[LEL17] LEL 2017

[Fidgetbuzz]

I would have a bigger organising team.

I think it's fair to say that LEL has left me, Sue and Keith utterly crushed. On reflection I'm not sure I actually enjoyed organising it. The amount of work involved has been brutal, the pace unrelenting.

If you want more events like LEL, AUK and its members have to change the way they do things. Having hundreds of events organised by one person results in hundreds of incredibly well-organised club runs. It also results in no spare time to support LEL beyond the event itself and the month leading up to it.

I cannot and will not give the time again that I have given to LEL for the last four years. So either someone else steps up and takes over, or more people join us toand preparation.

I've done what I can - I have nothing left to give. I think I've demonstrated the way forward so now it's up to you.

EDIT - I would point out that I've loved working with Sue, Keith, Roger, Tony and John, aka the core team. I will miss that immensely.

This is immensely important and needs a lot of thought.

 I have said for months that I had no idea how Danial was holding down a job and doing LEL. Sue and Keiths input has been huge too - and they may not be willing to put that effort into 2017 ( obviously I can not speak for them).

On the plus side there is now knowledge inside some AUK members of how to set up and run a 1000 rider LEL ( this is well documented and readily available to anyone who wanted to pick our brains)  - if the same team was doing 2017 - then it might be a 2 year job rather than a 3 1/2 year job - because we have the know how now, that was not available to us post the 2009 event.

Please dont post to this thread without a lot of hard thought- sit back and think carefully - what do we want LEL to be -what do we want AUK to be - how can these be achieved.

Many will know that I am concerned at the forward vision of the AUK Board, its formal structure  and its capabilities to deliver a LEL type experience , even if thru a separate company.

We delivered what seems to be regarded as an absolutely superb event ( and I think with a modest surplus too) - but read Danials post again  -- and think hard

[Fidgetbuzz]

BUMP - just in case you have not had the time to read this

[mattc]

_{(I was just about to post something to BUMP it! I think you scared most of us off posting ... )}

So my thoughts:
The event size felt about right. It was a big gamble increasing the numbers from 2009. It paid off, but it created many unknowns and extra planning issues. I would like to see the size maintained in 2017 - we can then focus on knocking off the rough edges and fixing all the small things we did wrong.

If we keep to the same size then we can reuse most of the 2013 planning/procedures. This will make a much easier job for the new team, and hopefully this will avoid newcomers being scared off! I would also like to see - if we can bribe them - many of the '13 core team volunteering as 'consultants', to maximise knowledge transfer/reuse.


If we get any bigger, then as well as making more work for ourselves and risking disasters, LEL will lose it's unique flavour and become just a longer/hillier/colder PBP. IMHO. 

[Peter]

Speaking as a first-time volunteer this year and, I hope, a first-time rider next time, I think that makes a lot of sense, Matt.

[Exit Stage Left]

The biggest leap forward seems to have been the availability of school premises, due to the increased autonomy of individual schools. It had been the intention to use a school at Alston in 2009, but that hadn't come to fruition. The combination of volunteers and trained, paid, catering staff worked well, and addressed the health and safety issues. The demands of the task were so extraordinary that those paid caterers found it to be a sort of professional extension.
I had some experience of the reciprocity between us and the wider world of Audax when we rescued a French rider in Alston. I've now got a standing invitation to stay in Dunkirk for the carnival. Those of us who have done PBP and the Semaine Federale are happy that we have been able to repay the hospitality of the ACP and the FFCT. PBP has 5,000 participants, and Semaine Federale has 15,000, both have between 1,500 and 2,000 volunteers.
There is a sense in which we can compare ourselves to sportives, and co-opt the professional aspects of their organisation. I'd argue that the nucleus of an organising committee attends Semaine Federale next year. They will find that LEL has produced a groundswell of goodwill in European cycle touring circles. It was already noticeable that volunteers of many nations felt they were paying back into a general pool that includes PBP and Semaine Federale, but that it was easier for them to work in an English-Speaking context. I attended Semaine Federal after PBP 2009, and was made very welcome by organising committee due to the hospitality we had shown.
It is interesting that the link between ACP and the FFCT is not replicated by links between AUK and the CTC. The logical link would be between the Birthday Rides and LEL, CTC members played a big part in LEL, but at a personal level.

[jacdaw]

I probably shouldn't post here, and I expect to be torn apart, however....

As a volunteer at Brampton with no audax experience, but with some experience participating (ie taking part and not organising) in other non-cycling events of all sizes, 2 things struck me:

1) I expected commercial sponsors, maybe 1 (above the title type) sponsor, and a lot of little / local ones. This may have been naïve of me.

2) Electronic timing could have cut handling times; even with a brevet card, a dibber system (such as SiEntries, for example) would have speeded things up, and all of that side of things (including online tracking) could have gone into the hands of an experienced third party.

I know this may not be in the spirit of audax, but as an outsider I thought I should at least mention it.

[STMS]

Although you want to keep the size, don't forget the demand this time. Now you have delivered who knows the demand next time.

[Somnolent]

We delivered what seems to be regarded as an absolutely superb event

You certainly did !

I'm inclined to agree with Matt, keep it the same size at least for 2017.  There are not that many rough edges to work on TBH. 
My fear is that the fame of such an excellent event will have spread over four years and the entry process may get a little "fraught".
It is not difficult to imagine a sell-out within minutes rater than hours.     Just maybe some sort of PBP-like qualification (or early opening of entries to pre-qualified riders) would smooth things out ?

jacdaw - I don't know what a commercial sponsor would bring to the table that would be useful,  money maybe, but that isn't going to deliver a clone of 2013's organising team.   Dibbers - maybe, I've used SI Enttries at OMM and elsewhere and it's not a bad system, I believe it is costly though.  If it frees up enough volunteers to work on other things it migh be worthwhile? 

[marcusjb]

Although you want to keep the size, don't forget the demand this time. Now you have delivered who knows the demand next time.

I think this is a very important point.

I'd totally understand a desire to keep numbers where they currently are in 2017 - after all, wasn't it supposed to be 850? riders in 2013 and the entry got expanded to 1150? with roughly 1000 starters.

With the reputation that this ride will now have, the demand could well be even higher next time.

Whether the answers lie in pre-qualification and/or qualification SR, who knows?  But it does need to be considered I think.

[mmmmartin]

Re dibbers: beware. Riders will lose them, and then they are in trouble. A brevet can be mislaid - and as I saw with one rider - the stamps can be collected on a piece of paper until rider and brevet are reunited and all is well again. You will still need a person sitting at the dibber box, so no saving on staff there. And as we saw, the software can sometimes go a bit awry, and a stamped brevet, hung round the neck of a rider and in a waterproof bag, is a pretty bomb-proof way of proving where you have been. Dibbers work well when you need to know timing to the second, which we don't on LEL.

FWIW, IMHO, change nothing. You mess with the 2013 LEL format at your peril. Using schools as controls worked well, the date was fine (in school holidays so school premises were vacant and people could take part if they or spouses were teachers), the route was as good as it could be, and the food - using the professional chefs - seems to have gone down really well.

My only minor suggestion would be to employ professional cleaners, perhaps those who normally work at the school, to free volunteers so they can do the "interaction with riders" bit, because that is where the event seems to have really shone. If necessary, put the price up. People flying in from Kyrgystan, Taiwan, Canada, or getting the train from the Lake District, are unlikely to be put off by another £30 or so on the price.

[Lightkeeper]

FB asked people to think hard about :

what do we want LEL to be -what do we want AUK to be - how can these be achieved.

The early answers tend to focus on what people want LEL to be - how big, what to keep the same, what to change - and that's a good place to start. 

The second and third questions, though, are harder and more important.  Even if people concluded that LEL2017 should consolidate on about the same numbers and format (I'm not saying they will, I'm just illustrating), we should remember that Danial is saying that the 2013 way of delivering it isn't sustainable, in particular because of the load on a few people for a long time running up to the event:

I think it's fair to say that LEL has left me, Sue and Keith utterly crushed. On reflection I'm not sure I actually enjoyed organising it. The amount of work involved has been brutal, the pace unrelenting.

If you want more events like LEL, AUK and its members have to change the way they do things.

So my point is, this thread shouldn't just address the first question. 

(My - selfish - reason for making it is that, having approached LEL2013 not sure whether I'd enjoy this distance, I had such a blast that I really want there to be a good LEL2017!)

[vorsprung]

jacdaw - I don't know what a commercial sponsor would bring to the table that would be useful,  money maybe..

What I was struck by, looking at various accounts from riders is that people on the route, ordinary people who had the route going through their town didn't know anything about the event.  If a commercial sponsor was on board they would be happy to fund publicity because it would benefit them. 

For example if in 2017 there was a commercial sponsor for posters and flyers along the entire route ("London Edinburgh London cycle ride passing through here July 30th 10am to 31st 1am and on the return..etc") the sponsor gets their logo/brand name plastered on a load of bus stops in a positive way and local people would know what was going on.

[vorsprung]

My only minor suggestion would be to employ professional cleaners, perhaps those who normally work at the school, to free volunteers

This happened at Brampton.  I cleaned the toilets a couple of times and the showers once in the early hours of the morning.  The professionals did it during the day

[Fidgetbuzz]

Guys -- you are looking the wrong way. These are admin details that we will be well aware of and will have ideas to solve etc.

THE KEY POINT IS 2017 CAN NOT ASK THE SAME TEAM TO JUST  DO IT AGAIN- DANIAL and SUE/KEITH HAVE TO HAVE MORE SUPPORT - they are entitled to have part of their life to themselves - rather than LEL becoming all consuming

2009 was a pickle financially- and I knew that I could offer something on the money side - so I did - and have been involved for all 3 1/2 years. I have learnt loads - which I can either use again or make freely available to someone else.
We now KNOW what a 1000 rider event can be put on for in £ terms. More money available  - we might have ideas on how to spend it -- so money side is not a problem

But the hours and effort that D and S/K put in , will not be repeated -- we  need real actual extra people putting hours of effort in -- OK Danial and S/K have the knowledge so they could supervise / mentor / do some them selves - but whio is going to join the team 

Read Danials top post

[marcusjb]

It seems (to me) that a lot of workload for Danial, Sue, Keith was just dealing with the riders - I would like to see that off-loaded from those really running the show as I would guess that 95% of queries can be answered by someone with a reasonable understanding of the system (75% can be answered with 'read the website and/or riders email of XXth of July').

There are always going to be some more complex ones, that will need input from someone higher up the chain.  But the sheer weight of questions on Email must have been very demanding and doesn't need to be handled by someone that high up in the food chain. 

Being agile with the FAQs would have helped as well (i.e. if lots of emails are appearing about whether it is compulsory to wear pink ra ra skirts in the confines of the Brampton control, then update the FAQ quickly to answer this question (only on Tuesdays is the correct answer by the way).

I am sure a small team of 3-4 volunteers with access to a central Email account could take most queries and answer them with very little training, just a reasonably detailed description of how each process will work on the ride.

As I did quite a bit of that myself, in effect, via Facebook etc. - I'd happily throw my name into the hat for that sort of role.

The big cheeses need to be dealing with big cheese things and just checking whether the smaller details have been done as tasked to others (rather than handling them all themselves).

[trickedem]

I'm really keen to ride in 2017, but I am torn between this and volunteering. I think the voluntary efforts before and after the event were key to the success.
I also think the entry cost should be increased by at least 50 pounds.

[Somnolent]

Guys -- you are looking the wrong way. These are admin details that we will be well aware of and will have ideas to solve etc.

THE KEY POINT IS 2017 CAN NOT ASK THE SAME TEAM TO JUST  DO IT AGAIN- DANIAL and SUE/KEITH HAVE TO HAVE MORE SUPPORT - they are entitled to have part of their life to themselves - rather than LEL becoming all consuming

2009 was a pickle financially- and I knew that I could offer something on the money side - so I did - and have been involved for all 3 1/2 years. I have learnt loads - which I can either use again or make freely available to someone else.
We now KNOW what a 1000 rider event can be put on for in £ terms. More money available  - we might have ideas on how to spend it -- so money side is not a problem

But the hours and effort that D and S/K put in , will not be repeated -- we  need real actual extra people putting hours of effort in -- OK Danial and S/K have the knowledge so they could supervise / mentor / do some them selves - but whio is going to join the team 

Read Danials top post

Surely what this boils down to is a choice between:
* a lot more committed volunteers who are prepared to give up time over the months (years ?) leading up to the event and not just for the week.
and
* paid project managers & staff

[marcusjb]

I'm really keen to ride in 2017, but I am torn between this and volunteering. I think the voluntary efforts before and after the event were key to the success.
I also think the entry cost should be increased by at least 50 pounds.

Why?

The cost should only be increased (IMHO) if there is better service/value to offer to riders by doing so.  If there are legitimate arguments for adding services to the ride that increase the rider's enjoyment and/or farm out some jobs to those with greater skillsets to deliver a product/service that just isn't possible to with volunteer effort. 

LEL is not out to make a huge profit - it has to turn a small profit to leave seed money for the next LEL.

[mcshroom]

I'm really keen to ride in 2017, but I am torn between this and volunteering. I think the voluntary efforts before and after the event were key to the success.
I also think the entry cost should be increased by at least 50 pounds.

Why?

The cost should only be increased (IMHO) if there is better service/value to offer to riders by doing so.  If there are legitimate arguments for adding services to the ride that increase the rider's enjoyment and/or farm out some jobs to those with greater skillsets to deliver a product/service that just isn't possible to with volunteer effort. 

LEL is not out to make a huge profit - it has to turn a small profit to leave seed money for the next LEL.

^^^This

I would be happy to help out ahead of the event (or after with reuniting lost property with owners etc), but I'm fully intending to have another crack at the ride in 2017

[αdαmsκι]

LEL2017 is four years away (although I do realise planning starts a lot sooner). I don't know where I'll be living in four years, but if possible would love to ride again. I'd potentially be willing to help leading up to the event, but I've no idea what the list of jobs would entail. Communicating with ForceGB about clothing Helping with the route etc.

I also think the entry cost should be increased by at least 50 pounds.

Why? The money-man says "money side is not a problem", so why should you want to increase the price? If it's to reduce the demand then that is, IMO, a vastly unfair way of achieving that aim.

EDIT: Cross-posted with others

[Chuffy]

I spotted Danial, in particular, spending a lot of time answering basic queries on here and other places, such as Facebook. Believe me, I'm very grateful to have the Man In Charge dealing directly with punters, but a lot of that could have been off-loaded.

A swipe card system (is this what people mean by dibbers?) for arrival and departure (in an Oyster card style) would create much more accurate info for controls up the road. Capital cost (assuming a commercial lease isn't practical) could be off-set by hiring the system out to other large events.

If we're talking about sustainability, I wonder if AUK needs a dedicated Prestige Events team (say, 2.5 FTE) who could put on a series of rides each year, culminating in LEL. If those rides were fully catered, that would create income plus expertise that would feed LEL 2017 and beyond.

[matthew]

Looking at what happened at Registration, the only part of the ride I saw, and seeing the amount of preparation that Sue and Keith had put in I am in awe of their commitment to LEL 2013.

Just to illistrate, on Friday the registration room was set up, and garden canes with the individual riders bags were laid out on the table. These bags were individual to the rider, labelled and contained:

• their individual Brevet Card,
• their individual bag drop labels
• their frame number
• various goodies

These had all been prepared in advance for all 1150 riders - minus those who DNS'd early. Also ready and waiting were the 1150 registration forms, in order by rider number in lever arch files (one for each table).

The control had been found and agreed, Food had been ordered, left luggage considered signage considered, crowd barriers hired etc. etc. etc.

How easy it would be to deligate these tasks out to a wider pool of volunteers who were prepared to offer say a weekend a month for the 6 months prior I am not sure. The obvious thing is that Danial, Sue and Keith have evectively dedicated the equivilent of full time hours for 3-4 years to make LEL 2013 the success it was. AUK (and that  has to be the board and its members) can not expect them to do the same again. Either AUK will need to consider employing someone, which doesn't feel quite right to me, or an ~10 strong team will need to form now to take on the event in four years time and start actively recruiting so that there are 15-20 in that team from the point of registration opening to the day controls man up with a sizeable number of volunteers, cooks and cleaners.

[mattc]

Guys -- you are looking the wrong way. These are admin details that we will be well aware of and will have ideas to solve etc.

THE KEY POINT IS 2017 CAN NOT ASK THE SAME TEAM TO JUST  DO IT AGAIN- DANIAL and SUE/KEITH HAVE TO HAVE MORE SUPPORT - they are entitled to have part of their life to themselves - rather than LEL becoming all consuming

Roger if you only want posts that are firm offers of help in specific roles - which would be very welcome - this will be a very quiet thread!

I see 2 prongs to our attack:
1) getting people to step up, in small ways or large,
2) working out ways to spread the load, cos it's quite possible NOONE will want to do what the core 2013 team did.

1) Clearly this thread is a start. As I posted in another thread, I think there will be a Snowball Of Good Will (TM Mattc). ESL's earlier post drifted into this. I think Ride Reports and word of mouth will create an avalanche. Expect more volunteers next time at every level. 

2) Several posts have already looked at spreading the load. Keep 'em coming folks, that's my view!

LEL2017 is four years away (although I do realise planning starts a lot sooner). I don't know where I'll be living in four years, but if possible would love to ride again. I'd potentially be willing to help leading up to the event, but I've no idea what the list of jobs would entail. Communicating with ForceGB about clothing Helping with the route etc.

Route checking/drafting and clothing seem like good areas for delegation - well volunteered

This is the future - we've already moved a long way from the 2009 Melita centralised nightmare, we can improve further; it will however take a few skilled managers to coordinate stuff/people, let's not lose sight of that.

[tiermat]

I understand your think, Chuffy, but instead of creating less work you are suggesting the team do MORE???

This is not meant as a criticism, after all who am I to criticise the organisers of an event which has been hailed (99.999% of the time) as a success, that last remaining bit being MINOR grumbles.  Anyway I would suggest that more power is devolved, and the Controllers are involved at an earlier stage.  I get the impression (from conversations I have had and on here) that they came into the planning rather late.  Decide where you want the controls and find someone to run that control.  Give them a budget and then tell them you only want to hear if there is a problem.  Same could be done for other tasks, such as bag drops etc etc.

Obviously risk assessments etc would need to be done (not for elfin safe tea, but as in "What if...")

I, personally, would step forward to assist, in any way I can.

ETA: X-post with mattc and matthew

[marcusjb]

it will however take a few skilled managers to coordinate stuff/people, let's not lose sight of that.

100%

Identify those people sooner rather than later, begin the knowledge transfer from the current team and in a couple of years the recruiting of teams can begin.

I think part of the key is (and this may already be done to a degree) to document the processes used (obviously noting down what didn't work out etc.) so that Team LEL 2017 don't have to reinvent everything.