Square & Compas

Last night, Jan. 30, 2010 at about 9:00 pm the official overnight towns for the worlds oldest, largest and longest multi day bicycle TOUR were announced. The start town is my city, Sioux City, Iowa. The end town is Dubuque, Iowa. I am at least doing the firs tday. I have other bicycle plans for 2010 that will use up my vacation time thus not allowing me to do the full week. I have done the full week as well as individual days in the past. Which days are you going to do this year?

https://ragbrai.com/

DieselDan

We heard RAGBRAI was going to end due to lawsuits and jack-hole county sheriffs that were NOT going to allow the event through there jurisdiction. Besides, there was this a-hole recumbent rider that ruined much of RAGBRAI for many of us with the initials JV.

Square & Compas

The law suit you refer to has to do with the incident in 2004 when a rider died from injuries after his front wheel was caught in a center line seam of a Crawford County Hwy. The law suit happened because a sheriff's deputy left his post too early after he was stationed there to warn riders of the danger. The family sued Crawford County and it was settled out of court. What happened next is Crawford county and a few others either banned RAGBRAI from coming through the county and/or banned cyclists from the county roadways unless they carried insurance even if they were not on a ride like RAGBRAI that would prevent them from being able to sue the county even if the county was negligent in not maintaining the roadway and preventing dangers like this. It was the first law suit of it's kind.

RAGBRAI changed the wording in the waiver participants sign and since then all counties who passed laws have repealed them. Other counties that were discussing it have ceased to do so.

RAGBRAI is not ending anytime soon.

How can one person out of 10,000+ ruin RAGBRAI for anyone else? Had these people who had their RAGBRAI ruined ever meet this person?

DieselDan

JV ran rampant here and other forums and that discouraged people from attending. He went as far as making death threats to some of us.

Part of the Tour de Georgia problem are a few jack hole sheriffs as well.

Square & Compas

As stated RAGBRAI isn't ending. I don't see how an anonymous person on an internet forum could discourage other anonymous people from participating in an event like RAGBRAI even with empty threats. Did people actually take this person seriously? Perhaps the problem was on both sides.

no1mad 

I won't be there. I'll be doing good to do any of my state's version- Freewheel.

Square & Compas

Anyone else planning on attending RAGBRAI this year? This years ride will be July 25 to July 31, 2010. The 442 mile route will be the third easiest fifth lowest in elevation and sixth shortest routes.

https://ragbrai.com/index.php/2010/01...-flatest-ever/

Square & Compas

There has been a change of plans for me. Instead of only doing one day I am riding the whole week.

mr geeker

never rode ragbrai, and doubt i ever will... dont see the point in paying someone for me to ride my bike along a route not of my choosing. thats $140 that could be put to better uses. yes, i know that that money covers everything concerning the ride, from food to entertainment to transport of my stuff so i dont have to carry a lick of it, but still it isnt worth it imho. and never will be. yea, im petty.

Square & Compas

Then ride bandit style. That is where you don't pay to do the ride. You either ride self contained or have someone, like a spouse, transport your gear for you. All you'll need money for is food, etc.

I have no problem with bandit riders. I was helped by the support vehicle of a group of bandit riders when I had a major problem with my bike. Up until it was decided I was doing the whole week I was going to ride the first day bandit. The reason I am paying the fee is my bike club has a number of guaranteed spots on RAGBRAI and we are not subject to the lottery.

After all the hard costs of the ride the rest goes to charity.

How do you feel about paying for other one day rides with a pre-determined route? Do you pay? Does it make a differance if the ride is just a fun ride or is a charity ride? Do you do MAR? Do you pay to do it?

Those that ride bandit on RAGBRAI are typically those that are not chosen in the lottery.

joe_5700

Is anyone interested in riding from Omaha to Sioux City a day or 2 before RAGBRAI? Like last year I am only planning on riding the first day.

Machka 

If RAGBRAI is all right with bandit riders and encourages them, then I guess that's fine, but most organizations do not like having bandit riders on the road at the same time as all the other riders for the following reasons (and probably more) ...

-- insurance. If a bandit rider is in an accident of some sort, the insurance situation (which may potentially result in law suits) gets really sticky because RAGBRAI can be held responsible for the bandit rider even though he is not a paying rider.

-- businesses along the route. If the businesses along route are told to expect a certain amount of riders and a lot more come through, they might not be able to handle it all, and may in the future try to ban the RAGBRAI fom coming through their area.

-- polution & nuisance. It's sad, but cyclists are some of the worst for littering, being rude to locals, and generally being a pain in the butt on rides like these. The organization plans for a certain number to keep the nuisance level down to something managable, if a bunch of non-paying riders enter it can get out of hand ... and again the communities it currently goes through may decide to ban it.


Do everyone a favour and do not ever be a bandit rider on a ride, any ride. If you want to be petty and not pay the amount, but still want to ride the route, do the ride the following week, or the week before. Or if you happen to find yourself on the route while the event is on, stay out of the way of the other riders.

mr geeker

its not so much about the money, as it is about the route not being of my choosing. the price of entry could be $0.01 and i still wouldnt desire to participate.

A: i dont like large groups of people. large groups make me nervous.
B: i like being able to set my own route, pace, distance, etc...

bnelson

guitar ted has a gravel route than I believe runs parallel to ragbri route stopping i believe in the same towns