Now I've had time to reflect, my thoughts on Louth are unchanged from the end of the event.
I'm pretty certain I know what went wrong at Louth, and to a lesser extent in Spalding. Happily, there's nothing there that cannot be fixed easily.
Louth is the only control that got swamped. Brampton got busy, but only Louth ran out of space. This was always my fear with Louth, but I was actually much more worried about the southbound traffic than the northbound.
Where I went wrong was spacing the riders out until 4pm, and leaving a gap between 8 and 9. If I had shifted 150-200 riders from starting at 3-4 to 8-9, most of those riders would have made it to Pocklington, where I had an extra sports hall almost empty. At Louth they estimate they were about 60 beds short, which is unfortunate but not a total disaster. Happily the school is building an extra sports hall next year, solving that problem.
What I also did wrong was underestimate the leg between Louth and Pocklington. I've ridden the route loads, but always split at Hessle, as that's where I usually get the train to to test the route around there. Again, I think this is easily fixed by putting some refreshment facility at the bridge. The Humber Bridge authority have a new events person, who is keen to work with events like LEL, and I think they would be up for letting us do something like this. I had tried to book the village hall in Swanland but they pulled out - I can always try again in 2021.
Finally, the caterer at Spalding and Louth was not up to the job. He was by far my most expensive English caterer, came with references and was excellent at devising and costing menus. I interviewed him and he was very, very plausible. As soon as I paid a deposit though, things started to go wrong. He wanted the full payment upfront, almost four months before the event, which alarmed FB and me hugely. Then came a mysterious VAT demand, which vanished as soon as it appeared. Then I had mobile bar companies asking to confirm their hire, which the caterer had booked but then emphatically denied he had. We were committed by then and I must confess I froze when confronted with the risk that he might never turn up.
I understand that the chefs at Spalding were great, even if the caterer hadn't ordered enough food. At Louth it was a different story. Only one proper chef turned up, bolstered by a couple of the caterer's family. We had paid for about five staff members for each control. The family members did hardly any work, were rude to riders, and committed food hygiene breaches that alarmed the controller enough to put someone else in charge temporarily. They had clearly failed to order enough food, wasted money on unwanted frippery, and cooked tiny portions of relatively expensive ingredients when I had briefed, again and again, of the need to provide big, big portions and to assume that everyone would eat seconds. Needless to say, the caterers wanted still more money after the event. I have refused to speak to them, and if I thought they had any money I would sue them.
So yes, heading north Louth was way, way below what I would have wanted to happen. The controller remains very upset at the failure, which was obviously not his fault. I am still mortified that it marred what I think was an otherwise pretty smooth event. Happily, I'm certain that we can fix things for next time - the school are very keen to be part of LEL2021, and this time they will cater for us. This is great, because the schools are generally very good at it.
