuring) but would have just done so more slowly?

in both cases, i'm more interested in what happens to the rider without a crew.

and in the case of the slower rider, if they can't finish without a crew then they need to train a little more..

and in the case of the fast rider, i think we should start appending asterisks next to times if they used any kind of support vehicle. i want to know the fastest rider that finished without support, just like the rest of us slobs. we didn't have anyone to wipe our noses at the controls, or to feed us.

for me, i don't really care how fast one can do a ride in the most "ideal" situation, with any amount of hand-holding along the way (even at controls). for that, there's Raam/Umca. for those of us that enjoy the extra challenge, there's a thing called randonneuring.


I'm personally disinclined to pass judgment or raise eyebrows or issue flak to anyone who follows the rules. For those who don't, they deserve a DQ and a lashing with the wet noodle. Everyone else, take a seat under the big tent.

ok, so maybe i was a bit quick to break out the wet noodle.. i have no problem with people doing whatever they want on rides, hell randos can be towed by their support car for all i care.. but i think the time to break out the asterisks may have come.

for me this is where the "spirit" of randonneuring comes into question. i wonder what Velocio would think of support cars?

--

again, i don't mean to infer that you, Octopus, are an offender here. but this is where i diverge from the mentality of some at the front of the pack.

Octo, speaking from the back of the pack, I don't see animosity to speed freaks. As I arrived at the hotel at 2 a.m. Sunday, less than 400 into a 600k, there were 2 "racer boys" in the lobby who were already finished. I congratulated them on their finish, and they wished me well.

Their +/-22 hr. finish is as unreal to me as my 39 hour finish to my friends who don't ride. They rode in a fashion which made it a challenge for them; the distance and time limit were worthy challenges for me.

I don't see anything wrong with either approach. I always hope both sets of riders finish safely and meet their own goals. I do have a slight problem with declaring a "winner", or placing folks, in a brevet. Offering an 80 hour option for PBP, for example, seems to imply that finishing in 89 is a lesser accomplishment. My understanding of rando tradition says you either finish or not, no? IMO, any target other than the time limit should be a private (or at least unofficial) goal, but good luck and congrats if you hit it.

Octupus,

I don't think you can get upset at the use of term "Racer Boys" in this thread when you used that term in the title of the thread.

I also see Matt's point regarding the use of crews, allowed as they are, at controls.

Regarding the initial thread on randon, I don't want to see the time shrink for brevets but I also have nothing but respect for those who push the envelope on time to complete. For myself I am a newbie to randonneuring. I personally have an inclination to improve my personal speeds, I would like to chase personal bests and hope that one day they would be impressive times.

The view of the front, from way in the back...

I don't see how it's impacting my fun if someone else wants to go all speed demon on their ride. I settle myself with the back of the group right from the start so I'm not getting in anyone's way as they head out. Over the last weekend as I rode, I found some people going my pace for a while and I hung with them for a bit. I sat on the curb and enjoyed the sunshine while eating a sandwich. I stopped at a streamside pulloff and sat on the side-rail and ate some more, listening to the stream gurgle past. The lead group was already finished, checked in to the hotel and showered by that time and I still hade 5 hours left. That thought crossed my mind as I ate my half of a sandwich, and I laughed about it in spite of my own slowness. In my mind, I was hauling! I mean, I felt great all day (and half the night) that I was riding. Knowing that some people finished 6h 30m ahead of me never ruined my appreciation of the ride.
I'm in awe of anyone who can pull that off, the same as anyone who's done a 600k, 1000k or 1200k, because right now they're just so beyond my capacity. I like reading about or talking to people about their fast finishes or their super distances, because it's something I can't do yet. It's not something I ever see in my future, to pull a sub-12 300k finish or (at this point) just manage to finish a 1200k. But knowing that there are "racerboys" out there isn't affecting my fun. I don't think an 11 hour hammerfest sounds like a good time. The same thought probably crossed some of their minds as they were coming across the finish line... "17 hours to finish 300k? Is that guy back there huffing and puffing up the hills actually enjoying this?"
Yup. We all had our own kind of fun.

. . . it sure as hell isn't "unsupported long distance riding" either. i wonder if those that actually use support crews think of themselves as riding unsupported?

I'm not sure where this "unsupported" notion comes from. Check the RUSA Rules for Riders (http://www.rusa.org/brvreg.html), in particular, Article 6: "Each rider must be self sufficient. No personal follow cars or support of any kind are permitted on the course. Personal support is only allowed at checkpoints. . . ."

There's a difference between "unsupported" and self-sufficient. The rules expressly permit outside support at the controls for those who want it. Those who want to sniff at people using non-neutral support at controls -- or append asterisks to their results -- should lobby for a rule change. I can tell you from my own personal experience that I have seen many more riders using crew who were not in the lead group than who were. By far.

While you're at it, please also lobby for the elimination of drop bags. And for clover-leaf shaped routes (which permit the rider to leave a cache of supplies at the start/finish/intermediate points). I can tell you from experience that there's not much of a time savings between a drop bag (which someone else put there -- hardly riding "unsupported") and a crew, but there's an enormous difference between no outside support at a control and having that drop bag. The one randonneuring event I truly "raced" I didn't bother with crew because I had access to three drop bags and crew would have made no difference in my ride. If I thought it would have made any difference in my time, believe me, I would have had crew.


what if a rider was too broke to have support? why should that exclude them from hanging with a certain group? (assuming their abilities are good enough to ride with them).

What if someone can't afford to pay Claus for the drop bags at PBP? Why isn't that any more "unfair" than someone who can't "afford" to have crew?


i thought randos had to carry everything (except for drop bags) on their bike, and that was part of the extra challenge.

Rule cite, please. I don't think this is the case. See Art. 6. And if a rider buys anything whatsoever on the road, how is she unsupported? She's not even "self-sufficient," as that term would be understood by many.


how is a support crew "available to all participants equally," if it only follows their rider around the course? having your friends stay at a control to meet you, and then stay afterwards to help everyone else out is one thing. but that's not the case, i'm guessing, with personal support.

Again, check the rules and what I wrote. Only neutral support is permitted outside the controls. Every 1200K I've done (LC, S1200, PBP) has provided some level of neutral support on the course. Some RBAs provide it, even on 200Ks. A personal crew cannot be neutral support because, by definition, it’s not neutral.


this is where i diverge from the mentality of some at the front of the pack.

Lest we argue about the surface area of pins and whether the angels get to dance on their tippy toes, in my experience, seeing randonneurs with crew is very rare. I think I've seen one rider do it on a local ride, and it was someone from out-of-state (and that was on a brutally difficult 1000K). (And that rider was a mid-pack rider who DNF'd. That was another good lead group experience; we worked and stayed together for 900K, all of us without any crew, thank you.) On those rare occasions when someone does have crew, it is on 1200Ks and in my experience it's not the racer boys and gals using crew. It's pretty much everyone else. Those of us with access to crew (thank you, family and friends!) will only call in those favors when it's really needed, and that's not going to be on a brevet . . . staying with the leaders at PBP excepted. As Jan wrote, that’s a lot like trying to stay with the leaders at a drafting-legal ultra race without crew. Doable for 12-hour and 200-mile races, but much beyond that it gets to be impossible. Chasing down a big group going 27mph gets really %&^*ing hard after you’ve been doing it all day. Been there, done that.

So, none of those randonneuring asterisks would go to me or, for the most part, to the rest of my fast friends. You guys will be handing them out to each other.

I'm OK with the fast riders as long as ...

1) They don't put slower riders down. I've had A LOT of faster riders make derogative comments about slower riders.

2) They don't make innane comments like, "Why don't you just ride faster". Yeah, right. :rolleyes:

3) They don't try to exclude anyone who is slower than they are by doing things like suggesting lowering the qualifying times. Not everyone has the ability or wants to ride at the speed of light out there ... but we still want to do these events, and we are still capable of doing these events.

4) They don't hog all the support, food, services, etc. etc. I've done several rides where by the time I get there, the fast riders have inhaled everything in sight, and have disgustingly soiled the services provided.

5) They provide support and encouraging words for the slower riders. This might be as simple as saying "Good job, keep it up" when passing a slower rider, or maybe slowing down for a little while and riding with a slower rider, or something along those lines. Ken Bonner, a fast rider I respect, came up beside me on the BMB in 2006, slowed down and chatted with me for a minute or two. He was very encouraging and that minute or so didn't take much out of his overall time, but it boosted my spirits. I'm not saying they have to slow down for every slow rider out there, but it's nice now and then to get some support from the fast crowd ... at least to be acknowledged that we're all in this together.

And I'd LOVE for a fast rider to do a 400K or 1200K with me at my pace and see what it's like. :D


I'm going for a ride shortly and will likely think of more, but we'll start with that.

Here's my experience with a club.
It was decided that on a certain 200k members would invite new riders to experience a 200k ride. The club members had completed a 200k the previous week, so this "participation" ride was an extra for the members.
As a newby I joined the ride and was told that the experienced member riders would adjust their pace to encourage the newbies. That happened for the first 10 or 15k, when the slower newbies (including me) were dropped. I rode alone for 80% of the ride and got lost for part of it. Later, I heard that the fast riders (all the member riders, & no newbies) abandoned the newbies and completed the 200k in the usual 7 hours. As far as I know, only a few of the newbies continued randonneuring in other events. The others never entered another brevet again.

Although this may be an isolated thing, it seems to me that the reason randonneuring is not a popular sport is simply that faster riders seem to have no interest in helping other riders to develop their skills.

There are lots of non-randonneuring non-racing cycling clubs that encourage new riders. They are more successful in enlarging their clubs and promoting cycling.

For me, randonneuring should be named abandonneuring.

I'm not sure where this "unsupported" notion comes from. Check the RUSA Rules for Riders (http://www.rusa.org/brvreg.html), in particular, Article 6: "Each rider must be self sufficient. No personal follow cars or support of any kind are permitted on the course. Personal support is only allowed at checkpoints. . . ."

my notion of "unsupported" comes from this line on the SiR (http://seattlerando.org) front page:


Randonneuring is self-supported long-distance cycling.

i guess i just don't see how the ACP made room for support cars in the realm of self-supported cycling..

Those people wanting to 'dance on the head of a pin' or 'hand out asterisks' should have a look at how the French ride their brevets. The drivers of most of the support cars and camper vans in PBP control towns are French. Their riders are spread throughout the field, not just concentrated at the 'pointy end'. If it is acceptable for the originators, why is it not acceptable for Anglophone newcomers to brevet riding. This attitude strikes of religious Puritanism, rather than accepting that different people ride events following the same rules but using different approaches.

Drop bags are philosophically and practically no different to having a support crew at checkpoints. I've ridden two PBPs with drop bags and one without. I'm happy to use a support crew or drop bags during future brevets or to ride unsupported, having ridden various brevets as a racer boy, a mid-packer and a DFL. After all, how does somebody else's approach to a ride materially affect yours?

Cadillac -- I think that the format of ride that you're preferring is actually 'audax' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audax_(cycling)), which is also another form of randonneuring. However, the randonnees that most folks discuss, and is more popular, is 'allure libre'.

In 'audax' riding, all of the riders on the brevet ride together for the length of the ride. Everyone arrives at a controle together, they leave together and they finish together. Within 'allure libre' it's everyone for themselves, more or less. While some folks will adjust their speed to form a small group, they won't go out of their way to change speed to ride with someone drastically slower or faster than their preference.

There is an audax version of PBP for folks who do wish to do the entire ride together. The next Audax PBP is 2011, and might be a worthwhile alternative for those who are into riding long distances in large groups.

Octopus,

A very nice write up. I'm new to the Rando tent with only two brevets so far, but in my limited experience your description is accurate on all counts. I'll probably never be riding with the lead group having started riding a year ago at age 48, but on last weekend's 300k I was able to hang with the group-behind-the-lead-group and finished in under 12 hours. I'm sure many would consider the group I rode with to be "racer boys." Your first post describes perfectly how I was treated by the group. They were welcoming and friendly, we talked about who needed to do what at controls, the first riders out of the controls waited for the group to reform before getting back up to speed, everyone waited and helped when one rider had a mechanical issue, I received friendly constructive advice on my pace line riding skills. I had never met any of these guys when I started the event, but by the end I felt like I had some new friends.

Thanks for the well reasoned and well written thoughts.

my notion of "unsupported" comes from this line on the SiR (http://seattlerando.org) front page:



i guess i just don't see how the ACP made room for support cars in the realm of self-supported cycling..

The ACP created randonnees in 1921, the definition of 'absolutely self-supported' is not theirs. Other people have created that definition.

By the way, there are nuances in how somebody finishes a brevet, despite all of us meeting the same absolute standard of 'finish or DNF'. Reading through old PBP plaquettes and 20+ year old stories, it is clear that riding fixed is more impressive than gears, unsupported is more impressive than with a support crew, showing incredible determination to finish (regardless of their place in the pack) is more impressive than a relaxed ride. Alongside that, finishing close to the opening or closing time limits is more impressive than a mid-pack finish. Despite that, everybody gets the same medal.

Cadillac -- I think that the format of ride that you're preferring is actually 'audax' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audax_(cycling)), which is also another form of randonneuring. However, the randonnees that most folks discuss, and is more popular, is 'allure libre'.


Audax is ridden at a riding average of 22.5 km/h with scheduled rest stops under the control of a 'road captain' aiming to maintain the ride schedule published prior to the start of the brevet. This brevet format doesn't exist in Canada and hasn't occurred in North America for at least five years.

Cadillac, your problem is your local randonneur club, not the concept of brevet riding as practiced elsewhere in the world.

my notion of "unsupported" comes from this line on the SiR (http://seattlerando.org) front page:

i guess i just don't see how the ACP made room for support cars in the realm of self-supported cycling..

matt -- by this token then accepting any form of pre-planned logistical resource contravenes the spirit of unsupported cycling. If you really must fend for yourself, then forget having manned controles with peanut butter sandwiches and boxed coffee. Forget having the club reserve rooms in a motel for you ahead of time on a 600k, or arranging overnight lodging at a gymnasium or volunteer's home. Forget drop bags.

Yes, if a person has a support vehicle, it is possible for them to arrange affairs in ways that exceed the current resources that a club communally offers. They can truck around refrigerated coolers of premixed, preshaken Sustained Energy that a rider can just grab and go. They can have friends degrease and regrease their chain as they're getting a controle card signed. They can get a fresh jersey every 100k to wear.

And in the end, does this make them any more or less likely to finish?

It's also easier to throw in the towel when you're in the middle of a long, wet, cold brevet and there's a nice warm support vehicle to retreat to. It's easier to get complacent about maintaining or checking your supplies when you think you've got everything that you need in your support car. It's easier to get sloppy and make mistakes that you might have to pay for in between controles.

Personally, I see the proposition as essentially neutral so long as the support is just provided at the controles. If you want to do a ride completely unsupported, then the opportunity is always available. Do the entire brevet without taking advantage of any of the amenities at any of the manned controles. Buy your own water, get your own food at convenience stores. See if that makes a difference in your experience.

Finally, I will add that I am planning on doing a 1000k in VanIsle, and part of what intimidates me about that ride is not so much the fact that there are no manned controles and thus there won't be any drop bag support or any free peanut butter sandwiches, but that services between controles are sparse. Part of my training for that now is just focusing only getting supplies at each controle and trying not to stop at any stores between controles. It's a strangely daunting prospect compared to the 'comfort' of knowing that one might be able to restock at a grocery every 50k or so.

If you really want a go at unsupported distance cycling, then contemplate riding a 400k or 600k without any resupply whatsoever. No stopping at stores along the way. No consumption of supplies from manned controles. Carry a couple gallons of water on your bike and 5000 calories of food, and see how that changes your ride. Could be interesting.

Those people wanting to 'dance on the head of a pin' or 'hand out asterisks' should have a look at how the French ride their brevets. The drivers of most of the support cars and camper vans in PBP control towns are French. Their riders are spread throughout the field, not just concentrated at the 'pointy end'. If it is acceptable for the originators, why is it not acceptable for Anglophone newcomers to brevet riding. This attitude strikes of religious Puritanism, rather than accepting that different people ride events following the same rules but using different approaches.

ok, so how do you say asterisk in french? i'll throw an asterisk on any ride result anywhere in the world, if they'd let me. =]

support cars may be acceptable to the originators, but that doesn't really change anything for me.

maybe i just want to make it really hard for myself (and others), but some riders do actually enjoy the extra challenge of being out there on your own (in terms of support).

what would i do if i got stuck in the middle of nowhere? i don't know, and that's all part of the fun. (for me anyway) i don't ride with a cell phone, and even if i did many brevets go outside of coverage. part of the excitement i get on these rides is that things could go really bad, and if they do, i have only myself to fix it.

in fact, i thought that was one of the main tenets of randoneuring, until reading Jan's "view from the front" article.


Drop bags are philosophically and practically no different to having a support crew at checkpoints.

is that right?

so why don't the fast groups, that rely on their support cars to stay fast, use drop bags instead? i mean if there's no difference..

the other difference between using drop bags & support cars, is that (normally) one car will bring all the drop bags to the sleep spot. compare the emissions of that to if every rider had their own support car.. only one of those options is marginally sustainable.

I'm OK with the fast riders as long as ...
<SNIP>
3) They don't try to exclude anyone who is slower than they are by doing things like suggesting lowering the qualifying times. Not everyone has the ability or wants to ride at the speed of light out there ... but we still want to do these events, and we are still capable of doing these events.


Randonneuring already excludes anybody who is slower than an average 15 km/h. It is a matter of where you draw the line and it has shifted over time. Nowadays the fairly arbitrary line is set at about 15 km/h minimum for most brevets, roughly based on the original Audax Italiano standard of at least 200 km in about 14 hours (between sunrise and sunset). Over the years, that requirement has been codified to an ACP limit of 13 hr 30 min for 200 km (not the 13 hr 20 min resulting from a 15 km/h average). Shifting the maximum time limit to 13 hr or 14 hr does not change the overall concept but would exclude or include people on the margins of the existing limit.

mattm, you are welcome to ride brevets any way you like within the rules and I am happy for you to look down your nose at how somebody else may ride a brevet, if you wish. I'll be enjoying my riding too.

You may want to read about Henry Kingman's 1999 PBP ride, completely unsupported and sub-50 hours on a significantly over-distance route.
http://www.milly.org/hkingman/henry_pbp.html

I'm OK with the fast riders as long as ...

1) They don't put slower riders down. I've had A LOT of faster riders make derogative comments about slower riders.

Amen. There's no place for putting anyone down in randonneuring, no matter what they ride or how fast (or slow) they ride. While it's a big tent, I'd personally be content to keep the insecure, judgmental types out in the cold.


2) They don't make innane comments like, "Why don't you just ride faster". Yeah, right. :rolleyes:

See #1. Why don't they ride slower? Silly rabbits....


3) They don't try to exclude anyone who is slower than they are by doing things like suggesting lowering the qualifying times. Not everyone has the ability or wants to ride at the speed of light out there ... but we still want to do these events, and we are still capable of doing these events.

I'm not sure where this came from. I saw lots of concern about this, but nowhere a proposal for lowering times nor any link between such a proposal and the speedier riders.

FWIW, I don't think there's any magic in the randonneuring time cut offs. No number is somehow objectively or morally superior to another (there is no natural law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_law) behind randonneuring's rules). Any number is going to exclude someone, somewhere. I understand from other threads here and elsewhere that 90 hours for PBP is a historically recent creation, and that the trend has been to reduce times.

It'll be interesting to see what happens to time limits in the next decade or two. I personally think (a thought that is completely unburdened by evidence!) that a large reason for the growth in randonneuring is demographics -- baby boomers have money, no kids at home (and while not required, these factors tend to make riding long rides a lot more accessible), and there are a lot of them. What happens when they age and (except for the Ken Bonners of the world), slow down? I suspect we'll see a push for longer time limits and more support.


4) They don't hog all the support, food, services, etc. etc. I've done several rides where by the time I get there, the fast riders have inhaled everything in sight, and have disgustingly soiled the services provided.

I can tell you that the front-of-the-pack folks take very little support at all from the neutral controls. We're too much in a hurry. Get the card stamped, grab what can be quickly stuffed in pockets (none of the provided sit down meals -- fruit and granola bars only, and the guys on liquid diets take nothing) and go. (If there's no staff, at least in this part of the U.S., it is custom to make a purchase from the control, no matter how fast you're tying to ride.) The side of the road is the bathroom; no time to find and use a proper facility. In a sense, we're subsidizing the rest of the field, since we're not using services and eating food that our entrance fees paid for. Some folks on the Last Chance would have had a private room at the Crest Motel because of me and a number of other riders who didn't sleep in Atwood either direction. I ain't asking for a refund. ;)

All that said, I agree. I think there's no excuse for any randonneur taking any more than he or she needs (and one must reasonably and realistically assess her "needs") and every rider should leave the toilet exactly as clean as he or she found it. But I don't think being a pig or a slob are characteristics that are somehow more prevalent among "fast" riders.


5) They provide support and encouraging words for the slower riders. This might be as simple as saying "Good job, keep it up" when passing a slower rider, or maybe slowing down for a little while and riding with a slower rider, or something along those lines. . . . it's nice now and then to get some support from the fast crowd ... at least to be acknowledged that we're all in this together.

Amen. We all like encouragement, and giving it liberally is part of "the randonneuring spirit." I try to do this as do most of the people I ride with. And most of the slower folks similarly shout greetings and encouragement as I pass. This is always great to hear. Us fast guys have low points too, and while it might look to you like we're moving a million miles an hour, we may feel like we're dragging butt. A greeting and encouraging word definitely lifts the spirits of all who hear them.


And I'd LOVE for a fast rider to do a 400K or 1200K with me at my pace and see what it's like. :D

$%^& that! ;) (I'll take you up on a 200K, though!)

I've always said, and I sincerely mean it, that it's a lot more difficult -- and therefore more of an accomplishment, if one wants to try to measure such a thing -- to do a ride at the maximum time limit than to race through it. Other than one particular comedy-of-errors permanent, I've never had to stress about a control closing time. When I finished my first 1200K, I hung out for a few hours talking with others and then checked into the hotel, had a steak and a few beers with another "fast" guy, hit the hot tub, and went to bed. I got up the next day, fully rested, and spent the entire day flying airplanes with my uncle, and then went back, got cleaned up, and went to the celebration dinner. The dinner ended and I went to sleep again. While I did all of things, there were still two riders on the road, and both of those people finished within time. As much as I hurt, as sore as I was, I could not even begin to imagine riding for a day and a half longer than I already had. That's hardcore. That's impressive. My butt, my hands, my feet -- they all spent a lot less time on the bike (and you newbies will soon learn that that unholy trinity, along with your neck, are the things that really hurt on rides 400K and longer). I ate a lot less "bike food." I faced a lot less sleep deprivation since I was out there for a much shorter time. If the weather was bad, I was in it for a much shorter time. If anyone wants to give out badass points in randonneuring, they ought to go to les lanterns rouge.

Cadillac -- I think that the format of ride that you're preferring is actually 'audax' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audax_(cycling)), which is also another form of randonneuring. However, the randonnees that most folks discuss, and is more popular, is 'allure libre'.

In 'audax' riding, all of the riders on the brevet ride together for the length of the ride. Everyone arrives at a controle together, they leave together and they finish together. Within 'allure libre' it's everyone for themselves, more or less. While some folks will adjust their speed to form a small group, they won't go out of their way to change speed to ride with someone drastically slower or faster than their preference.

There is an audax version of PBP for folks who do wish to do the entire ride together. The next Audax PBP is 2011, and might be a worthwhile alternative for those who are into riding long distances in large groups.


Unfortunately the average speed of that style of riding is 22.5 km/h, which is way too fast. I have toyed with the idea of riding the Cascade 1200, but apparently it is ridden Audax-style, so I know I can't do it.

If they'd have an audax-style with an average of 16 km/h, we'd be in business! :D

Here's my experience with a club. . . . I heard that the fast riders (all the member riders, & no newbies) abandoned the newbies and completed the 200k in the usual 7 hours.

I too, have had this experience (although no one comes close to a 7-hour 200K here; our RBAs and their taste for repeated, steep hill climbs see to that!).

On a 200K recently there was an agreement (I thought) to do the ride audax -- by which we truly meant a rolling average of 22.5kph -- in part to make some converts to the sport. The route was easy: flat and with mild temperatures, no wind, and no humidity. It was a few of the riders who typically ride mid-pack who broke the covenant early on, once they saw that conditions would permit them to try to set personal best times. A few people took off up the road and then all hell broke loose. A few of us stayed back and rode as originally planned and preached the word and made a few converts. One of 'em is on my fleche team this year. Hooray!


Although this may be an isolated thing, it seems to me that the reason randonneuring is not a popular sport is simply that faster riders seem to have no interest in helping other riders to develop their skills.

That's not been my experience here at all (or in any of the other states I've done brevets in). Most people, of all speeds, are more than happy to help others and if that means slowing down a bit (or a lot) to make a new friend and answer questions, then most people are glad to do it. No, I won't do it when I'm out there trying to get the cool-looking "RAAM qualified" plaque on a 1200K, but on a 200K, what the hell? I'll definitely have more fun talking with the new folks than racing around on another 200K. Most fast guys and gals I know feel the same way.

I'm OK with the fast riders as long as ...

1) They don't put slower riders down. I've had A LOT of faster riders make derogative comments about slower riders.

2) They don't make innane comments like, "Why don't you just ride faster". Yeah, right. :rolleyes:

3) They don't try to exclude anyone who is slower than they are by doing things like suggesting lowering the qualifying times. Not everyone has the ability or wants to ride at the speed of light out there ... but we still want to do these events, and we are still capable of doing these events.

4) They don't hog all the support, food, services, etc. etc. I've done several rides where by the time I get there, the fast riders have inhaled everything in sight, and have disgustingly soiled the services provided.

5) They provide support and encouraging words for the slower riders. This might be as simple as saying "Good job, keep it up" when passing a slower rider, or maybe slowing down for a little while and riding with a slower rider, or something along those lines. Ken Bonner, a fast rider I respect, came up beside me on the BMB in 2006, slowed down and chatted with me for a minute or two. He was very encouraging and that minute or so didn't take much out of his overall time, but it boosted my spirits. I'm not saying they have to slow down for every slow rider out there, but it's nice now and then to get some support from the fast crowd ... at least to be acknowledged that we're all in this together.

And I'd LOVE for a fast rider to do a 400K or 1200K with me at my pace and see what it's like. :D


I'm going for a ride shortly and will likely think of more, but we'll start with that.


6. They are polite and respectful to the volunteers. And in instances where there's a convenience store or grocery store as a control, they go in and buy something (even just a bottle of water) rather than just demanding that the cashier sign their cards.


Note that I'm NOT saying that ALL fast riders behave badly ... some are really nice ... many are likely quite nice. Some, however ...


EDIT: I'll add that I was working the control where I DNF'd on the GRR when Ken came in (he was one of the first riders), and I helped him with his equipment, his supper, etc. etc. He was very polite and friendly. :)

Man o' man, has the current generation of cyclists also lost the spirit and meaning of randonneering? It occurred to me a while back that many people these days are just transferring their automobile mentality onto cycling and their bicycles.

I do not know what is meant by this, but as someone who bicycle commutes 5 days a week, year-round and whose car use is pretty much limited to getting to bike rides, I am certain that it's not aimed at me. :notamused:

Unfortunately the average speed of that style of riding is 22.5 km/h, which is way too fast. I have toyed with the idea of riding the Cascade 1200, but apparently it is ridden Audax-style, so I know I can't do it.

If they'd have an audax-style with an average of 16 km/h, we'd be in business! :D

Originally Audax was 18 km/h, then 20 km/h, nowadays 22.5 km/h for most distances and regions but 25 km/h in the Netherlands. 100 km Audax brevets are occasionally scheduled at 20 km/h riding average plus a scheduled stop about halfway.

As I understand it (some friends have ridden it), the Cascade 1200 has designated overnight stops with everybody leaving as a group each morning but people ride each day al allure libre.

If anyone wants to give out badass points in randonneuring, they ought to go to les lanterns rouge.


I snipped most of this, but this was the comment that got me in trouble on the NERd list that spokenword commented about. I congratulated the 'first finisher' of the Shen1200, and then posited the theory that while it is impressive that this certain person rode the ride as 'a fast tour with friends, until we ran into the weather' - I was more impressed with the folks who spent nearly a day or more in the saddle - 24 more hours to make a mistake in a sleep deprived, moving war of attrition. 20% - 25% more time on the bike than the fast guys and gals - giving it their own 110% which is likely to hurt way more than the 110% that was thrown down by the folks who make it look easy.

This year I'm making a little lantern to hang off my saddle. I'm way out of form from my first season riding brevets, when I put in respectable (average) times through a series. This year though I'm struggling to adjust to fatherhood, keep the business running, and stay motivated to 'train'.

I am going to qualify for the EM1240... and I'm fully preparing myself to be last man (or woman) on the road. The lantern rouge will be an LED affair. I'll wear it with pride, unless things go smashingly well between now and September... :thumb:

I have toyed with the idea of riding the Cascade 1200, but apparently it is ridden Audax-style, so I know I can't do it.

Not exactly. Unlike other 1200k randonnees, C1200 only offers full support (food, bad drops, a place to sleep) at the controles that are going to be night time stops for most riders. (There are other staffed controles, but AFAIK they usually only have water, ice, and some food.) If you want to go fast, and not stop at the controles for the night, you may get to the second and third night controls when they are "open" according to the controle open/close times, but there is nobody there. If you have a crew that provides support it may be OK, but fast unsupported riders will have a problem.

For the rest of us, the Cascade 1200 is a great ride. Go at your own pace, and you'll do fine. I look forward to riding it next year.

Some good observations and it does bring up the mixing of traditions. It sounds like the op rides in a more traditional Audax style. Win. On a side note related to riding a fast randonée, I for one would love to see a revival of the old technical trials that were common in the late 50's and 60's.

I for one would love to see a revival of the old technical trials that were common in the late 50's and 60's.


Like 24-hour time trials?

Interestingly enough ... I like slow randonnees ... but I also like racing 24-hour TTs, and I clip along fairly smartly on those.

I wish Australia had 24-hour TTs so I don't have to come all the way to the US or UK to ride them.

Kinda wish that I could find someone to run a paceline with. It isn't done on the brevets I've been on. I do have the minor problem that I probably would get dropped. But I've been surprised that even at the front nobody does pacelines, that's not something I'm used to from my previous riding experience.

Kinda wish that I could find someone to run a paceline with. It isn't done on the brevets I've been on. I do have the minor problem that I probably would get dropped. But I've been surprised that even at the front nobody does pacelines, that's not something I'm used to from my previous riding experience.

Go ride with the Manitoba Randonneurs. Things may have changed, but back when I rode with them, there was a group of anywhere from about 5 to 10 of us who all rode in a group together and we'd form pacelines now and then. Our on-bike pace was usually about 20-25 km/h depending on wind.

All that said, I agree. I think there's no excuse for any randonneur taking any more than he or she needs (and one must reasonably and realistically assess her "needs") and every rider should leave the toilet exactly as clean as he or she found it. But I don't think being a pig or a slob are characteristics that are somehow more prevalent among "fast" riders.

I would also say, on the note of 'first comers hogging all of the stuff at controls', most of the responsibility for managing supplies actually falls onto the volunteers manning the controls. Folks should know that you don't lay out all of the food at once and you don't bring out all of the water right away.

People will ration themselves according to what they see as being available. If riders get to a control and see a massive spread, then they're more likely to pig out. If they see a meager menu, then they're going to be more choosy. If someone really wants something, they should ask, "hey, do you guys have any more potato chips?"

and that should be the cue for the volunteer to go back into the van or the box and say, "why, yes, in fact we can open an extra bag, just for you." (and not mention that there are still five more bags of chips in the cache)

Well Mr. Octupus...

I can tell you why I feel the way I do about this subject, and I suspect that many other ardent anti-racerboy advocates feel the same way that I do. They probably just haven't analyzed exactly why they feel so strongly about it.

History:
I've been into and around bicycles my entire life. During college, I even spent some time turning wrenches at a LBS to earn some cash. In my younger days, I followed the racing exploits of Davis Phinney, Eric Heiden, Connie Carpenter, and that LeMond guy. :rolleyes:

But I was never fast enough to be competitive in racing. I loved to ride, but I knew that I'd never be a racer. I tried riding a few club rides with a few different groups, but that didn't prove enjoyable for me. The riders were generally nice when standing around chatting, but they tended to turn into bloodthirsty competitors when they got on the road. I felt like Dave from Breaking Away because many of these guys would cut your throat if it would take 30 seconds off of their time.

The flip side of the coin when it comes to organized rides was the family oriented event. But these are insufferable in a different way. Poking along with folks riding erratically on rusty old beaters and BMX bikes wasn't my bag either. One of my friends actually went down on one of those rides when she was sideswiped by a kid acting the fool and horseplaying out on the road... so I didn't enjoy those rides much either.

I didn't really fit in with either camp so I avoided most group rides for the next 25 years, choosing to ride solo most of the time. Now I find myself at age 45 too old to keep up with the young studs (I'm slower now than back when I wasn't fast enough)... but still too fast to ride with the old geezers and young kids. And in this phase of my life my child is grown... career is on auto-pilot... and I have time to ride all I want again.

Then I heard about this randonneuring thing. These riders were serious about riding, but not to the extent that they'd stop watching out for each other. This type of cycling didn't require that you be fast... just that you plan well and are too stubborn to give up. The riders cooperate and revel in the triumphs of the others. Count me in!

Now let me say this to you "Eight Legged One"...
You guys who currently ride at the front of the pack sound as if you ride with the rando spirit at heart. You guys probably ought to more accurately be called "fast randonneurs" than "racer boys".

But here is what I fear:
I fear that an influx of riders with a primary goal of going faster and faster will shift the focus of randonneuring from it's non-competitive nature and turn each event into a 200K or 300K race. I fear that you fast randonneurs will be replaced at the front of the pack by racerboyz... but not the fast racers. The racers that come to do rando events will most likely be those who aren't fast enough to be competitive in crits or traditional road races. They'll be those insecure and judgemental riders that you talked about, and they will come puff up their egos by outrunning people who aren't fast to begin with. People like me. And many of these wannabe racers make themselves feel important by treating us slower guys with disdain and snobbery instead of with encouragement and comeraderie.

I fear that lowering cutoff times and raising speeds will cut me out of participation in a sport that I just discovered. If you look at the folks who ride randos, I'll bet that a lot of them are in the same boat as me... not fast enough to race, but love to ride. And brevets give us a goal to strive for.

So fear is what makes me oppose the influx of racerboyz and the attitude that comes with it. I don't want to lose my opportunity to ride brevets. I just found you guys... and I wanna stay.

...They look out for each other. They give encouragement to each other and aid to those in need. Only the finish times are different. All are randonneurs.

I'm barely even a newbie--my first 200K will be this weekend--but I wanted to say I've been in other situations where similar issues have come up, and I really like the way this post discards a false dichotomy and keeps to the point.

The "all are randonneurs" spirit is a significant part of what attracted me to randonneuring in the first place. Hearing it from somebody at the front of the pack (where I'll probably never ride) helps confirm that I might fit into the sport. Thanks.

Hydrated:

:thumb:

I fear that lowering cutoff times and raising speeds will cut me out of participation in a sport that I just discovered. If you look at the folks who ride randos, I'll bet that a lot of them are in the same boat as me... not fast enough to race, but love to ride. And brevets give us a goal to strive for.

i wouldn't worry about the finish times changing; there are only rumors about that (not even rumors of it happening, just general fear that it might), the only official recent change in rules was in regards to PBP qualification.

so, i wouldn't worry about finishing times changing at all.

I just found you guys... and I wanna stay.

Glad you found us and please do stay! I think just about everyone who likes to ride at the front will welcome you to our sport and will provide encouragement, just as will those riders competing for the lantern rouge destinction.

A point you raise, and it's one that's echoed by others who have commented insightfully on this thread, deserves some further attention. The 200Ks in particular can attract a very different crowd than the 300K and longer rides. 200K isn't really much tougher than a century and (at least in Ohio) there are Cat 1 and Cat 2 road races that are nearly 200K long. Most of the 200Ks I've ridden attract some riders who aren't RUSA members and who are out there in team kit looking to just tear it up. And they do. And they're not necessarily observing some of the kinder, gentler traditions of randonneuring. Some RBAs and clubs tolerate or encourage this more than others.

It's a mixed bag, honestly. On the one hand you want the sport open to as many as possible for a lot of reasons. Maybe those folks have no more interest in or committment to randonneuring right now than just blazing around the course, but someday when their riding goals and styles change you want them coming back to the sport. Some of the current RUSA leaders and most dedicated volunteers are former racers; they can be a real asset to our sport. On the other hand, you don't want to be attracting one kind of rider at the price of making others (yourself, Cadillac, lots of other people) feel unwelcome, less-worthy, insulted or even endangered by someone blowing by you on a hill at three or four times your speed and chopping your front wheel in the process. I'm a strong advocate for finding a way to make everyone feel welcome and happy (and safe) and to keep them coming back for the long haul. The trick is how to do that.


I fear that you fast randonneurs will be replaced at the front of the pack by racerboyz...

Ain't gonna happen. Not on this cowboy's watch. :D

Us fast guys committed to randonneuring are not shy about administering lessons to the "racerboyz" on 200Ks about how to behave on a brevet. ;) One of those lessons (and another pressure that tends to cut down on the ego-driven focus on performance-as-measured-by-time on brevets) is that the fastest guys (and gals) on the road aren't necessarily riding at the very front of the pack. Those looking for and claiming bragging rights for "winning" a 200K get humbled pretty quickly when they're standing around at the fiinsh all out of breath and exhausted but preening their feathers and then they start learning that there are RAAM-finishers and ultra-distance verterans coming in just a few minutes behind them who look fresh as daisies and who were clearly "taking it easy" on the ride. Further humble pie gets served when (on rare occasion) the "racerboyz" show up at 300Ks, double centuries, or 12-hour races and try to ride with the same gusto that they did on a 200K, only to blow up spectacularly well before the end of the ride. The word gets back to the racing teams that this long distance stuff is pretty hard and that -- surprise! -- you have to train specificially for doing long rides successfully.

One of the things that happens in that front group, both at brevets and in the shorter ultra-races, is that when there are riders who are unknown to us regulars, people swap stories about their cycling experiences. (It's always a ton of fun every year at Calvin's (http://www.calvinschallenge.com/) to see these kids learn just exactly who Danny Chew (http://www.dannychew.com/) is.) The "racerboyz" pretty quickly get the message that there are people up there who are totally committed to randonneuring and who are "the real deal".... Some 50+ year old guy telling a 19-year-old kid about his 7 RAAM-qualified plaques and three PBP finishes tends to instill humility in the kid (and on a more primal level convinces the kid, stud racer though he may be, that he will never, ever ride away from the 50+ year-old guy on a ride of this length and that the old man will totally ride away from him on anything longer). The "racerboyz" also cannot believe that we can ride like the blazes for 750 miles without any support at all. My Last Chance story usually gets doe-eyed looks and I really butter them up good and put 'em firmly on the hook before revealing that as smokin' as my ride was, I got "beat" by almost 10 hours by a guy thirty years older than I am! That always floors 'em.

Anyway, it's not all sunshine and roses. There are still jerks out there, but I do think the jerks are spread rather uniformly throughout the pack (for every racerboy sniffing at your results there's a retrogrouch telling me that my carbon racing bike and non-Brooks saddle offends his Randonneuring Purity Test). But we fast randonneurs are doing what we can to keep the torch lit at the front of the pack. Our replacement by people less committed to the sport isn't going to happen anytime soon. We can still ride those fools off our wheels. ;) See you on the road,

-The Eight-Legged One

I'm just now getting interested in randoneurring, and not sure how it will work out. I shall see.

However, one thing that is attractive about it to me is the de-emphasis on speed. If I was fast, I could go race. I'm not fast, am not likely to get fast, but hey, here's a sport I can still participate in, too! But if it seems that sport is being converted into a race, it loses a lot of that attractiveness.

Suppose you work in a big office building, with people walking down the halls of that building. Suppose, that for whatever reason, certain people decide to just run down those halls as fast as they can everytime they need to go down them. Is there anything wrong with that? Well, it may not be violating a rule, but it sure seems to be changing the event into something it's not, too. And it seems to me that's kind of how some of this comes across.

I read that randonneuring was "self sufficient" and was kind of surprised then to learn that people mostly ride around in groups drafting each other. I mean, that's fine to do, just don't say it's self-sufficient if it's a team effort.

I read that randonneuring was "self sufficient" and was kind of surprised then to learn that people mostly ride around in groups drafting each other. I mean, that's fine to do, just don't say it's self-sufficient if it's a team effort.

in my experience, you find more organized groups as you move up in the pack. therefore, most of my brevet experience has been riding solo. from mid-pack on, it seems like people are more willing to do group work in order to make good time (and also not suffer in the wind, alone).

i think towards the back, nobody can guarantee their pace, so groups are more hesitant to form. and of course there are those that just want to do the whole thing solo, and there's nothing wrong with that!

point being that not everyone rides in groups on brevets, and you certainly don't have to (at least with "allure libre" style events, like in the US).

also, some people ride in groups to pass time, not just to draft. for instance on last week's 300k i rode with a guy for the last 100k or so, side by side, talking. it made the time pass much quicker than doing the same stretch solo (which i've done).

I would also say, on the note of 'first comers hogging all of the stuff at controls', most of the responsibility for managing supplies actually falls onto the volunteers manning the controls. Folks should know that you don't lay out all of the food at once and you don't bring out all of the water right away.

People will ration themselves according to what they see as being available. If riders get to a control and see a massive spread, then they're more likely to pig out. If they see a meager menu, then they're going to be more choosy. If someone really wants something, they should ask, "hey, do you guys have any more potato chips?"

and that should be the cue for the volunteer to go back into the van or the box and say, "why, yes, in fact we can open an extra bag, just for you." (and not mention that there are still five more bags of chips in the cache)


Yes, it should be up to the volunteers to control those things. I've been on several events where I've rolled up and all that is on the menu are crumbs ... the last few broken bits of potato chips in the bottom of the bag, some crumbled fragments of cookies, and a couple sad-looking apple slices or something. And I have not been the last person to roll into the control/rest stop either.

On one ride, the volunteers packed up the rest stop and left with about 20 people still on the course because they ran out of food. That was a century ride.

And I've actually had to wait while the volunteer went to the grocery store down the road to buy more food because ... surprise, surprise ... the group of cyclists who just came in wanted to eat! Go figure. What a shock. (Incidentally, that was on the GRR ... a word to those doing the GRR: bring your own food.)

So just what happened to the Octopus to get his web all bunched up? Someone make a wise crack - to close to home? Or do you just want a "good job" from every one regarding your last ride?

Six posts in this thread, and about 60,000 words - something's rubbing your chamois the wrong way.

...one thing that is attractive about it to me is the de-emphasis on speed. If I was fast, I could go race. I'm not fast, am not likely to get fast, but hey, here's a sport I can still participate in, too!....

Right there with you. There are many of us out there just trying to finish. Nobody made me feel bad for not being fast in my series.


I read that randonneuring was "self sufficient" and was kind of surprised then to learn that people mostly ride around in groups drafting each other...

Seems the exception to me. Even as the fast riders passed me going the other way, they were seldom in a group of more than 2 or 3. Many people ride solo, part way or all the way. I like to go out last, alone, but often ride in with someone I catch.

The energy in this thread is amazing. The issue seems pretty small on the road. I have yet to have a bad experience with anyone on a ride.

So just what happened to the Octopus to get his web all bunched up? Someone make a wise crack - to close to home? Or do you just want a "good job" from every one regarding your last ride?

Um, just trying to be helpful here. I hope most people find what I've written to be helpful, informative and in good spirit. I apologize if you don't.


Six posts in this thread, and about 60,000 words - something's rubbing your chamois the wrong way.

Make it seven. And 60,000? Might want to recalibrate your word counter.

Seriously, though, RC. You fancy yourself a speedy guy. How about adding something substantive to this discussion? There are folks in this thread who don't agree with some of what I've written (and that's fine), but no one has spoken up from "the front of the pack" to challenge the veracity of what I say or to offer a different viewpoint. Care to do either?

So just what happened to the Octopus to get his web all bunched up? Someone make a wise crack - to close to home? Or do you just want a "good job" from every one regarding your last ride?

Six posts in this thread, and about 60,000 words - something's rubbing your chamois the wrong way.




Um, just trying to be helpful here. I hope most people find what I've written to be helpful, informative and in good spirit. I apologize if you don't.



Make it seven. And 60,000? Might want to recalibrate your word counter.

Seriously, though, RC. You fancy yourself a speedy guy. How about adding something substantive to this discussion? There are folks in this thread who don't agree with some of what I've written (and that's fine), but no one has spoken up from "the front of the pack" to challenge the veracity of what I say or to offer a different viewpoint. Care to do either?

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