No reason for clubs to give up race dates ( although Velo Promo is always willing to give up a race date to another club just like they did for the Petaluma Crit. Having more days where we have two or more races on the same day would be good for the region. We certainly have enough riders to support more than one race in a day. Of course it would be nice if say the two races weren't both Crits and not right next to each other ( unless the promoters coordinated tart times for each groups so riders could do one race in the morning and another race in the afternoon. I remember on day many years ago when we had 4 crits on the same day.

Having m,ore races on teh same day would hopefully allow promoters to get more creative with the categories offered ( like having a separate Masters 3 race).

Upgrades to to the riders who place in the top 6 ( generally). It doesn't matter how someone places in the top 6, via breakaway or bunch sprint. I just personally prefer races that end in breakaways since that is more exciting to me.

More races being promoted you say?
How do you figure?

Fact: It's already a rule that a sponsored club must put on a race, not an option. (Although not very well enforced)

Fact: The schedule is pretty full as it is.

Is Velo Promo willing to give up one of his races (and courses) to a club?

Oh, now you don't like bunch sprints? Yet the upgrade points system favors the bunch sprinter. Which is it?

casey wrote:How does restricting prizes help promote racing? Easy if the rule leads to more promoters being able to break even or even make a little profit on their race then maybe more races will get promoted. As a general rule when more races are held USCF membership has gone up. Nor Cal is different from most of the rest of the country. We have a large rider population and we are fairly isolated from races in other regions. In other regions where they don't have as large a rider population, or the race faces competition from other areas promoters often feel they have to offer a large prize list to attract riders. When these promoters depend on entry fees to help cover the prize list they can often lose money if they don't get the number of entries they expect. Losing money isn't a good incentive to promote more races. Fewer races leads to fewer racers which is bad for the sport.

I can't think of any other sport where participants at the same level as 3/4/5 racers earn prizes. At the recreational level of a sport the main attraction should be the fun and recreation , not from the prizes.

Personally I don't like lots of primes in a race. To many primes tend to encourage bunch sprints. I realize I'm probably in the minority but I find bunch sprints dull and they lead to more accidents. Give me a race that finishes in a breakaway any day. Instead of offering so many primes I wish more promoters would offer deeper prize lists. Instead of awarding prizes to 6 places ( or maybe 10 places for a larger prize list) I'l like to see more races give out prizes to 15 and 20 places. I think this approach would lead to better and more interesting racing ( and hopefully safer racing).

As for masters Cat 4s who upgrade and suddenly find themselves racing against former Pros and National Champs I think this problem could be addressed in a couple of different ways. The fir
st would be to have more ( any) handicap racing. I've seen arguments that one reason why Australia turns out so many great bicycle racers is the large number of handicap races they do. Handicap races make for harder racing and if done properly helps balance the chances of riders of all categories placing well.. Instead we get what I call cookie cutter racing where most races offer the same categories going the same distances in the same events. I guess the cookie cutter race approach is a safe choice for promoters since riders know what to expect but I think it kind of makes racing stale.

Also promoters could have separate prizes or recognition for the Cat 3 riders in a masters 1/2/3 event or in an open 45+ race.

If a rule does pass that restricts prizes of monetary value to the lower categories then promoters will have to get a little creative in coming up with ways to entice riders to their races. Some ideas might be to have raffle type drawings for prizes and prizes based on team classification for the day. I think it would be good for the sport in general if promoters get more creative with the types of race they offer and how their races are conducted.

Anonymous wrote:casey wrote:
When I notice some has reached the automatic upgrade level I upgrade them.
Doesn't 107511 have at least 35 points now in the 4's?

It looks like the Paterson RR put him over the magic 30 point limit so I'll contact him today.

Since this rider didn't upgrade until May he only has 17 points as a Cat 4. Points earned as a Cat 5 don't carry over to the 4 to 3 upgrade so the rider in question only has 17 points earned as a Cat 4.

casey wrote:
When I notice some has reached the automatic upgrade level I upgrade them.
Doesn't 107511 have at least 35 points now in the 4's?

I am all for doing anything that would encourage breakaways and discourage group finishes. Ironically, I find that primes do in fact encourage breakaways. Folks go for primes, other riders let them go because "they're just going for the prime" and then before you know it a break has formed. I guess it could work either way though.

I'm glad that folks are thinking up ideas in order to prevent the racing from becoming stale, but I don't think that ending Cat 4/5 schwag is the answer. "Look, I just won a pair of...." yada, yada almost always gets the biggest smiles and the happiest grins from successful racers after the deed is done. Do we really need to take that away?!? Amateur racers race "just for the fun of it" no matter the prizes, but the prizes make the effort seem legitimate and worthwhile. Otherwise, it feels like a "practice race" or "practice crit". Most people will never, ever get to say "I'm a pro." However, they can still experience the glory of winning a prize... at least they can with the current status quo. If a 100 rider Cat5 field brings in $2000, should that money really just go to supplementing the pros who already get the mammoth load of prizes and even get free gear, bikes, etc.? Obviously, that will do nothing to make the pros race more. They will race every chance they get no matter what.

Back to breakaways.... if you really wanted to decrease the cash prizes for Cat 3/4/5 and encourage breakaways, why not just say "The only people awarded prizes are those that win within a breakaway." Can you imagine how different the racing would be?! Holy smokes.

Jason wrote:There are automatic upgrades for Cat 4s and 3s if they get to many points. For Cat 4s you get an automatic upgrade if you get 30 upgrade points in a 12 month period and for Cat 3s the magic number is 60 points in a 12 month period. I do tack upgrade points earned in Cat 3, 4 and 35+ 4/5 races. I only track races held in the NCNCA region ( so someone could have more points than I know about ). When I see someone getting close to a mandatory upgrade I normally send them a warning about a pending automatic upgrade. When I notice some has reached the automatic upgrade level I upgrade them.

So what happens if someone who should be a cat 3 via points takes points ahead of you in a 4/5 race? E.g. rider A with 25 points towards a Cat 3 gets 1st and rider B with 10 points gets 2nd. Seems like Rider A should not be allowed to take the 7 points and rider B should get 7 instead of 5. I know this issue will possibly arise for the CAL CUP and there are 4s that should upgrade.

As long as a rider hasn't been upgraded then they get the upgrade points. A cat 4 with 25 upgrade points isn't at the point of getting an automatic upgrade so rider A would get the upgrade points. Of course the 7 upgrade points will push that rider past the mandatory upgrade level so if he doesn't upgrade on his own he will probably get an automatic upgrade in a couple of weeks.

There are automatic upgrades for Cat 4s and 3s if they get to many points. For Cat 4s you get an automatic upgrade if you get 30 upgrade points in a 12 month period and for Cat 3s the magic number is 60 points in a 12 month period. I do tack upgrade points earned in Cat 3, 4 and 35+ 4/5 races. I only track races held in the NCNCA region ( so someone could have more points than I know about ). When I see someone getting close to a mandatory upgrade I normally send them a warning about a pending automatic upgrade. When I notice some has reached the automatic upgrade level I upgrade them.

So what happens if someone who should be a cat 3 via points takes points ahead of you in a 4/5 race? E.g. rider A with 25 points towards a Cat 3 gets 1st and rider B with 10 points gets 2nd. Seems like Rider A should not be allowed to take the 7 points and rider B should get 7 instead of 5. I know this issue will possibly arise for the CAL CUP and there are 4s that should upgrade.

Anonymous wrote:

Yes, one of the nice things about being old enough is having options. I race in elite and masters races. Not implying that there isn't a choice there. I did have a guy in my group at Copperopolis this year that mentioned that he'd gotten 26 pts the year before. He sat on my wheel most of the last lap and then went around me at the finish to put me in 7th. Cost me a point in my eyes, at least. If he had worked as hard as I did, maybe we could've brought back more guys and finished higher up. But he also mentioned he didn't want to do the longer harder cat 3 races. Well, I do!! He's since upgraded, or maybe Casey upgraded him. Point is, not EVERYONE wants to make the jump, and will sandbag as long as they can. How can we stop that? Automatic upgrades as soon as someone gets enough pts, maybe? I don't know...

Registered, but can't log on....G

There are automatic upgrades for Cat 4s and 3s if they get to many points. For Cat 4s you get an automatic upgrade if you get 30 upgrade points in a 12 month period and for Cat 3s the magic number is 60 points in a 12 month period. I do tack upgrade points earned in Cat 3, 4 and 35+ 4/5 races. I only track races held in the NCNCA region ( so someone could have more points than I know about ). When I see someone getting close to a mandatory upgrade I normally send them a warning about a pending automatic upgrade. When I notice some has reached the automatic upgrade level I upgrade them.

In crits there is a sizeable percentage of people who have no chance to win by sitting in and waiting for a bunch sprint, but are happy to sit in and wait for a bunch sprint. One of the problems is that it is a big risk to try anything - if you try an attack, fail and cannot recover you get dropped and are not permitted to continue. If one cannot continue, it's a sort of poor bargain for one's entry fee. It's less of a risk in road racing as one can usually continue but may not be placed.

At any level except the P12's, any one who could successfully pull off a breakaway solo should probably be in a higher category anyways just based on far superior fitness.

How about trying to run 4/5 crits as points races and 3 races as team point races? :)

My experience on the track is that below the P12 level, most people have the same behavior as they do on the road, they are happy to sit in for the final sprint. However you do see more people try something since there are typically three to four races per category so if they fail they can try again later. Much of the separation that occurs in local track racing is because there are far fewer people in the pack and a wider disparity in ability.

And handicap races are the among the hardest races for everyone, as everyone has a chance to win. Except for that one last Friday night. :)

I want to state (again) that I don't think that prizes and/ or cash are an entitlement. If we can get the racing to be less "negative", w/o offering goodies, then cool. My whole point that I've been writing about isn't whinging about getting prizes taken away, but I also don't think that we should tell promoters not to offer good prize packages if they can put them together. Bonus upgrade points for breakaways?? Hell yes! That's better than cash, I'd say.

Yes, one of the nice things about being old enough is having options. I race in elite and masters races. Not implying that there isn't a choice there. I did have a guy in my group at Copperopolis this year that mentioned that he'd gotten 26 pts the year before. He sat on my wheel most of the last lap and then went around me at the finish to put me in 7th. Cost me a point in my eyes, at least. If he had worked as hard as I did, maybe we could've brought back more guys and finished higher up. But he also mentioned he didn't want to do the longer harder cat 3 races. Well, I do!! He's since upgraded, or maybe Casey upgraded him. Point is, not EVERYONE wants to make the jump, and will sandbag as long as they can. How can we stop that? Automatic upgrades as soon as someone gets enough pts, maybe? I don't know...

I think that the NCNCA has taken a step in the right direction getting Josh in there as a media guy. It shows that our "government" does understand it's up to us, including the promotors, AND racers, to SELL the sport. Anyone ever get ahold of one of the local news stations to run a piece on one of the local events? Might be worth trying, to get a greater audience. "Next in sports, the Blah crit presented by Schmalty Inc. happened today in downtown Hoopty-ville." What sponsor wouldn't want a free plug on TV??

Channel 4 was in my shop last week doing some segment because DZ crashed. I didn't get to see it, so I don't know how it turned out, and they didn't know Freddy's from Emeryville, and was also in the Tour till we told them, but, hey, it was something....didn't cost a dime though.

Registered, but can't log on....G

Anonymous wrote:Thanks, Casey for your reply. I agree about not having too many preems, but I've beeen in way too many bunched up crits that have basically rolled through prime (I'll spell it both ways, since I've seen it spelt both ways) laps because the prize wasn't worth the effort to sprint for, or maybe one guy is let go. So offering good primes can encourage more aggressive racing. I'd love to see more breakaways!! Dare we encourage team efforts?? Hey, who knows, maybe eliminating primes would encourage more breakaway attempts. It's a good point you make there. I'd also like to see more KOM's and intermediate sprints in the RR's too, maybe for time bonus' instead of prizes.

Maybe we should try giving a couple of bonus upgrade points when riders finish in a breakaway. If it will help encourage more races to finish in a break I'd be for it.
Quote:
I'm all for promotors making more money, and maybe get more races in towns, instead of business parks and get better crowds.

I still think that we need to sell the sport to sonsors to generate more cash, if possible, rather than relying mostly on the gate.

To get more sponsors you need more riders and media attention. Having more races helps attract more riders but to have more and better races you need more sponsors. We are just 331 riders short of match our all time high mark for USCF membership in NCNCA territory. Who knows maybe with a late season recruitment drive we could match our all time USCF membership this year.

If one is good enough to upgrade to cat 3, just do the cat 3 race. No one said one has to do the 35+ 1/2/3 or open 35+ race. When I have the opportunity to race against higher class riders, I consider it an opportunity and a challenge. If one likes winning and just wants to keep winning, just buy a one day license and race as a cat 5 and abuse that loophole.

http://www.usatriathlon.org/News_Info/demographics.htm

The claim is the fastest growing sport is triathlon. There are more licensed triathletes than USCF bicyclists. They have more juniors than the USCF AFAIK. Nobody in triathlon wins much of commercial value except the professionals. And the fees for triathlon make road racing look very cheap.

On handicap racing - the Australians are doing it on the track and the distance is 1000 to 3000 meters, the racers get the opportunity to race maybe six to ten times in a daylong meet. They also have about 100x the number of velodromes per capita versus the US with 1000's showing up and paying to watch the pro handicap races. Not sure how well that would translate to the US as even T-Town has faded a bit the last couple of years.

Thanks, Casey for your reply. I agree about not having too many preems, but I've beeen in way too many bunched up crits that have basically rolled through prime (I'll spell it both ways, since I've seen it spelt both ways) laps because the prize wasn't worth the effort to sprint for, or maybe one guy is let go. So offering good primes can encourage more aggressive racing. I'd love to see more breakaways!! Dare we encourage team efforts?? Hey, who knows, maybe eliminating primes would encourage more breakaway attempts. It's a good point you make there. I'd also like to see more KOM's and intermediate sprints in the RR's too, maybe for time bonus' instead of prizes.

I'm all for promotors making more money, and maybe get more races in towns, instead of business parks and get better crowds.

I still think that we need to sell the sport to sonsors to generate more cash, if possible, rather than relying mostly on the gate.

How does restricting prizes help promote racing? Easy if the rule leads to more promoters being able to break even or even make a little profit on their race then maybe more races will get promoted. As a general rule when more races are held USCF membership has gone up. Nor Cal is different from most of the rest of the country. We have a large rider population and we are fairly isolated from races in other regions. In other regions where they don't have as large a rider population, or the race faces competition from other areas promoters often feel they have to offer a large prize list to attract riders. When these promoters depend on entry fees to help cover the prize list they can often lose money if they don't get the number of entries they expect. Losing money isn't a good incentive to promote more races. Fewer races leads to fewer racers which is bad for the sport.

I can't think of any other sport where participants at the same level as 3/4/5 racers earn prizes. At the recreational level of a sport the main attraction should be the fun and recreation , not from the prizes.

Personally I don't like lots of primes in a race. To many primes tend to encourage bunch sprints. I realize I'm probably in the minority but I find bunch sprints dull and they lead to more accidents. Give me a race that finishes in a breakaway any day. Instead of offering so many primes I wish more promoters would offer deeper prize lists. Instead of awarding prizes to 6 places ( or maybe 10 places for a larger prize list) I'l like to see more races give out prizes to 15 and 20 places. I think this approach would lead to better and more interesting racing ( and hopefully safer racing).

As for masters Cat 4s who upgrade and suddenly find themselves racing against former Pros and National Champs I think this problem could be addressed in a couple of different ways. The first would be to have more ( any) handicap racing. I've seen arguments that one reason why Australia turns out so many great bicycle racers is the large number of handicap races they do. Handicap races make for harder racing and if done properly helps balance the chances of riders of all categories placing well.. Instead we get what I call cookie cutter racing where most races offer the same categories going the same distances in the same events. I guess the cookie cutter race approach is a safe choice for promoters since riders know what to expect but I think it kind of makes racing stale.

Also promoters could have separate prizes or recognition for the Cat 3 riders in a masters 1/2/3 event or in an open 45+ race.

If a rule does pass that restricts prizes of monetary value to the lower categories then promoters will have to get a little creative in coming up with ways to entice riders to their races. Some ideas might be to have raffle type drawings for prizes and prizes based on team classification for the day. I think it would be good for the sport in general if promoters get more creative with the types of race they offer and how their races are conducted.

I'm sorry if I hadn't read this whole thread in detail, but why not have another option where Cat 5's will be required to upgrade after 10+ races with 10-15 points, and keep the original option to upgrade once 10 race experiences (even if no points) have been met. So basically, have a points system that will prevent sandbagging, yet make it a maximum instead of a minimum requirement to upgrade.

How can disallowing prizes of commercial value in any category help promote amature racing? What would become of preems? In the race my club helps put on (Ronde van Brisbeen) we went out of our way to ensure there were big cash and prize preems to energize the fields into racing aggressively. We still do all of the races with smaller prize lists (VP), but to not allow promoters and clubs to provide as big a prize as we can come up with for our races seems counter productive for promoting the sport of racing. We dropped the w's fields this year not because we don't like the girls, we love them, but our race was on the same weekend as a big woman's stage race (which we figured would attract a majority of the woman racers), and the bottom line is we got a hell of alot more entries from adding one cat 5 field than we got from all w's fields combined last year.

The thread got to mentioning cat'ing up. Erm, I don't think people will stop sandbagging so they can get that box of Clif Bar preem, and I don't really think a whole lot of people are just going for BAR pts. I think that, especially in 35 and 45+ fields (arguably the largest populace of racers in our region) the biggest deterrant is having to all the sudden go from racing against other club racers to getting your ass handed to you by a former pro/ Nat'l champ etc. And that's just going from 4 to 3!! Why should a cat 3 have to race against those guys? There is a huge difference between a 3 and a 2 and a 1. Most guys w/ full time careers can handle other 3's, and that's about as high a level as most of us can realistically hope to get to, but a 50 year old lawyer who races recreationally, does pretty well, and gets to cat 3 now has to race against the Caldwells, Nolans, Melchers, etc...the list goes on. Those guys are great racers, the rest of us are not. So there is no realistic hope of ever beating the likes of those guys, and alot of fellas realize they are now going to spend the rest of their racing days picking up scraps, and going for that illustrious pack finish. Why cat up for that? Wouldn't a more level playing field, and a greater chance at getting good results be a more effective way to keep people stoked about racing? If the point is to encourage racing, then I'd submit that in the masters categories, there should be seperate 3 fields. At least if the field sizes can be large enough to support that (I know, there's only so much time in a day, permits are only for so long...). Of course there is always the option of racing with your son in the elite 3's, I suppose...

Back to the original point, that of disallowing prizes of commercial value, what's the point? To pad the prize list for the higher categories?? Are they the majority of racers, that generate the majority of entry fees and revenue? To help promotors pay for permits and other costs involved with putting on a race? Again, it seems like the largest volume of racers, the ones that do generate the most money would be penalized. That doesn't promote racing either. I'm not saying that we full time working shleps deserve stuff, or even expect it, but I don't think it's right to tell a promotor or club that they can't have sweet cash and prize incentives in their races if they can get the sponsors to pony up. I heard alot of very stoked racers after Morgan Hill because they got shades or something because Specialized stepped up and gave great prizes out. Doesn't happen very often, why stifle it? We aren't paying rent from racing, so why not allow us, every now and then, to race for some goodies, or some 2 dollar bills when the promotors can provide them?

I think that it's up to the people putting on races to come up with ways to generate enough revenue to make the race happen. Not just in entry fees, but getting sponsors for the events. Uless NCNCA, or USCF takes over putting on all of the races, then there is not going to be any roll over from races that make money to subsidize those that don't. The only one who could pull that off might be Bob, because he does so many of our races he could take a surplus from a bigger race to help him pay for one of his smaller ones.

In areas of the country that don't have as many racers, or races as we are fortunate enough to have, it may be alot harder for promotors to put on good races. They also don't have to grow old and race against the level of competition that exists here. Because of the varying dynamics from region to region, blanket rules that are applicable elsewhere should not be enforced in an area, like ours, where they just don't make any sense. I must be missing some obvious thing, because I don't even understand the point of this proposal for a rule change is.

Anonymous wrote:I looked at the txbra.org forums.

Who is our local representative in this affair? How will this get decided? Why does it get three times the discussion over in the Texas forum versus here? Do they have three times the number of licensed riders? One of the main ideas expressed there is that there are too many financial incentives to remain a one day license holder( cat 5) or cat 4. I think we have the same problem here but for whatever reason we don't have a single place to figure this out - not a lot of races submit results to UCSF so the database coverage is spotty there. Some people feel that promoters need this to attract riders, on the otherhand, triathletes pay much more than we do for each event and none of them except for the professionals gets anything for placing.

Tom Simonson is the most local member of the USCF Board of Trustees. If any rule change is presented to the USCF Board of trustees then the board will vote on it.

The Texas forum has been around for a lot longer than the NCNCA forum has. In Texas they don't have an email list like NCNCA has so naturally their forum is more active.

The NCNCA territory has about twice as many licensed USCF riders as Texas. NCNCA is the largest region in the USCF based on the number of licensed riders.

Since most local NCNCA races don't offer much in the way of financial prizes to Cat 5s ( and not much in prizes to Cat 4s) I don't think there is a local incentive to stay a Cat 4 or 5. Last year I did 271 upgrades from 5 to 4 and 180 Cat 4 to 3 upgrades. It looks like we will have slightly more upgrades this year.

There is a mandatory upgrade for Cat 4s if they get 30 or more upgrade points in a 12 month period. It is pretty rare when someone gets to the point of receiving a mandatory upgrade. In most cases people who do get a mandatory upgrade are trying to rack up as many BAR points as they possibly can. I think for next year we need to change the BAR rules so that riders stop earning BAR points when they reach the point of meeting the upgrade requirement ( ie earn 20 upgrade points in a 12 month period). Around here I think the BAR points are a much larger disincentive to upgrading that prizes are.

I looked at the txbra.org forums.

Who is our local representative in this affair? How will this get decided? Why does it get three times the discussion over in the Texas forum versus here? Do they have three times the number of licensed riders? One of the main ideas expressed there is that there are too many financial incentives to remain a one day license holder( cat 5) or cat 4. I think we have the same problem here but for whatever reason we don't have a single place to figure this out - not a lot of races submit results to UCSF so the database coverage is spotty there. Some people feel that promoters need this to attract riders, on the otherhand, triathletes pay much more than we do for each event and none of them except for the professionals gets anything for placing.

Anonymous wrote:what about junior prize money?

If it is an open category race then the prize rules for 1/2 riders would apply ( I assume). If the race has restricted the the restrictions for the highest category in the race would probably apply.

what about junior prize money?

SWoo wrote:Why is there the restriction that only one rule can be added?

No Any number of new rules can be added. Of course it really is best if the number of rule changes in any one year isn't to great. Then again given how it seems so few racers actual read the rule book maybe it really doesn't matter how many rules are changed in one year.

Why is there the restriction that only one rule can be added?

I actually like a 6th option which would be to say

no prizes of commercial value to Cat 5s

A limit of $100 or $200 in prizes to Cat 4s with no cash

A limit of say $400 or $500 in prizes to Cat 3s with a 50% limit on cash

No limit on prizes for 1/2/Pros

Treat the Elite and the Master categories the same

In mixed class races the prize limit of the highest category would apply.

OK, I'd be in favor of 1,2,3 and 4.

Anonymous wrote:What does this mean for cash prizes? No effect?

Cash prizes are considered prizes of commercial value. IN the case of option 3 above that would mean that only Cat 1/2 riders would be getting cash and other prizes of commercial value.

What does this mean for cash prizes? No effect?