unterhausen

I'm coming up with a 300k ride in the Central Pennsylvania area. My goal is to have 10 climbs and 10k of climbing. Trying to figure out how to have controles. My route right now has a deficit of good candidates for controles.

Machka 

If you don't need the controls to provide food, water, and toilet facilities, then you can use information controls.

Pick a spot with something unique and relatively permanent and ask a question on the brevet card about it.

I've used things like the color of a barn at a particular intersection ... or the weight listed on a sign on the road at a particular intersection. The BC Randonneurs do this all the time and they'll ask questions like the name of a certain store, or a saying on a road sign, etc.

I've thought about doing this, and having the participants take photos at a certain point which they would send to me. This idea would work well with one of the Alberta Randonneuring routes in the Calgary area. They had to reroute it a few years ago because of construction and basically had us do an out-and-back on a particular road to make up the distance. If it was me, I'd have had the cyclists ride to the top of the first hill where they could see the Calgary Tower (which was the right distance, as it happened), and then take a photo of it and send it to me.

The other option is to reroute your route. I've created a full series of routes here (200K, 300K, 400K, and 600K) because I'm the ride organizer for my area, and let me tell you ... it's not an easy thing to do!!


Here are the ACP rules ... check what they say about unmanned controls:
https://www.paris-brest-paris.org/ACP...p?showpage=322

mattm

+1 to what Machka said - Seattle Rando does similar things, asking about signs on buildings, color of a gate, etc.

in remote areas, perhaps a mile marker would do.

unterhausen

Thanks for the inputs. Central Pennsylvania can be surprisingly remote. Nothing like some other places in the world, but for the Eastern half of the U.S. it's only sparsely populated. I like the info controle idea for a couple locations. I guess I have some more scouting to do.

StephenH

On the photo idea, you'd have to make sure everyone had a camera with them. I like to take pictures when I'm out, and usually do have one, but not everyone does that.

I went on a ride around the neighborhood this afternoon, and stopped to take a picture and my camera batteries were dead. Good thing I wasn't on your ride! Also, I don't normally pay any attention to the time on my camera, so for a long time, it was off on the dates or hours- keep this in mind when getting photos in from people.

You're allowed to use postcards, if the route passes through a spot with a post office.

If you know anyone in the area, you could always have a real live person out there.

Machka 

I've never used the photo idea on any of my brevets ... I thought of it recently because most people have cell phones with camera capabilities these days, and it might be a variation on the postcard or information control idea.

In many cases, it's very difficult to have a real life person out there, even in "populated" areas. Things close up early, towns go to bed at 8 pm, farmers don't want to be sitting by the side of the road between 8:30 pm and 4:00 am until the three widely spaced cyclists on the ride go by ....

zowie

How would you know when the picture was taken, that it was not shot from a car the day before? Then again, this could apply to most types of informational controls.

StephenH

You really wouldn't. There are cameras that put the date in the photo, and it's in the file information on a lot of them, but that can be wrong and shouldn't be depended on. Then again, on the permanent I rode the other day, the clerk at the starting point asked me what time I wanted her to put on the card, so that's not foolproof, either.

mattm

btw one more option might be mailing a postcard as a control (to the organizer, with date/time, from a known location)...

this is allowed for brevets, not sure about permanents tho.

Machka 

Brevets are very much run on the honour system ... especially where I live where there might only be one or two riders on the route. You could technically drive the route, or sit at home and sign all the cards yourself, or whatever.

But why? I'd rather do the ride ... ride the whole distance. To me, there's no point to cheating.

Things like photos, informational questions, postcards, etc. are just meant to give a small degree of assurance that the rider actually rode the route.

noteon 

Do ride organizers ever plant a small cache of some sort of token at a controle, and require riders to arrive at the end with the correct tokens?

You know, poker chips from a certain casino, pawns from a red plastic chessboard, that kind of thing.

Machka 

I've never heard of an organizer doing that, but it might be an interesting idea.

mattm

actually on a 600k i did last summer we had to collect little stickers from a message board atop Windy Ridge, near Mt. St. Helens (the roads were closed to cars leading up to it, and there wasn't anyone at the top to sign cards).

one of the organizers (jan heine no less) rode a bike up to the top and put the stickers there before the ride. he also hauled something like 50 lbs of stuff (in a trailer) up the mtn for a secret control where there wasn't anyone else around, that was pretty rad.

later on in the ride they had more stickers, and one rider was DNFd for not collecting his. he said he was there but couldn't find it, or something like that.

Paul Scearce

From recent experience getting a route approved, I think the permanents committee is going to want at least a few evenly spaced staffed controles to verify the riders' time through the course. The riders are also probably going to want to be able to replenish food and water at regular intervals, too. If the course doesn't pass near any place to buy food/water for stretches of over 50 miles or so, I would consider rerouting.

In between, information or postcard controles may be needed to prevent shortcuts. Around here most of the post offices seem to be pretty well consolidated, so if there is no store, there likely isn't a post office either. The RUSA site doesn't go into great detail about what sort of information should be requested-only that it should prove that the rider passed by the indicated spot. Also, when you submit your route for approval, you only need to give the location and type of controle. You don't need to submit a list of questions. You will need to mail in the brevet card for the first rider, so don't get too creative.

I am in the western portion of Schuylkill county. If your route passes through this area, I would be happy to help if you need specific suggestions for controles or routing. Google doesn't always show everything, and sometimes shows things in the wrong place. Also, you could try the NJ randoneers message board for local input. https://www.njrando.com/forum/

bmike

i've thought about the photo idea. would be great to get a permanent packet with a disposable camera. snap the shots required, fill out the brevet card, mail it back. owner would then develop film.

on a route i'm working on here in vt i send folks on many side roads. you can get there on the paved road - but in many cases its nicer riding (and a bit more scenic with climbing) on the dirt. we have an information control at an old old cemetery to prevent shortcutting...

noteon 

Yeah, I guess the idea does open itself up to that kind of problem and/or abuse.

mattm

then again, even "straightforward" controls, like the Blue Mountain gas station in Pendleton, OR, can be problematic. it was one of the controls on a 600 i did down there last year.

the tricky part was that the name of the station had changed, and it only said "blue mountain" on a sign inside the store! needless to say it caused much confusion, and i ended up just getting water from a baseball field's bathroom sink (yuck).

Machka 

This is a pet peeve of mine ... the ride organizer did not ride (or drive) the route shortly before the event to see that the name had changed and to update the cue sheet. Drives me crazy when ride organizers are that careless.

thompsw

"Drives me crazy when ride organizers are that careless. "

That may apply to organized rides around a schedule, like Bevets, but most Permanents might be open year-round and the route owner is not necessarily going to travel the route once per month to keep things up-to-date. He/she must rely on the riders to report any issues and may or may not ride the route occasionally.

For informational controls it helps to develop a few different questions around the location so that a rider repeating the route doesn't already know the answer. Also, a staffed Control later on the route will allow the route owner to review the completion times between Controls to see if they are reasonable.

Having said all that, there is nothing to stop the rider from riding in a car, sitting around to create reasonable times, then check-in at Controls. I agree -- what's the point -- but who knows what some people's motivation might be.

As for Brevets -- my experience is that they are less likely to be abused, much less on the "honour" system than Permanents.

supcom

Although RUSA does not yet recognize a photo control, I would like to see it added to the permanent rules. However, instead of simply asking for a photo of some landmark, I would require a simple composition. For example, riders would need to take a photo of their bicycles facing left in front of the Anytown city limit sign.

The downside of a photo control is that riders would need to carry a camera. But just about everyone has a camera (it's hard to find a cell phone without one), so it would not be an onerous requirement.

rhm

Apologies for bumping such an old thread! I couldn't find a newer one that addressed the same questions in such detail.

As a new RUSA member who (as a rule) won't drive a car to ride my bike, I'd like to set up some Permanents that (a) give me credit for the rides I ride anyway and (b) let me share some of my favorite out-of-the-way places with other riders. But the problem is, most of my rides involve detours away from busy roads, while the kind of places that make for good controles are on the busy roads. I understand the idea of an information controle, and I may do that. But I'd rather go with convenience stores and the like.

So for my controles I'd like to use a sequence of businesses that are open 24/7, that guarantees the rider has done at least 100 km, so the ride qualifies as a populaire no matter what short cuts a rider might take; but I will provide a cue sheet that goes the route I would actually ride (more like 114 km).

Is that done? Is that even permissible?

Steamer

On non-free route perms, controles need to be arranged so there aren't massive short cuts that are possible. Some minor shortcuts, or uncontrolled short cuts due to safety issues are usually ok.

Your post seems to imply that you are going to do a free route permanent, however. In that case, keep in mind that you only get mileage credit for the shortest navigable route between controles.

The free route perms that Unterhausen has created generally have you riding a good 10-15% extra miles compared to what you get credit for because the nice routes are on less travelled roads that are less direct than the minimum distance route (which are to be avoided if unpleasant / highly trafficked).

In any event, yeah, you need to have at least one or two stores in there as controles. But add in info controls and post office controles if needed to preserve the integrity of the route.

unterhausen

What you are describing is a free-route perm. Recent posts on the randon email group have raised some concern about free route perms, so you need to come up with multiple routes that will fit your controls. But this is just alternative routes on a mapping site like ridewithgps.com. You only need to do a cue sheet for the shortest bikeable route. I always do a cue sheet for the shortest route and my preferred route. The thing about a populaire is that you probably don't even need any resupply at all, although one convenience store would be nice.

Your perms don't have to be rideable 24/7. I have one where if you ride it on Sunday, there are no control spots open and you have to send a post card. Don't obsess over shortcuts and ruin a good route. I don't know how Joe K. (your RBA has to approve your route) is about shortcuts, but I don't think he is that strict. Just don't make it too ridiculous (more than 10%) without a control.

I didn't remember starting this thread. I don't remember which 300k I was thinking about, one of my goals for this year is to get a couple of 300k perms approved. I find designing perms to be really challenging and fun. I think the motivation for most perms is that a person wants a route that starts near their house. I also didn't like the fact that there were no rides in my area, and thus a new rando had to be really motivated to get started.