I'm not the only one who enjoys a challenge... right?

[frankly frankie]

Difficult to know where exactly that line of thought takes one. Is riding PBP on a bike with one gear a freaky thing? On a recumbent perhaps?

Or just take your common-or-garden upright trike.  I must say most trikies I know are genuinely 'hard' riders in the best possible sense of that phrase.  And they mostly do it to increase the challenge (there may be one or two with inner-ear problems, but most trikies are just hard, and ever so slightly exhibitionist).

In 1975 14 UK riders are listed as completing PBP - of those, 4 were on trike.  I've got a photo somewhere, of three of them riding in line astern (one of them smoking a pipe!).  That sort of thing probably did lead to a bit of "zut alors, zees crazy Engleesh!" sort of talk.  Present-day gentlemen riding museum pieces with onions strung round their neck tap into that tradition.  The PBP organisers don't seem to mind, but maybe they're just being polite.

Recumbents are different - most people who ride a recumbent genuinely believe they are gaining an advantage (incredible but true), they don't do it for the challenge.

[mattc]

Present-day gentlemen riding museum pieces with onions strung round their neck tap into that tradition.  The PBP organisers don't seem to mind, but maybe they're just being polite.

Didn't they give him some kind of award? Hardly the best way to suggest he sod off and stop taking the piss.

[frankly frankie]

They might have been trying to be ironic ...

[Hot Flatus]

Here's my judgement -

... someone who's decided to make their personal challenge harder by riding a bike that's completely unsuitable for long-distance riding (like the chap with the two-geared bike that one of the gears involved pedalling backwards

I actually think this sort of thing is disrespectful of PBP, and turns it into a bit of a freak show.

Is it not a freak show to begin with?  It's hardly normal behaviour.

Isn't that partly why it's fun?

[Pip]

Drew has pedalled a furrow into the annals of PBP folklore. He cannot be imitated and that is why ACP are not being ironic or polite in giving him an award, they know that no one dare copy him, he is unique and the French celebrate his eccentricity....................................................................I think!?

[Wothill]

Recumbents are different - most people who ride a recumbent genuinely believe they are gaining an advantage (incredible but true), they don't do it for the challenge.

I doubt it that is quite right. I ride a recumbent because my back stopped me riding long distances on an upright some years ago. Others got into recumbent riding for a variety of reasons but we all end up just like riding that particular sort of bike. I doubt if many of us see it as gaining an advantage over all (up hill harder, downhill faster) or as more of a challenge.

[damerell]

You wrote that you'd rather DNF than use a bag drop.

Now, I can't talk because I'm a big wuss who'd rather DNS at the moment, but me too. However, on reflection, this is - for me - not so much self-sufficiency as hating cars; it's the same reason I've never accepted a lift after an audax (or at any other time) no matter how wiped I am. If bag drops were done by railway I'd probably be gung-ho for them.

I do agree that - while PBP is a heroic achievement either way, and one that's apparently well outside my grasp - it may be marginally less heroic if you have a support vehicle, and it's sure as hell less self-sufficient.

[Manotea]

Drew has pedalled a furrow into the annals of PBP folklore. He cannot be imitated and that is why ACP are not being ironic or polite in giving him an award, they know that no one dare copy him, he is unique and the French celebrate his eccentricity....................................................................I think!?

But wouldn't it be great if there were a veritable peloton of mustachioed strippey shirted & bereted onion carriers riding round in close formation, club style, in the summer!

I don't have a problem with bag drops. It's those people who take 3, 4 and sometimes even more gears that ought to be ashamed of themselves!

[LittleWheelsandBig]

Luckily I only had a two speed hub in 2003.

[pumpkin]

But you still have to ride the distance in the allotted time. Nobody expects the TdF riders to carry their own tyres/mend forks etc so if someone wants to ride PBP and get a clean pair of shorts at the halfway stage what does it matter? You could say that someone who requires medication shouldn't ride unless they carry their own medication but what about if they feel they need to have eg spare insulin 'just in case'. Anyone who does the ride deserves credit due. You could extend the logic to eg RAAM and say a support team means you haven't done it.

[Greenbank]

However, on reflection, this is - for me - not so much self-sufficiency as hating cars; it's the same reason I've never accepted a lift after an audax (or at any other time) no matter how wiped I am. If bag drops were done by railway I'd probably be gung-ho for them.

Interesting.

How do you sit with the fact that there's probably less than a handful of Audaxes that don't involve the use of a car by the organiser (and/or multiple helpers) at some point on the day (and more likely before too). If the organiser (or a helper) is having to drive to one of the controls from the start (after the ride has started) then why not offer a bag drop service, it works on the Bryan Chapman (where the organiser takes bags to the 200km/400km point at Dolgellau) because he's going there anyway.

Organisers aren't exactly blessed with a plethora of helpers local to each of their controls so they have to get some non-locals to man them, many of whom drive there.

[damerell]

However, on reflection, this is - for me - not so much self-sufficiency as hating cars; it's the same reason I've never accepted a lift after an audax (or at any other time) no matter how wiped I am. If bag drops were done by railway I'd probably be gung-ho for them.

How do you sit with the fact that there's probably less than a handful of Audaxes that don't involve the use of a car by the organiser (and/or multiple helpers) at some point on the day (and more likely before too).

That's certainly one reason I'm becoming a bit ambivalent, yes. It may be a trifle hypocritical to ride events that people drive in order to organise.

ETA: but I'm not really trying to do a thread derail into me and cars. What I'm saying is a) I wouldn't use a bagdrop, I agree with EF but b) perhaps in fact that concern isn't self-sufficiency so I don't agree with EF that much.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

RAAM won't let you enter without a support crew and at least one support vehicle.

[/pedant]

[Grandad]

Or just take your common-or-garden upright trike.  I must say most trikies I know are genuinely 'hard' riders in the best possible sense of that phrase.  And they mostly do it to increase the challenge (there may be one or two with inner-ear problems, but most trikies are just hard, and ever so slightly exhibitionist).

The best description of this sub culture that I have seen. I used to be almost semi hard but am now 100% exhibitionist.

[zigzag]

it is strange to read that people hate cars. i would understand someone hating inconsiderate drivers, but cars?..

[Manotea]

There is also the reverse bag drop, i.e., dumping your saddlebag at Dolgellau on the way to Menaii on the BCM, though if you've got a bag drop it begs the question of why you need anything more than somewhere to park a couple of tubes and a chewy bar.

[urban_biker]

If you really want a challenge why not try filming the ride and still completing it like Damon did for PBP 2007.

At times I bet he'd have killed to be riding a two speed bike only encumbered with a string of onions. 

[Manotea]

If you really want a challenge why not try filming the ride and still completing it like Damon did for PBP 2007.

At times I bet he'd have killed to be riding a two speed bike only encumbered with a string of onions. 

You need to be hard and exhibitionist to pull that off!

[simonp]

I didn't enjoy PBP.  I enjoyed Mille Cymru.

Mille Cymru was the more challenging ride, in terms of terrain.  But in terms of fitness, there was no comparison between me in 2007 and me in 2010, and this made Mille Cymru the less challenging ride.  A harder challenge, for which I prepared better, which made it less of a miserable struggle, and more enjoyable.

[arvid]

I'm just doing it in my way, for myself.

^^This.
I like being self-sufficient in that I bring everything I expect I might need with me, if someone else has support for whatever reason, good for them. If for whatever reason I can give someone a hand, or take opportunity to get a hand, that's just great. I'd say that's just coping with the circumstances, and I have my preferences, but I keep all options open.
The non-competitiveness and camaraderie is what makes an audax different to just a normal long bike ride, for me. I also enjoy those, but they are different in that respect.

Also: I'm with Ural that any audax in itself is a freak show, and I reckon it's fun for bike freaks to see other bike freaks.

[valkyrie]

I value more the rides that were "challenging" because they push the limits of what I can ride. My first 100km felt really hard, my first 400km felt really hard, but once you've done a distance it becomes much less of a mental challenge in itself. The ability to cope with adversity - weather, hills, mechanicals, whatever, just grows with experiencing these things and if you insulate yourself too much from troubles then you don't grow your ability to deal with them.

I didn't use a bag drop in the 2007 PBP, not because I thought there was anything wrong with the idea, just because I was too damn knackered when I got back to Loudeac to ride the extra few km to the camp site to get my bag. Having finished the ride in the one pair of shorts I now know -

1. It's perfectly possible to ride a 1200 un-supported without a bag drop.
2. My shorts don't smell very good at the end of it.

So if there's going to be an official bag drop this year then I'll happily use it. I know it won't make the ride any easier, but it'll make me smell marginally better when I get to the finish.

I think that if riding with a support team is all you do then you convince yourself that you've got to have support on long rides and therefore you limit yourself. Last summmer Salvatore managed a 1200, a 1500 and a good few thousand kms in between without any support. That's the kind of riding I admire and aspire to, but I think it'll take me a bit more experience of riding really long audaxes before I could leave the house for a whole summer without worrying about support.

[zigzag]

i don't really understand someone who seeks respect and admiration just because he rides a bike! if you do something good for others by riding the bike, this will earn you some respect. but if you just ride your bike, whichever way, supported, unsupported, slow, fast, for leisure, for training - who cares?.. challenges are a personal thing, and the hardest thing you've done in your life may seem a walk in the park to someone else. would he have a right to look down on you?

[urban_biker]

. . . . challenges are a personal thing, and the hardest thing you've done in your life may seem a walk in the park to someone else. would he have a right to look down on you?

The only people I look down on ride recumbents.

[EdinburghFixed]

i don't really understand someone who seeks respect and admiration just because he rides a bike! if you do something good for others by riding the bike, this will earn you some respect. but if you just ride your bike, whichever way, supported, unsupported, slow, fast, for leisure, for training - who cares?.. challenges are a personal thing, and the hardest thing you've done in your life may seem a walk in the park to someone else. would he have a right to look down on you?

It's a truism that anything we do in life pales into insignificance compared with those who have gone before. Ever thought you had it tough? You've probably not sawn off your own arm with a blunt penknife to escape certain death. You've probably not spent 20 years in jail as a prisoner of conscience, or trusted yourself to a tiny boat in the Antarctic with just the slimmest chance of surviving the teeth of winter's storms to return with help. You probably haven't stepped outside "for some time" because there's not enough supplies for everyone...

Happily, the discussion avoids this absolutism by posing the question "how do YOU feel about a given ride being easier/harder than expected".

Let's be honest, riding a bike is not heroic (Rapha aside) in the slightest, and about as unlikely to fetch you admiration and respect as anything it is possible to set your hand to in the western world. Even charity bike rides are basically a giant concience-salving experiment. Instead of spending two weeks riding from Land's End to John o Groats, you could spend two weeks volunteering with the actual people you're trying to help (and you'd probably get more donations).

[simonp]

Let's be honest, riding a bike is not heroic (Rapha aside) in the slightest, and about as unlikely to fetch you admiration and respect as anything it is possible to set your hand to in the western world.

Oh?

"You 'ave done Paris-Brest?  You are crazee.  'ey everyone, zis guy 'as done Paris-Brest!  'e is crazee."