Long Distance Competition/Ultracycling, Randonneuring and Endurance Cycling - Super Randonneuring Award / Medal

I read over the RUSA web site and the handbook. The awarding of the Super Randonneuring award / medal. Is this done thru ACP brevets? or can you do any RUSA brevet in a year? or is it a calendar year? I guess I just need some plain talk on this award, Thanks.

To qualify for the SR, you have to complete the four ACP brevets (200k, 300k, 400k, 600k) in the same calendar year. RUSA brevet don't count for the SR, but they count for other RUSA awards. At the end of the randonneuring season (in October, if I remember correctly), you request the medal through RUSA. The only exception is for those riders who go to PBP, who should get their SR medal with the PBP registration (assuming that they qualified for the award, which is usually the case, unless they had to substitute a longer ride for one of the other brevets in the SR sequence).

A randonneuring year starts November 1 and goes to October 31.

You have to ride a 200K, 300K, 400K, and 600K randonnee in one randonneuring year in order to qualify for the Super Randonneur award.

The randonnees have to be sanctioned by the ACP.

You can ride randonnees in any country where there are sanctioned randonnees. (For example, you could ride a 200K in Canada with the Ontario Randonneurs, a 300K in Australia with an Audax Australia club, a 400K in the UK with an Audax UK club, and a 600K in the US with a RUSA club. If you did that, you would not only get a Super Randonneur award, you would get the International Super Randonneur award)

RUSA is just an organising body for randonneuring like Audax Australia, Audax UK, BC Randonneurs, Alberta Randonneurs, Prairie Randonneurs, Ontario Randonneurs, and many, many others.

A randonneuring year starts November 1 and goes to October 31.

You have to ride a 200K, 300K, 400K, and 600K randonnee in one randonneuring year in order to qualify for the Super Randonneur award.

The randonnees have to be sanctioned by the ACP.

You can ride randonnees in any country where there are sanctioned randonnees. (For example, you could ride a 200K in Canada with the Ontario Randonneurs, a 300K in Australia with an Audax Australia club, a 400K in the UK with an Audax UK club, and a 600K in the US with a RUSA club. If you did that, you would not only get a Super Randonneur award, you would get the International Super Randonneur award)

RUSA is just an organising body for randonneuring like Audax Australia, Audax UK, BC Randonneurs, Alberta Randonneurs, Prairie Randonneurs, Ontario Randonneurs, and many, many others.

"International Super Randonneur"? Never heard of that one. Is that an ACP/RM award?

SP
Bend, OR

http://www.aukweb.net/isr/index.htm

http://www.aukweb.net/isr/index.htm

And if you scroll down the list of recipients to #51, you'll see me. :) I got my 3 Continent 1200K International Super Randonneur award by riding the RM1200 in Canada, the Last Chance in the US, PBP in France, and Great Southern in Australia.

If a tree falls in the woods, does it make a sound? Yes, of course it does, silly.

To qualify for the SR, you have to complete the four ACP brevets (200k, 300k, 400k, 600k) in the same calendar year. RUSA brevet don't count for the SR, but they count for other RUSA awards. ... .Although that is what the RUSA website indicates under the "International Awards" section on the "Awards" page ( http://www.rusa.org/awards.html), that is not the entire story.

If you go to the "Results" page, and enter someone's name or number and click "Search", the following text appears at the bottom of the individual's results:

"ACP SR indicates that the rider completed a Super Randonneur Series according to the ACP rules (ACP brevets of 200km, 300km, 400km, and 600km where longer events cannot be substituted for shorter ones).

RUSA SR indicates that the rider did not complete an ACP SR but did complete a Super Randonneur Series according to the broader RUSA rules (ACP or RUSA brevets of 200km, 300km, 400km, and 600km, where longer events, including RM randonnées, can be substituted for shorter ones missing from the series)."


The "International Super Randonneur" is also explained on the RUSA website, the "Awards" page, the "International Awards" section.


Stalking the SR in the U.S., whether ACP or RUSA, is essentially a calendar year award. I understand that there are no ACP brevets offered in the USA after (approx.) October 15th of each year. 2 1/2 months later, there are quite a few ACP brevets offered on Jan-01 in the warmer areas.

I was looking for that RUSA SR statement, and couldn't find where it was.

I'm not sure why the statement is in there. As far as I can tell, there isn't any kind of recognition or award for doing an SR series under the RUSA rules that doesn't meet the ACP rules. Unless, maybe, it's used as qualifying for something else.

As far as I can tell, there isn't any kind of recognition or award for doing an SR series under the RUSA rules that doesn't meet the ACP rules. Unless, maybe, it's used as qualifying for something else.

RUSA has an award (Ultra Randonneur) for members who complete 10 SR series, and that includes ACP SR series (of which I have 4) or RUSA SR series (of which I have 2, for years where I did not complete a 400 or a 600 but did a 1000 or a 1200). So I still have 4 series (either ACP or RUSA) to make that award.

So many rules it is worse than the military...

So many rules it is worse than the military...

Without all the rules and the paperwork it would not be randonneuring. It would be just cycling.:p

Awards & medals routinely involve rules, paperwork and, usually, ego.
Randonneuring involves a a cyclist, a human-powered vehicle (usually a bicyle), and a formal, timed route (whtether on road, trail, both or other).
Cycling involves only time, place, vehicle and person.

The first has "pressure" if it's a goal. Otoh, the award/medal is only rarely the goal for me - it's what it represents, not the paper or medal.
If/when the first is the goal, I'll play by those rules and formalities; occasionally, I play by those relatng to the second.
I prefer the last - eliminating ego, pressure and formalities.

Excuse me while I get out of my rocking chair...Back when I first started doing brevets there were very few rules, very few awards and very little paperwork when it wasn't getting lost or burned up in a fire at the firehouse(another old-timer might get that one) . Well, maybe there were rules but we didn't have the rule police breathing down our backs. We just rode our bikes. Most of the time we didn't even order medals for the brevets we did, except the 1200ks. Now those are worth collecting. The problem nowadays is that as randonneuring has become more popular people have gotten involved. When people get involved we suddenly have to have a rule for this, a rule for that, a medal for this and a medal for that. Now it seems you can get a medal for wiping your rear. My cane is heavy, I better settle back down in my rocker and take a nap...btw, somewhere I have a box of old brevet medals if anyone is interested...

The problem nowadays is that as randonneuring has become more popular people have gotten involved. When people get involved we suddenly have to have a rule for this, a rule for that, a medal for this and a medal for that. Now it seems you can get a medal for wiping your rear.

Randonneuring awards can help get people motivated to be out and ride long distance. Many RUSA riders do long rides in the winter, and probably would not do them if there wasn't that small token of recognition that is the R-12 award. I am motivated to do multiple SR series this year, to get closer to that Ultra Rando award. Other people chase that unofficial title of K-Hound and ride 10,000 km in a year, probably lots more than they normally would.

Whatever it is that keeps people riding long distance rides, it's a good thing.

I suppose if people need a medal to motivate themselves that’s fine but I wish the masses would leave their rules police at home. ;)

I was looking for that RUSA SR statement, and couldn't find where it was.

... .
As I wrote ... go to the results page, enter the name of a valid RUSA member (or their RUSA number) and click "search". When the results pop up, scroll to the bottom of the results and read.

...

I'm not sure why the statement is in there. As far as I can tell, there isn't any kind of recognition or award for doing an SR series under the RUSA rules that doesn't meet the ACP rules. Unless, maybe, it's used as qualifying for something else.RUSA SR jersey, e.g..

So many rules it is worse than the military...
It is a French sport ... and since 1792, the French have been in love with "scientific" and have always been enamored of rules.

Once you are on the bike, the rules don't seem so ... annoying.

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Sorry for the troll-like three consecutive repsonses, but I have never figured out how to correctly do a "multi-quote".

Randonneuring awards can help get people motivated to be out and ride long distance. Many RUSA riders do long rides in the winter, and probably would not do them if there wasn't that small token of recognition that is the R-12 award. I am motivated to do multiple SR series this year, to get closer to that Ultra Rando award. Other people chase that unofficial title of K-Hound and ride 10,000 km in a year, probably lots more than they normally would.

Whatever it is that keeps people riding long distance rides, it's a good thing.
+1

I suppose if people need a medal to motivate themselves that’s fine but I wish the masses would leave their rules police at home. ;)
Gee, I don't see where the medals are causing "rules police."

I think it is the cheaters that cause "rules police".

Either that, or people that let a little bit of "authority" go to their head.
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okay, sorry for making 5 trollish posts.

The medals don't have anything to do with the rules. Medals are just "things" that people get attached to. That wasn't really my point. It's the same problem with everything. Something gets too popular and "people" ruin it. What happens when someone "cheats" on a brevet? What does that get them? A $2 medal that they pay for? Cheating happens, it's going to happen whether there are rules or not. I've seen more than one RBA falsify their own results so they could enter either PBP or another 1200k. What did that get them? They got a DNF at a 1200k and the scorn of everyone. Everyone knew and none of them are in the sport anymore. What more do you need?
What happens when you get too many people involved is that now, instead of hopping on my bike with some friends and doing a ride in some part of the country or world I've never ridden before we now have the "rules police" who try and dictate what we ride, what we wear and what equipment we have to have etc.. I’m not arguing that we don’t need rules. That would be anarchy. What I’m arguing is that the sport is slowly becoming a police state…

Skiffrun, after you posted that, I was able to find it, I had just looked for it under the "Awards" section and it wasn't there.

Marcello, your point about the Ultra award make sense, I hadn't realized it could qualify with the RUSA rides (I'm still working on my first SR, so I haven't started worrying about the other 9!)

When I first started in randonneuring, I wondered about the rules myself. Specifically, if you're going to ride X miles, does a requirement that you finish in Y hours somehow add to the experience? And I think that ultimately, having a specific goal, and specific rules to follow to achieve that goal do add to the experience. I know for sure that I would never have ridden as far as I have on some of my rides were it not for a certain number of kilometers that I was trying to cover, so that aspect has certainly motivated me to ride more.

All in all, there's not that many rules, it's not like football or anything.

So many rules it is worse than the military...

That's was I was concerned about (rules police) when I rode my first brevet last year, but I found the randonneuring crowd to be pretty much the complete opposite. Laid back, friendly, all about the ride and the challenge. I found randonneuring after decades of "just riding", and I'm enjoying the challenge and the comeraderie.

^ +1

That's been my experience too. Some are concerned about rules but only as they apply to themselves. I've never, ever seen one randonneur telling another, "hey, you cheated!" The people I've ridden with seem to pretty clearly understand that you can only cheat yourself.

Now, on the other hand when I used to golf...

It really varies from RBA to RBA and how they run their events and to be perfectly honest the majority of them are great.
I really shouldn't paint this too badly. I was just getting a little grumbly sitting there in my rocker. ;)

btw, I don't have a problem with the rule about going too slow or too fast. If I'm doing a 600k in 22hrs and someone else is doing the same ride in 40hrs that means that the organizer has to have volunteers out there for a long time (assuming they are doing some minimal support). When the riders get so spread out it becomes very difficult to keep tabs on everyone. On a 1200k there are riders coming in almost two days apart!

It really varies from RBA to RBA and how they run their events and to be perfectly honest the majority of them are great.
I really shouldn't paint this too badly. I was just getting a little grumbly sitting there in my rocker. ;)


Hi, Homeyba,

Not to poke a wasp's nest, but as somewhat of a newbie, I'm just curious what you see as the substantive rules changes? I've been randonneuring since 2005 and can't think of a rules change that has affected me at all. In particular I can't think of any rules changes that apply to ACP brevets since 2005. There are new awards with arcane rules, but unless I bother to apply for them, they don't affect me.

Were there big changes between 1998 (after RUSA was created) and 2005 in the rules that apply to ACP brevets? Did going from IR to RUSA lead to a slew of new rules in 1998?

As to cheating, I've seen one person deliberately break a rule that they thought was silly in the particular context, but it was trivial, didn't save them any distance, and certainly not my business to police. I know there's been accidental rule-breakage by myself and others. E.g., I got lost on a 200Km in 2006, and I may not have returned to the route where I left it because I have no idea where I left it. But after half an hour of riding around in the pouring rain, getting misdirected by the local folk, I finally got back on route. I haven't seen anyone cheat for the purpose of taking a shortcut or faking a control or whatever.

Nick

It's really not that there are new rules but it's more in how the old rules are interpreted by some individuals who know "everything." As an example, there was an RBA that tried to DQ anyone who showed up at his/her ride without fenders on their bike or the "you have to have lights" or your DQ'd guy. If I'm starting in the daylight and finish in the daylight who cares if I have a headlight? I could go on but you get the point, it's just stuff like that. Some people just get real anal about the rules and that's not what I'm out there for.
Back before 1998 there was probably 500+/- people nation wide doing brevets. Half of us were here on the west coast and the other half were east coast in the Boston area. It was really pretty loose back then. The only restriction on control times was going too slow. I remember doing a 600k out of Davis back in 1997ish where we did the first 200kms in 4:45! We had brevet cards but half the time they'd get lost. There were a slew of problems which is the very reason that RUSA is today. I guess we just have to take the good with the bad. :)

Not all the east coasters were in the Boston area.

Raleigh, NC 28th Annual Brevet Series (http://www.unc.edu/~alanj/)