24 hour Time Trial
Jun. 24th, 2011 09:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bluefirebirdSome of you, who know me, already know that in my real life I am the voluntary secretary of a cycle racing club (hence my twitter moniker). This weekend we are involved in the promotion of a 24 hour Time Trial. There are 96 riders entered and they will be starting at minute intervals from 12 noon tomorrow somewhere in the wilds of Kent (England). They have 24 hours from the moment of their start time to cover as many miles as they can manage along a defined route. They are allowed to stop - and even to sleep for the night if they so wish - just as long as they stay within the 'cover' of the race and complete enough of the route to get them to the safety of the finishing circuit.
My club are manning the night HQ at roughly the most westerly point of the course. We will be open from around 19:30 Saturday evening until approx 06:30 Sunday morning (at which point my plan is to scoot home to bed!). There are about 10 of the club involved, so we are hoping to get a couple hours sleep during the night and I plan to take my laptop and dongle in the hope of a network connection.
I went shopping for the event this morning, but the fun bit is that I am effectively organising a party but I don't know how many people will be coming or what they want to eat!! We've been directed to provide tea, coffee and sausages but not much other direction, certainly not quantities. The thing is that it is almost impossible to know how many takers there will be for what we have on offer. Riders who want to be competitive will hardly stop unless they have problems. They will almost all have their own support teams and carloads of whatever food they think they might want. Theoretically our main customers will be those support teams, some of whom might camp out with us while another night support team takes over their rider. There's very little telling what any of them might want.
I've ridden 12 hour events and also been part of the support team for riders and experience says that the support team almost forget to look after themselves, so they might be interested in a ready take-away supply in the wee small hours. Also riders these days tend to ride using sophisticated sports gels, bars and drinks BUT after 10 or 12 hours of such things the body starts to crave real food.
This event is a special this year - there is usually only one 24 hour event left on the calendar and that is run on Merseyside, with a cafe which stays open all night on the night circuit - so I know that there are a number of southern riders entered in the event who are just planning on surviving the distance and I guess it is those riders who could prove to be our customers.
We will see. If there are lots of customers I haven't bought nearly enough, if there aren't many then there is a load of stuff that will need fridge and freezer space that I just don't have.
And right now I am hard at work cooking cheesy pasta, tomato pasta and sausages!
My club are manning the night HQ at roughly the most westerly point of the course. We will be open from around 19:30 Saturday evening until approx 06:30 Sunday morning (at which point my plan is to scoot home to bed!). There are about 10 of the club involved, so we are hoping to get a couple hours sleep during the night and I plan to take my laptop and dongle in the hope of a network connection.
I went shopping for the event this morning, but the fun bit is that I am effectively organising a party but I don't know how many people will be coming or what they want to eat!! We've been directed to provide tea, coffee and sausages but not much other direction, certainly not quantities. The thing is that it is almost impossible to know how many takers there will be for what we have on offer. Riders who want to be competitive will hardly stop unless they have problems. They will almost all have their own support teams and carloads of whatever food they think they might want. Theoretically our main customers will be those support teams, some of whom might camp out with us while another night support team takes over their rider. There's very little telling what any of them might want.
I've ridden 12 hour events and also been part of the support team for riders and experience says that the support team almost forget to look after themselves, so they might be interested in a ready take-away supply in the wee small hours. Also riders these days tend to ride using sophisticated sports gels, bars and drinks BUT after 10 or 12 hours of such things the body starts to crave real food.
This event is a special this year - there is usually only one 24 hour event left on the calendar and that is run on Merseyside, with a cafe which stays open all night on the night circuit - so I know that there are a number of southern riders entered in the event who are just planning on surviving the distance and I guess it is those riders who could prove to be our customers.
We will see. If there are lots of customers I haven't bought nearly enough, if there aren't many then there is a load of stuff that will need fridge and freezer space that I just don't have.
And right now I am hard at work cooking cheesy pasta, tomato pasta and sausages!
