Organizing a ride.
 

I want to organize a non competative all night (sundown to sun up) bike ride and was wondering what I need to take into consideration.

I know i will need to require all participants to use lights (front and rear, not blinking)
I know I will have to require all participants to carry a cell phone.
I know it will be a no drop ride
I know I will require that participants supply their own nutrition
I know that i will supply everyone with a map of the route.

Please help me fill in the gaps in the plan.

INSURANCE!!!!!!!!

If you are going to organize a ride you absolutely MUST have insurance. Sorry, but that's the way it is these days. Contact your local cycling association. You should be able to tap into their insurance provider.

Next, if you are expecting any quantity of riders ... enough to clog up the road a little bit in places, you have to get permission from the local police force. It becomes a public gathering or parade or something. You may have to pay a fee to be allowed to do that.

If these things are too daunting for you, have a look at my Links page: http://www.machka.net/links.htm
On it you'll see various Randonneur and Audax organizations ... these all have long distance rides (from sun up to sun down, and longer). Check out the 24 hour events. Most 24 hour events have a 12 hour option. And definitely have a look at the UltraMarathon Cycling Association link.

I'd give the whole plan some more thought.

If you're organizing a ride, do you want it under the most dangerous conditions or the least dangerous conditions? Once you start thinking like that, a daytime ride sounds a lot better. Especially if this is organized like the common century-type bicycle rallies.

I've got a nice headlight. But I know it won't last all night- 6 hours max on the "low" bulb. So you may have a lot of people that ride at night that can't ride ALL night.

I'm not that familiar with it, but thought "no drops" meant the group didn't ride off and leave the slowpoke. And in that case, why does everyone need cell phones and maps?

Seems to me that if this is a half-dozen of your buddies, it should be no problem. If you're inviting a 100 strangers, give some thought to these items.

For a large organized ride, a major difficulty on the first outing would be gauging turnout. Especially if you're giving out Tshirts, you need to know ahead of time if there's going to be 20 or 200, or you can be stuck holding the bag for 180 unused shirts, or having 180 people irate that they didn't get a shirt. I went on my first ride like that this fall, and I'll bet those people had a trunk full of unused Tshirts when they got done.

Seems like there is a midnight rally in Houston, Tx, downtown- but that's not quite the same as the typical tour-through-the-country-side, and also not all-night.

* What month of the year?
* What geographical location?
* Who are the targeted ride participants?

I thought you were more familiar with long distance cycling than that.

If you're planning to ride all night, you get a Schmidt dynohub or stock up on batteries ... just like you would on a randonnee. I've ridden right through a lot of nights, and lighting hasn't been much of an issue.

From my randonneuring/24-hour race perspective, I read "no drops" to mean: "no drop bags" ... which is something you announce ahead of time when organizing a long distance ride. And from a randonneuring/24-hour race perspective, it is highly recommended to bring cell phones, and to ensure that everyone gets a map.


To the OP, check the Long Distance forum for more info on long distance events ... you might even want to have this thread moved over there.