Arrivée est arrivé!

[quixoticgeek]

I thought about this but for me I think a nickname on its own conveys an expectation that it should mean something to me, whereas a real name doesn't - I can just think do I know him/her or not. I remember someone after an event telling me about some exploits which involved "nickname x" (a prolific audaxer) but at the time I had no idea who it was. The nickname meant nothing to me and so it seemed rather cliquey, and made me feel that I was a real outsider as I probably should know who he was.

I think the combination of both real and nickname can be OK - so using Cudzo's example "Rob Norris (known to his audax friends as Gasbear)", or some similar wording, would be fine for me and would enable me potentially to associate the two names for future reference. 

As is often the case, context and specific wording is key, rather than hard and fast rules like "no nicknames" - but beware of potential alienation if not done in the right way.

A few years ago I was visiting friends in Belgium. We had a lovely evening of Beer and Frites, and I ended up sleeping on one of the friends sofas.

I woke up with a hangover to discover an old woman offering me a coffee. Turns out it was the mother of my friend. Through the fog of an early morning (I am not a morning person), while drinking coffee, I am asked by this old Belgian woman with very broken English. "How do you know Peter?"

"Who's peter?" I respond.

Because these were friends I had met online, I know this person by an entirely different name. We use our online nicknames in person. Depending on the name someone uses for me, you can tell how long they've known me (my nickname has changed over the years).

There is some belief that "Real names" are important, critical even. But the reality is, the name you know someone by is all that matters. A lot of you know me as Quixoticgeek. I do actually respond to that in real life. I receive mail addressed to it. I also respond to Katje. Perhaps it's being part of Gen X that grew up on the internet, but I really don't see any reason to insist on real names. There is a YACF member who I've known since university days. Approaching 20 years now. I only learnt their last name in the last year or two. I've always known them by just their first name only.

We often see people talk about being anonymous online, we see various attempts by social networks to insist on real names only. And they fail. Because that's not how things work. A lot of people use different names to their "Real names" whether it's shortened (i.e. Ben rather than Benjamin), or a nickname the reasons for which may have been lost in the dim distance past. The reality is, insisting on real names for everything is an out dated idea.

J

[LittleWheelsandBig]

Many folk seem to have no memory of anything before this instant. The ‘Important notes for contributors’ isn’t something that has been set in stone for ages and HK hasn’t gone out of her way to infringe them. Looking at Arrivee Autumn 2020 (being the first one close to hand), there is nothing that future contributors need to conform to. All this bollox of “just conform to the editor’s requirements and get HK’s article published” is difficult when those requirements didn’t exist before the article was submitted.

The concept of wanting more club magazine submissions from the AUK membership is at odds with treating those submissions as if they were from paid writers submitting articles for a commercial publication. While Arrivee may now be more polished, a growing number of member submissions are falling by the wayside. Arrivee is rather less reflecting its membership, more being curated to avoid those AUK character stories that I would like to see more of. HK’s piece is written in an interesting style by an AUK character about AUK characters but is deemed by the editor to be unsuitable for publication in Arrivee. Several people in this thread disagree.

Some thought needs to be given to the balance between the editor’s intent to produce a highly polished publication and the membership’s desire to read a range of their compatriots’ stories, even if some of them would not make the cut in a newsagent’s magazine.

[Geriatricdolan]

Some thought needs to be given to the balance between the editor’s intent to produce a highly polished publication and the membership’s desire to read a range of their compatriots’ stories, even if some of them would not make the cut in a newsagent’s magazine.

This, again, is the membership that you are aware of, which, we discovered is about 5% of the real membership, being very generous. As I said, very few members actually ride Audax events regularly... or even at all, but all of them pay a fee and get a magazine.

I, for one, tend to lose interest quickly when an article mentions a lot of "nicknames" of people I have never heard of... it just seem to be written for a restricted club, of which I am not part.
Most of us have 5 digit memberships and have no recollection of what happened in the Audax world at the turn of the millenium... it's something you'll have to live with.

With that in mind, negotiating politely with the editor, things can be achieved

[LittleWheelsandBig]

There are always bits in Arrivee that I skip over as uninteresting and others that catch my attention. A reasonable compromise is when everybody does a bit of that. The editor seems to be trying to kill off an idiosyncratic type of writing that I and others enjoy.

Like it or not, AUK and audaxing has some history and, for me, finding out that history encouraged me further into audaxing. I enjoyed learning that McNasty won a Scottish 24hr decades ago with a distance that would still get him a top-ten place now and that he did some phenomenally tough brevets and roughstuffing. For you, that doesn’t apply but for some others that sort of thing might be interesting too. Eliminating those sorts of stories on an editor’s whim seems undesirable.

[arabella]

My 2p
It's interesting that HK got feedback, I've heard absolutely nothing back about something I submitted last July.  It probably fell foul of one of those notes to contributors that have only just appeared. 

I've only flicked through so far but was pleased by the absence of a baking section and of a health section, thus leaving more space for articles about actual bike rides.

Printing appears OK.

[Karla]

Did you email it in or submit via the web portal?  The latter doesn't work properly and I've previously had stuff lost in there for months.

[Geriatricdolan]

Like it or not, AUK and audaxing has some history and, for me, finding out that history encouraged me further into audaxing. I enjoyed learning that McNasty won a Scottish 24hr decades ago with a distance that would still get him a top-ten place now and that he did some phenomenally tough brevets and roughstuffing. For you, that doesn’t apply but for some others, it might be interesting too. Eliminating those sorts of stories on an editor’s whim seems undesirable.

As a matter of fact, I have an interest in TT, so I would be interested in this sort of stories too.
But as the editor says, keep them real... not many know what a fuxxing Audax Hotel is, or whether a bench in Atherstone is the best in the Midlands if you need a nap in the Heart of England 300, or whether that guy was only known by a nickname that came from flattening a sheep during a Welsh brevet... nobody gives a sxxt about this stuff... it is important that a story can be enjoyed by all, not just by those three or four in the know...  I guess that's what the editor is trying to say

[citoyen]

I think a lot of what Ged has done is apply what you might call "magazine craft" - eg adding crossheads, pullquotes, panels etc, placement of pictures, to help break up blocks of text and make pages more inviting and readable. He may not be the most experienced long-distance cyclist among the membership, but he is quite possibly the most experienced at putting magazines together, and that counts for a lot. These changes aren't so much about making Arrivée fit for the newsstand as making it all more accessible and engaging for the benefit of AUK members, who remain its core audience (although there's an argument to say that Arrivée is also a shop window for the organisation so should partly serve to help draw in new members).

I'm wholly in favour of submissions being edited for readability (many pieces benefit from having their word count cut) and appropriateness (eg removing in-jokes that aren't as funny as the author thinks). This needs to be done sensitively though, to ensure the original character of the author's writing is retained, but contributors could sometimes be less precious about their copy and not go the full Giles Coren.

I kind of get the argument for not allowing nicknames, but it sounds like the baby has been thrown out with the bath water in the case under discussion. I think what bhoot* said earlier on this matter is spot on.

I also think the core content of the magazine should remain firmly focused on long-distance cycling. It shouldn't be diluted to become a magazine to cover anything and everything related to cycling. There are enough other titles and forums out there to cover those. That said, I don't mind it occasionally covering other audacious cycling efforts such as everesting and hill climb racing.

*Oh the irony... should I use bhoot's real name here?

[citoyen]

not many know what a fuxxing Audax Hotel is

Maybe someone could contribute a piece on audax jargon, which would potentially be both very entertaining and very informative.

[Ian H]

As a matter of fact, I have an interest in TT, so I would be interested in this sort of stories too.
But as the editor says, keep them real... not many know what a fuxxing Audax Hotel is...

Different disciplines have their own jargon.  Who, new to testing, knows what a "short O" is, or a float day, or a dead-turn.  You learn as you go along – it's part of the fun.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

Randonnee, brevet, fleche, arrivee FFS! These are all audaxing jargon terms and there are lots more. Not all of those terms come from the French. Bikepacking and ultra-endurance racing seems to revolve around sleeping by the side of the road (at least according to their own rapidly evolving mythology), so ‘audax hotels’ fits right in there. If you want everything pitched at the ‘Janet and John’ beginner level, more experienced riders and readers will quickly get bored.

[Peter]

Amen to that.

[grams]

I've only flicked through so far but was pleased by the absence of a baking section and of a health section, thus leaving more space for articles about actual bike rides.

If I had my druthers everything resembling a ride report would be verboten, or at least have to strongly justify its existence.

Might be quite a thin volume, of course.

[Peter]

I thought penicillin had made druthers a thing of the past?

[Cudzoziemiec]

On the whole I think it's a good magazine. There's always at least a few things in it that I enjoy reading, as well as some stuff that's less engaging for me. And there are always good photos. The things that I would cut if I were editor would be the lists of RRTY, SR, OCD and similar awards; people who really want to find these lists can always look them up on the website (or ask someone else to do so for them if they're internet free). But as I'm not editor and nor am I volunteering to ever be, that's just my opinion and not particularly relevant to anyone else.

As for nicknames (again), in the last few pages of this thread we've had McNasty and Rocco. I'm sure I've seen the name McNasty in a previous issue. At any rate, it's a name I recognize but I have no idea what his real name is. And Rocco is another name I've heard mentioned often, so much that I didn't realize it was a nickname (thought it was an Italian or similar name). Finally, I had to think long and hard to recall the real name of Black Sheep, who I have met a couple of times at the start/finish of his eponymous audaxes (it's Mark Rigby, unless I'm mistaken – which I might be).

(although there's an argument to say that Arrivée is also a shop window for the organisation so should partly serve to help draw in new members).

How so? As it's only distributed to members, virtually the only non-members who get to see it will be friends and families of members, who will already know about it.

[Karla]

FYI McNasty is George Berwick

[Redlight]

If I had my druthers everything resembling a ride report would be verboten, or at least have to strongly justify its existence.

Ride reports that give some practical information about the ride - what the route is really like, whether there are places to get bonk rations between widely-spaced controls, whether certain parts get busy with traffic at unexpected times of day (on perms) can be both interesting and useful in helping a would-be rider decide whether to try an event for themselves. This is particularly the case with some perms, where the information available prior to entry is minimal. 

There used to be some guidance to this effect (maybe in the old handbook?) for would-be contributors and perhaps it's time to revisit that, either on Audax.Uk or in the magazine.

I agree, though, that the ones that mainly comprise of 'I rode for a while then got hungry. After I had eaten something, I rode some more' can be a bit dull (although judicious editing in recent years has eliminated the very tedious ones that used to appear). The exceptions are those rides on which something outrageous or unique occurs to make the ride a story in itself - the one that always springs to mind is George Berwick finishing a German 1200 with his frame held together by drinks tins and zip ties. That was a superb report.

[bhoot]

(although there's an argument to say that Arrivée is also a shop window for the organisation so should partly serve to help draw in new members).

How so? As it's only distributed to members, virtually the only non-members who get to see it will be friends and families of members, who will already know about it.

Hence our "send to a friend" initiative publicised in latest issue and a few times last year...
Also we were planning to put a few copies in some selected strategic locations like cycle cafes etc (remember them?)... this could be one to restart as we come out of lockdown.

[Redlight]

While Arrivee may now be more polished, a growing number of member submissions are falling by the wayside.

Can you give some evidence to support this statement, please. Aside from HK's piece, which had been sub-edited and laid out as a double page spread before she withdrew it, and another which she withdrew before it had reached that stage in the process, I'm aware only of two - Arabella's, which appears to have gone astray and I will ask Ged to check on, and one by another contributor who, again, withdrew it after edits were suggested.   

[Peter]

The exceptions are those rides on which something outrageous or unique occurs to make the ride a story in itself - the one that always springs to mind is George Berwick finishing a German 1200 with his frame held together by drinks tins and zip ties. That was a superb report.

Yes, that was a great story.  i think what gives the stories involving George an extra dimension is the knowledge (if you have it) that he is not only bonkers but a past national champion*, whereas most of us are just bonkers.

* I think that's right but if not he was a very high finisher.

[citoyen]

(although there's an argument to say that Arrivée is also a shop window for the organisation so should partly serve to help draw in new members).

How so? As it's only distributed to members, virtually the only non-members who get to see it will be friends and families of members, who will already know about it.

And how do you persuade those non-audaxing friends and family members to join in the fun?

I've also seen back issues lying around in the staff cafe area at Rapha HQ.

It's potentially a very valuable marketing tool for the organisation, though I don't know exactly how/if it is used in this capacity. Others OTP will know more about that.

ETA: cross-posted with bhoot who answered that last point nicely!

[Tommyp27]

I've only just joined AUK and I'm yet to even receive my first copy of Arrivé. However one of the things that attracted me to joining was the slightly outsider status of Audaxing say touring or Racing.

I recon one of the reasons AUK might of grown its membership is for the same reason to even smaller RSF has seen a growth, both offer a chance to be part of something outside of the mainstream of cycling. Also neither will ever compete with the big 3 organisations and they shouldn't bother to try.

I enjoy being a member of this forum because of the banter (some of you have proper sharp tongues, but it never actually seems cruel and I'm thick skinned), the humour (some pythonesque replies at times) and there's a lot independent minds on here. I also know that this forum isn't an official AUK forum, just contains a number of members.

Personally I have no problems with nicknames or the odd bit of jargon. It's part of the romance of cycling. If a piece is well written it can just add to the fun of reading it.

[Ian H]

FYI McNasty is George Berwick

I think you'll find it's the other way round.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

FYI McNasty is George Berwick

I think you'll find it's the other way round.

http://www.thedrumup.co.uk/cycling-riders/george-berwick-500km-on-a-broken-frame/

[LittleWheelsandBig]

While Arrivee may now be more polished, a growing number of member submissions are falling by the wayside.

Can you give some evidence to support this statement, please. Aside from HK's piece, which had been sub-edited and laid out as a double page spread before she withdrew it, and another which she withdrew before it had reached that stage in the process, I'm aware only of two - Arabella's, which appears to have gone astray and I will ask Ged to check on, and one by another contributor who, again, withdrew it after edits were suggested.   

Messrs Marshall and Hanna might be good places to start. HK suggests you look through the Facebook discussions about this for some more names.