I wasn't meaning to have a go at you in particular, but it seems that every time anybody mentions they are participating in a cyclosportive event on the "Audax and
Cyclosportive" board we get the same old hackneyed stuff trotted out about:-
(A) The price of entry (and the inevitable... "Ooh I was riding the Flanger's Pizzle 150 on almost the same roads as the "mid-rutshire challenge sportive" so I pointed out to the sportive riders that overtook me that I was riding the same route on public roads for only £2.50 (plus 2 C5 SAEs, and a letter to my bank to get a replacement chequebook for the one I lost since entering my last Audax) so aren't they just a bunch of idiots with too much money!")
(B) How much of that goes to charity then?
(C) People on Sportives are so unfriendly.
(FTR, I do Audax by preference, but do occasional local Sportives too. I really don't see the need that other people do to whine about (A), (B) and (C) every time a sportive is mentioned. It gets
really boring).
Oh, and:-
I once got knocked back on a sportive as it was fully booked (non charity) so went anyway, cost £0.00
That's another comment that comes up occasionally on Sportive-related threads. I guess people could also do that on Audaxes that fill up. Or club events. Maybe I'll ride the Seething 600 after all. And - bonus! - doing it your way would cost me £0.00.
(BTW - I wouldn't actually do this - it would be pretty sucky to take advantage of people's hard efforts without contributing towards them in some way.)
IOW:-
Do we REALLY have to rehash this every time someone mentions a Sportive on this board? It's just another sort of bike ride - if you don't want to do one then hey - that's your choice.
I don't see Sportive riders coming onto this board and whining about the lack of chip timing on Audax rides, or about how 0% of the entry fee goes to charity, or how they could have ridden the same route "on a public highway
" for £0.00, etc. etc.
