Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => Audax => Topic started by: dasmi on 14 August, 2017, 09:57:40 pm
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I have just looked at my results page........got 29 points..but it says that only 10 points count under 50% rule.
Have looked at aukweb site but can't find any references to it.
anyone help ?
thanks in advance
dave
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It only affects the Points Championship - 50% of points must be in calendar events. So points garnered in calendar events x 2 = your points total for the purposes of the Points Championship. It doesn't affect any other awards.
Sorry to break it to you, but I don't think you're in the running :)
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http://www.aukweb.net/official/aukregs/
Rule 13.1.1
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Really only applies if you are in contention for one of the annual distance awards.
For the AUK annual distance awards, you need to do at least 50% of them on cal events.
The reason for this was some historical accusations of cheating.
One year, there was some contention for the winner of the award, and there were accusations that someone had been spotted on a train, or something.
It's easier to cheat on a train on a Perm or DIY when you are by yourself.
It's less easy on a cal event with loads of others.
So this rule was brought in.
Some people consider it to be a bit of a knee-jerk, and over heavy-handed on the basis of the events that precipitated it. I take no view, it doesn't apply to me because I'm not in that league.
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I think the rule was also bought in so that the points leaders 'could be amongst us' as well and not just anonymous Audaxers doing daily 200 DIYs without ever getting involved with calender events. I think it's a good rule.
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disappointed to find that my measly 29 points put me out of contension :o :facepalm:
thanks for the rapid explanations
cheers
dave
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(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v333/pnweb/yacf/fixiespotting/audaxspotting_white.png)
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Thanks for that Ivan.
There might just be a little less wall space somewhere in the house when I print that off and put it in a frame. :thumbsup:
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I found my spoke card version of that only yesterday (it was given to me and a few other fixed riders at the start of the Bryan Chapman in 2009).
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my measly 29 points put me out of contension
One year I was very proud to be able to say I had the same number of points at Teethgrinder. He had 81. I had 18. Well, the numbers were the same - just in a different order.........
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Don't worry, you'll get over it.
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50% rule saw me take the Vets Trophy in 2009, although Chair Chris Crosland had amassed more points. I was also working towards the Trike Record, which I gained with 103 points, so was watching my rides matched the Rule. I chased all over Southern England to find Events.
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Really only applies if you are in contention for one of the annual distance awards.
For the AUK annual distance awards, you need to do at least 50% of them on cal events.
The reason for this was some historical accusations of cheating.
One year, there was some contention for the winner of the award, and there were accusations that someone had been spotted on a train, or something.
It's easier to cheat on a train on a Perm or DIY when you are by yourself.
It's less easy on a cal event with loads of others.
So this rule was brought in.
Some people consider it to be a bit of a knee-jerk, and over heavy-handed on the basis of the events that precipitated it. I take no view, it doesn't apply to me because I'm not in that league.
Were Mandatory by GPS DIYs considered too? I'd have thought they'd be nigh on impossible to fake or at least so time consuming as to not make it worth it.
Although this I can understand...
I think the rule was also bought in so that the points leaders 'could be amongst us' as well and not just anonymous Audaxers doing daily 200 DIYs without ever getting involved with calender events. I think it's a good rule.
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DIY or DIY by GPS or mandatory route DIY perms did not exist when the 50% rule was created. AUK has been around for over 40 years now, so there is some history leading to the current situation (for just about everything).
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Were Mandatory by GPS DIYs considered too? I'd have thought they'd be nigh on impossible to fake or at least so time consuming as to not make it worth it.
Not really. I've got 200+ points worth of GPS tracklogs from old DIYs and old calendar/perm rides that the DIYxGPS system has never seen. Strava is filled with many many more examples should I need them. Manipulating the timestamps is trivial.
Faking something from scratch (e.g. from GPS route without timestamps to convincing fake) is several orders of magnitude harder.
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DIY or DIY by GPS or mandatory route DIY perms did not exist when the 50% rule was created.
Furthermore, at that time there was a rule that only one instance of a Permanent could be ridden (counted) in one season. You couldn't even ride once in each direction. So it was relatively unusual then, for anyone to amass anything like 50% of their points in Perms.
I was present at the AGM when the 50% rule was voted in - and it was, completely, a collective knee-jerk response to the shocking revelation that someone had been spotted using train-assist while riding Perms. A couple of rabble-rousing impassioned speeches from the floor by respected elder auks was all it took.
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Personally, I'm ok with the 50% rule even though I am currently affected by it. High distance points aren't an obtainable target for me at the moment but I'm somebody that's embraced the DIY mandatory by GPS simply due to it's accessibility. As someone who hasn't necessarily got the time or the finances to drive to lots of calendar events the mandatory method of logging rides is great. I ride the same route more than once too. How I would have coped in the old days of Audax I don't know.
I'm disturbed more by the fact that it's easy to fiddle with the gpx files. Maybe some additional proof should be obtained as a minimum. So, aswell as the gpx file, two receipts at the two furthest (or thereabouts) points of the ride. It's less work than having to obtain proof of passage at every extreme point or turn, that is possible to bisect, which the advisory routes take care of. But then that is where the gpx file comes into play. You can edit a gpx file without actually having gone out and ridden the ride so at least getting two forms of proof "beyond the world of computer" would prove you went out there and actually rode it.
The thing is it's like everything. Embrace new technologies but be aware that they can also pose additional problems and it's best to try and anticipate and respond to them without forgetting the primary motive is to get as many people as possible out there on their bikes....not e-bikes presumably (dope!)
Then perhaps I could be complicating an otherwise great facility. I'd just hate to see it get compromised and the thought of somebody catching a train, presumably to each control point, ermmm why? It's only audax ;D
Just goes to show it's not only big cash prizes that encourage people to cheat.
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Baldy,
Were Mandatory by GPS DIYs considered too? I'd have thought they'd be nigh on impossible to fake or at least so time consuming as to not make it worth it.
Not really. I've got 200+ points worth of GPS tracklogs from old DIYs and old calendar/perm rides that the DIYxGPS system has never seen. Strava is filled with many many more examples should I need them. Manipulating the timestamps is trivial.
Faking something from scratch (e.g. from GPS route without timestamps to convincing fake) is several orders of magnitude harder.
I raised this a couple of years ago and had someone put a fake one through the machine for a test, it didn't go down too well. Maybe times have changed.
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Whatever the origins of the 50% rule, it is rather irrelevant from a 'stopping cheating' point of view.
What it does do is encourage 'high milers to participate in calendar events, and that strikes me as a good thing.
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Personally, I'm ok with the 50% rule even though I am currently affected by it. High distance points aren't an obtainable target for me at the moment but I'm somebody that's embraced the DIY mandatory by GPS simply due to it's accessibility. As someone who hasn't necessarily got the time or the finances to drive to lots of calendar events the mandatory method of logging rides is great. I ride the same route more than once too. How I would have coped in the old days of Audax I don't know.
Then you are not affected by it.
Continue as you are, with your DIYxGPS.
You still get all your points, it's just they don't all count towards the prize for the most points.
I'm disturbed more by the fact that it's easy to fiddle with the gpx files.
I don't think so. It's not as easy as you might think to produce fake GPX files that can pass muster.
There are all kinds of checks that can be made.
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I'm disturbed more by the fact that it's easy to fiddle with the gpx files.
I don't think so. It's not as easy as you might think to produce fake GPX files that can pass muster.
There are all kinds of checks that can be made.
There was a programme a while ago going round which would produce a file that passed the test. Of course I'm not letting on which one, but it took 5 minutes to produce a convincing fake.
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Then perhaps I could be complicating an otherwise great facility. I'd just hate to see it get compromised and the thought of somebody catching a train, presumably to each control point, ermmm why? It's only audax ;D
Some folk find it easy to convince themselves that cutting the corner off a route or leapfrogging a chunk in the middle is justified by e.g. a mechanical problem or sickness and that their ride still 'deserves' validation. It isn't necessarily a case of avoiding every kilometre of a route.
I think that controlling every possibility of cheating is not practical or desirable (it leads to distorted route choices). It would be preferable to have the 'big stick' of refusing to validate any future brevets ridden by that person. Some other countries take that approach.
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It does seem weird why someone would bother to enter a 300 and only want to ride 250, or enter a hilly and ride the valleys instead.
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I
Then perhaps I could be complicating an otherwise great facility. I'd just hate to see it get compromised and the thought of somebody catching a train, presumably to each control point, ermmm why? It's only audax ;D
Some folk find it easy to convince themselves that cutting the corner off a route or leapfrogging a chunk in the middle is justified by e.g. a mechanical problem or sickness and that their ride still 'deserves' validation. It isn't necessarily a case of avoiding every kilometre of a route.
I think that controlling every possibility of cheating is not practical or desirable (it leads to distorted route choices). It would be preferable to have the 'big stick' of refusing to validate any future brevets ridden by that person. Some other countries take that approach.
Yep it could come across as being draconian. I think of the times when I've been let of having missed an answer to a question on the brevet card and that could easily be misconstrued as me having cut a corner. A lot of it is based on trust I'd imagine most audaxers are trustworthy.
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Unless all Audax events become mandatory route with GPX validation, then the possibilities for cheating are always there.
But for most people, we don't really care.
Someone else cheating does not invalidate my ride, although it may devalue it somewhat.
The only people who care are those few in contention for awards.
So my general position is that we probably should not make it more onerous on everyone in order to satisfy the few.
I'm not sure the 50% rule actually works.
The basis of it is that on a cal event, you are 'with other people' who can validate your ride.
I don't think that's actually true.
Typically on a longer ride, we set off in a big group, we thin out, and then group / split / re-group in different groups along the way.
Every rider who temporarily teams up with another will assume they have ridden the distance.
Plenty times, they will ride for a few hours and not even get their name.
I often see people for a while, and never see them again.
There is no one person who can say 'yes, he rode the whole distance'.
Would the org put out an e-mail to all entrants asking "Did some dude in an Audax Ecosse top ride with any of you, and where?"
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There have been infrequent instances where a rider's brevet has been validated despite the brevet card having missing controls because of other riders vouching for them.
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There have been infrequent instances where a rider's brevet has been validated despite the brevet card having missing controls because of other riders vouching for them.
Sure.
We know he was at this control, and was seen and/or had has card stamped.
But we have no idea how he got there.
There may be the *occasional* circumstance where other riders can say 'Yes, this dude was with us all the way from the Perineum to Glans controls', I'd say this is not robust enough to justify the 50% rule.
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AUK doesn't have compulsory routes for most brevets. Those riders can take any route they like. On the other hand, repeatedly jumping in a car is likely to get noticed eventually. As I said previously, I think it would be useful for AUK to be able to say "You've cheated. In the future, you can enter as many brevets as you like but none of them will be validated."
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then the possibilities for cheating are always there.
'cheating' at Audax.....heavens above, how low can human life possibly descent too?
I'd like to think I had a go a robbing a few banks [as in tunneling underground for a month only to be caught with all the gear in Spain] before I fell into the nadir of 'cheating at Audax'.
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Unless all Audax events become mandatory route with GPX validation, then the possibilities for cheating are always there.
As others have noted, gpx validation doesnt really solve the problem when it comes to Perms.
As for others cheating , why should it devalue your ride? Its your ride not theirs.
More to the point, if a rider were out to deliberately 'cheat then the one thing they don't get to do is brag about it.
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If you choose to shortcut the official route, or (even worse) jump on a train (car, or caravan), you are just cheating yourself. Really!
I also remember when the 50/50 rule came into force. I only recollect it concerned an individual, who was in contention with the points championship, and was not 'working' a day job at the time. Consequently, he had almost every day he could spend amazing points riding DIY routes (bear in mind, this was way, way pre-GPS - so keep receipts). I shall say no more, but feathers were rustled and the motion passed at haste!
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There have been infrequent instances where a rider's brevet has been validated despite the brevet card having missing controls because of other riders vouching for them.
Indeed, I once validated a rider who had lost his card a the final control. Some riders had already stated that he was with them for the first day on that 600. When he arrived at the finish and reported that he had lost his card, I asked him to hand me his GPS. At the finish I copied his track to my netbook, doublechecked it with the route and concluded that it was ok. So I validated.
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I also remember when the 50/50 rule came into force. I only recollect it concerned an individual, who was in contention with the points championship, and was not 'working' a day job at the time. Consequently, he had almost every day he could spend amazing points riding DIY routes (bear in mind, this was way, way pre-GPS - so keep receipts). I shall say no more, but feathers were rustled and the motion passed at haste!
It was pre-DIY perms. Were Mesh perms or Hostel Darts the most flexible permanent options back then? For newer AUKs, both are extinct brevet styles.
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It was pre mesh perms, 1992 i think was the year the 50/50 rule came in.
Interestingly the individual who was cheating also ran off with some members money, but thats another story.
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There have been infrequent instances where a rider's brevet has been validated despite the brevet card having missing controls because of other riders vouching for them.
Indeed, I once validated a rider who had lost his card a the final control. Some riders had already stated that he was with them for the first day on that 600. When he arrived at the finish and reported that he had lost his card, I asked him to hand me his GPS. At the finish I copied his track to my netbook, doublechecked it with the route and concluded that it was ok. So I validated.
The nightmares I had about losing my card before BUM, and it turns out it may not have been game over after all.
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It has been known, in foreign parts I might add, for other riders to offer to validate a card if a control was accidentally missed.
I believe this was perfectly acceptable to the organiser.
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I've frequently witnessed controllers doing incredibly helpful, generous, common sense and flexible applications of rules in support of riders - and have once benefited from this myself when arriving at a manned control around 6am having ridden straight through the night on a 600, hands too frozen to write, brain in that state specific to Audax - no matter what I tried to say, only inaudible mumbles emerged. The controller made an assumption that someone in my state, and only minutes inside the cutoff, had probably passed the info control even though the brevet card wasn't complete, and he wrote it in for me despite my incoherence. I almost cried in gratitude.
As a controller myself I might occasionally have appeared to have misread my watch when a rider could have appeared to a different observer to have been a minute or two behind the cutoff.
I've only ever once seen something and thought "hmm, that looked a bit generous".
As so often the case, isn't the most important rule "thou shalt not take the piss", with (to steal from LWaB) the penalty being a lifetime ban and AUK exclusion for anyone proven to have cheated?
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It has been known, in foreign parts I might add, for other riders to offer to validate a card if a control was accidentally missed.
I believe this was perfectly acceptable to the organiser.
And in the UK as I stopped at a control, purchased 'stuff' and forgot to ask for a receipt as I was being barracked by some very esteemed members of AUK, one of which signed my card at the next control to vouch for my presence at previous control. I did have GPS track if required but Org said it was not required as chap that signed my card could be trusted. Excellent pragmatism!
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It's often said that AUK look for reasons to validate a ride, not for reasons to not validate a ride.
(I've had a calendar ride validated that I didn't even finish.)
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If you choose to shortcut the official route, or (even worse) jump on a train (car, or caravan), you are just cheating yourself. Really!
I also remember when the 50/50 rule came into force. I only recollect it concerned an individual, who was in contention with the points championship, and was not 'working' a day job at the time. Consequently, he had almost every day he could spend amazing points riding DIY routes (bear in mind, this was way, way pre-GPS - so keep receipts). I shall say no more, but feathers were rustled and the motion passed at haste!
Think you should use he/she; do not assume male!
Whatever the excuses, I can be proud that ALL my trophies have been achieved through correct abiding by the 'Rules'.
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While we seem to be discussing cheating at Audax, I was once aware of one particular rider on a PBP 600km qualifier, who had been reported by other riders as being behind them as they left controls, only to find him ahead at the next control, even though whenever anyone had seen him in action his progress was rather too slow to have allowed this. He still got his ride validated, as the Organiser only had hear say rather than direct evidence of cheating. He DNFd the subsequent PBP, which seemed like justice.
I know from personal experience that having completed the SR qualifiers is no guarantee of PBP success, so I couldn't imagine going to the trouble of travelling to Paris without qualifying. You'd just be setting yourself up for a bigger, and more expensive, fail.
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While we seem to be discussing cheating at Audax, I was once aware of one particular rider on a PBP 600km qualifier, who had been reported by other riders as being behind them as they left controls, only to find him ahead at the next control, even though whenever anyone had seen him in action his progress was rather too slow to have allowed this. He still got his ride validated, as the Organiser only had hear say rather than direct evidence of cheating.
I think that is a problem resulting from requiring a too high standard of evidence.
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I don't know how you'd address that sort of situation. Riders are always leapfrogging each other on the road, so if somebody was taking serious shortcuts, whatever, then I'd be looking at the route and control positioning.
Otherwise its about right overall... strict enough to keep people honest... flexible enough to give the benefit of the doubt where merited.
Who decides? We'll, that's a matter for the org and auk... the point is, riders short on PoP, whatever, cannot assume, so better to be safe than sorry.
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It's often said that AUK look for reasons to validate a ride, not for reasons to not validate a ride.
This is the point, and many of the replies upthread should be read in the light of this.
The people (and there are many of them, if you include organisers) who are tasked with reviewing (I won't say 'scrutinising') the proofs of passage generally start with the assumption that what they have in front of them is kosher. Only if a particular possible problem is pointed out (eg, an organiser refers an irregularity to Auk Central - or, the GPX checker software throws up a red flag) are they going to look closer. Even then more often than not a validation will still be the end result.
I feel myself that there should be just a bit more scepticism built into the process - for example the checker software could easily be tuned to be more sceptical, more prone to throw up red flags - but the people in charge of it at Board level are happier keeping everything more trust-based.
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While we seem to be discussing cheating at Audax, I was once aware of one particular rider on a PBP 600km qualifier, who had been reported by other riders as being behind them as they left controls, only to find him ahead at the next control, even though whenever anyone had seen him in action his progress was rather too slow to have allowed this. He still got his ride validated, as the Organiser only had hear say rather than direct evidence of cheating.
I think that is a problem resulting from requiring a too high standard of evidence.
Assuming it's the incident I'm thinking of, it resulted from the organiser's desire to have some actual evidence to justify a decision not to validate, rather than a few bits of hearsay that might have had a perfectly innocent explanation.
As DC says, the rider subsequently DNFd PBP: had he in fact completed, it might have lent some support to his assertion that he'd also satisfactorily completed the qualifier in question.
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It's often said that AUK look for reasons to validate a ride, not for reasons to not validate a ride.
This is the point, and many of the replies upthread should be read in the light of this.
The people (and there are many of them, if you include organisers) who are tasked with reviewing (I won't say 'scrutinising') the proofs of passage generally start with the assumption that what they have in front of them is kosher. Only if a particular possible problem is pointed out (eg, an organiser refers an irregularity to Auk Central - or, the GPX checker software throws up a red flag) are they going to look closer. Even then more often than not a validation will still be the end result.
I feel myself that there should be just a bit more scepticism built into the process - for example the checker software could easily be tuned to be more sceptical, more prone to throw up red flags - but the people in charge of it at Board level are happier keeping everything more trust-based.
Seems a fair summary.
We can certainly say "it ain't broke", so why fix it? But I also think that any professional body doing similar - let's take exam boards as a not-very-similar example! - would at least be doing random checks of validation. I don't think that would be a bad thing in AUK, handled correctly; keep everyone on their toes, and maintain an understanding of what is expected.
BUT it probably isn't broke :)
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Well for BRM events, ACP have the right to mount an independent roadside secret control, at any such event, without reference to AUK. (Of course they'd be wasting their time 'cos advisory routes.)
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I expect that would be a waste of time and money.
I have a Gut Feeling that the cheat rate is so low that a random spot-check would be *highly* unlikely to discover the odd instance.