Hosting a long brevet

Last weekend I hosted a 400k/600k brevet called the Orange Triple Loop. That's 250 miles/375 miles for those of us not raised in Europe. I've never hosted a ride that long before and it introduced some unexpected challanges. Most ride organizers run rides over roads they are very familiar with -- makes sense. The problem is that their riders are probably less familiar with those roads so a routesheet that seems clear to the organizer may be confusing for the riders. This is especially true when the route contains a lot of bike paths, as mine do. For some reason Parks and Recreation rarely put signposts on bike trails. I remember cycling around Lake Zugersee in Switzerland and being impressed with all the signposts on the bike trails. I wish we did the same thing in SoCal.

In addition, a routesheet entry that is crystal clear after 100km of riding may be incomprehensible to a rider who has ridden 500km and is quite possibly bonking.

As a result, quite a few of my riders got lost at various points and at least two failed to complete the ride as a result -- although that mistake was made on regular, well-marked roads. So I need to really concentrate on simplifying the route and clarifying the routesheet whereever there is the slightest room for confusion. I also learned that I need to put the exit directions for each control on a seperate line after the control instructions instead of comingled with the control description.

In the end I had twenty-three 600k riders and seven 400k riders start the event. Out of that total I had eleven DNFs. The weather was close to perfect (hot, but little wind). Most riders had more tail-wind than head-wind. Quite a few of the riders rode personal best distances. No-one crashed to my knowledge. I only had to rescue one rider who melted down about 40 miles from the ride HQ.

I had some very useful feedback from several of the riders, especially those who got lost. Riders were very positive about the overall structure of the ride including the triple loop format and the extensive use of bike trails in Orange and LA counties.

I already have tentative route changes for the 2013 version of this ride. It will be very similar but with fewer turns, no info controls, and at least one less receipt control. I will be working extensively on the routesheet as soon as I've had a chance to pre-ride the modified routes.

I need to thank my wife who helped enormously throughout the event, and my daughter who helped me design the route and helped on Saturday. Hosting a ride like this is very hard work, I don't think I got more than an hour of sleep at a time on Saturday night.