The 2015 Night Ride thread

[mmmmartin]

my plan for 2015 is this - run one tour

Will that be the Normandy tour or another one? If another one, then where/when/who/how etc? Thoughts?

 

[Tim Hall]

lTrust me, Adrian, this is going to be a year off.

Good. And extremely well deserved.

 

[redfalo]

less work that answering a bunch of dopey e-mails from people who cancel at the last moment ('will I make it?' - to which I answer - and this is the best I can come up with - 'if you can answer no to two out of these three questions - are you over 65, two stone overweight and riding a bike that weighs more than 13kg you will be ok'). And a whole lot less worrying about the weather, about asking the same people time and time again to waymark junctions because you just know the young man riding six inches behind your back wheel is going to stick it out for ten minutes and then go off after his mates, and the woman who is always there to offer help (thankyou Miranda) should not really be doing solo waymarking at dodgy junctions in east London. Not giving a monkeys about the next letter of complaint about the lack of toilets en route. Telling 100 ****ing idiots (of whom 99 will never turn up) that there isn't a Garmin track of the route because I change my mind as we go along.

hm....

Or we could leave the club, and its insurance cover, to one side for the time being and people could run and participate rides between friends on a consenting adults basis.

maybe Adrian does have a point after all?

Most of the issues described by Simon should become less important the smaller the group is and the higher the share of experienced Friday members is. Not advertising non-Simon rides in an email might help.

I have great sympathies for Simon's point of sticking to well-proven routes for medium to big Friday's rides. The new stuff could be done in a smaller contingent of consenting adults, like @StuAff's IOW ride earlier this year or Els' Brussels to Oostende ride.

 

[ianmac62]

... rides leaders have to be named as officers. The ride has to be on a website. The ride has to be recce'd and risk-assessed - and that includes things like making sure the length of the ride and the refreshment stops are suited to those taking part. There has to be a central record of those taking part - and that has to be formatted in a consistent way so that the data can be found if there's some kind of question after.

Spot on, as a Rides Secretary of a CTC Member Group would confirm. Leaders agreed by the Committee, their names sent to CTC HQ, rides recce'd and risk-assessed, refreshment/toilet stops advised in advance, good record-keeping including details of guest riders. Most riders aren't/don't need to be aware.

 

[User10571]

Good. And extremely well deserved.

^
This.
DZ, you've done more than well to deliver for as long as you have.

 

[StuAff]

hm....



maybe Adrian does have a point after all?

Most of the issues described by Simon should become less important the smaller the group is and the higher the share of experienced Friday members is. Not advertising non-Simon rides in an email might help.

I have great sympathies for Simon's point of sticking to well-proven routes for medium to big Friday's rides. The new stuff could be done in a smaller contingent of consenting adults, like @StuAff's IOW ride earlier this year or Els' Brussels to Oostende ride.

Quite. The IOW is, I imagine, unlikely to appeal to newbies, (Travel to Portsmouth! Slow expensive ferry ride! Lots and lots and lots and lots of climbing!.....) and frankly I'd be very wary of having too many of them on it, certainly without a good number of experienced old hands.

 

[ianmac62]

No more snide comments about Northampton, please - we going to have the world's largest lava lamp

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-northamptonshire-29410790

 

[Dogtrousers]

Well, this thread has been an education in ride administration if nothing else. As was the Normandy "not a package" tour thread. It's good to know stuff, even if you don't use it.

 

[w00hoo_kent]

hm....
maybe Adrian does have a point after all?
Most of the issues described by Simon should become less important the smaller the group is and the higher the share of experienced Friday members is. Not advertising non-Simon rides in an email might help.

I have great sympathies for Simon's point of sticking to well-proven routes for medium to big Friday's rides. The new stuff could be done in a smaller contingent of consenting adults, like @StuAff's IOW ride earlier this year or Els' Brussels to Oostende ride.

Making them basically recce rides for possible inclusion in a 2016 calendar...

 

[Andrew Br]

Well, this thread has been an education in ride administration if nothing else. As was the Normandy "not a package" tour thread. It's good to know stuff, even if you don't use it.

Yes.
You have to see first hand what Simon does before there's even a ride, it's quite an eye opener..

.

 

[User10119]

Does it have to be either/or? If, and only if, dz is happy for rides that are Properly Done By The Rules to be run and led by others under the fridays banner then Hurrah! and Youpi! and thanks in advance to him for facilitating this and for all those old hands who are prepared to step up and undertake the recce-ing and risk assessing and answering a bazillion Emails Of Ever Increasing Stupidity. At the same time consenting adults are certainly able, just as they always were, to organise themselves into social rides that may well be at night, as they in fact often have. Inspired by the Fridays, perhaps, but nonetheless not Fridays rides as would be clear due to their non-inclusion on the club rides list, calendar and website.

 

[w00hoo_kent]

Yes, but because of the different organisers doing 'official' ones the unofficial ones will be harder to differentiate and so more work should be put in to differentiating them because of the special circumstances.

 

[Flying Dodo]

Yes, but because of the different organisers doing 'official' ones the unofficial ones will be harder to differentiate and so more work should be put in to differentiating them because of the special circumstances.

Perhaps have the unofficial ones NOT go to the coast.......

 

[srw]

Resurrecting this thread after a few brief conversations yesterday morning - @Fab Foodie and I are still discussing possibilities for Oxfordshire, perhaps in connection with the Abingdon cycling festival. Someone (I can't remember who) suggested a dressy ride - a proper old-fashioned Night Out in glad rags - which sounds like a spiffing idea. And @theclaud promised faithfully (or I may have got the wrong end of the stick) that she'd do Cardiff to the Gower on a day I'm not otherwise booked.

 

[BalkanExpress]

Resurrecting this thread after a few brief conversations yesterday morning - @Fab Foodie and I are still discussing possibilities for Oxfordshire, perhaps in connection with the Abingdon cycling festival. Someone (I can't remember who) suggested a dressy ride - a proper old-fashioned Night Out in glad rags - which sounds like a spiffing idea. And @theclaud promised faithfully (or I may have got the wrong end of the stick) that she'd do Cardiff to the Gower on a day I'm not otherwise booked.

I think that at some stage in the evening we all pestered TC about the ride..to the extent that she promised good weather just to get rid of me.