'First back' & Strava links: not in the spirit of Audax?

[whosatthewheel]

Where gravel bikes score is in being able to take big tyres, which are a good idea on our terrible roads. I interviewed the 'first back' in last year's Mille Pennines, and he used an 80s light tourer with 700c wheels replacing the 27s, the spare space was filled with 38mm tyres.

Younger riders on modern bikes can be first back on shorter rides, but experience offsets youth at longer distances.

I think 28 mm is the sweet spot, when it comes to tyres for rough tarmac and many bikes can take 28. Going over 30 mm typically means losing out on rolling resistance, as most big tyres are not made for roads. Even when it comes to like for like, I have a pair of Hutchinson Sector 28 and I have the equivalent 32 mm on another bike, noticeable difference in speed, not much difference in comfort over rough roads. They both run at 70-80 PSI. Problem with 28 and over is mudguard, the light types typically won't go over anything bigger than a 25 mm

[Paul H]

They both run at 70-80 PSI.

I'm not sure what the point of wider tyres is other than being able to run them at lower pressures.

And back on topic, I'm never likely to be first back except when DIYing, but I'm always interested in my time and usually post all my rides of Strava.  I don't see where there's a problem, unless someone has eaten all the cake before I finish.

[tonyh]

I'm never likely to be first back except when DIYing, but I'm always interested in my time and usually post all my rides of Strava. 

Me too. Usually interested in a segment or two as well... it would be easier to impress myself if there were an over-75 age group though!

[Cudzoziemiec]

Posting rides with slower times can encourage others to come along who feel your pace suites them.

This is a really fucking brilliant point that hadn't occurred to me.  The usual problem for a newbie joining an unfamiliar group is that when they ask about the pace, people always say it'll be 'relaxed' or 'sociable' or some other term that may mean a gentle day out on the bike, or slogging your guts to keep up with Proper Cyclists.  I expect the opposite is also true, but unless there's a risk of hypothermia, most people have sufficient good manners to stick to the pace of a slower-than-expected group for the duration and simply not come next time.

Strava means you can measure it objectively, rather than resort to guesswork based on demographics, choice of kit and apparent level of clue - all of which can be misleading.  Given a decent number of Strava users on a ride, the flyby feature is a good way to see how a group behaves in terms of how spread out things get and the amount of stoppages.

Yes. No. Yes, no and no, yes. We've had both problems on Wednesday evening rides. Back in April, we had a ride when loads of new people turned up – because they'd heard we were cool, friendly, warm, fast, slow, their kind of pace, or whatever – so we had about 30 people, lots of them new, age range from early 20s to about 60, almost 50/50 male/female; great! But it turned out to be problematic; the large group caused problems getting out of town and most of the new people were slower than the regulars, which meant they formed a self-contained group with the regulars who stayed back to shepherd/guide/encourage them along, getting cold due to riding at a slower pace than they'd reckoned on. So we put a guide pace on the website but the rides are still tagged as "social/no drop". Then last month we had a similar number of new people but this time they were all shooting off the front, racing each other up hills and not waiting at the top and so on. Statistics are all very well but are they measuring the people who will actually be there or the people who simply turned up once or twice?

Thinking about it, I remember a similar incident on a CTC ride last summer. Bloke turned up for 65 mile ride described as very hilly. All seemed to be fine till we almost back and he had consecutive incidents of being unable to unclip, due to being totally knackered. Turned out he'd never ridden further than 30 miles before. Ambitious is good but not over-ambitious.

[bikey-mikey]

I stick all my rides on Strava, as a simple record of everything. Garmin Connect is much harder to view in discreet timescales...

Strava also does a nice heat map showing where you ride... mine (below) shows how I get around...

Strava allows photo uploads too, which is a great feature. I see places all over the globe, and it's fun to browse.

I don't look at segment times except very occasionally comparing my own repeat times on sections of Audaxes that I've done more than once, and I tend to look at segments over 20 minutes... you can exclude everyone else if you like...

I'm pretty sure most Strava users who ride Audaxes ignore segments too, based on comments I have read on hundreds of different rides, however non-Strava users would not realise that, so may get a wrong impression.

Gradually I have built up a group of followers, who are interested in what I'm doing, and who leave kudos and encouraging comments.

They are scattered over the globe, including USA, Australia and Europe, but mainly U.K. 

Many of them don't ride the distances I do - often it's commutes and slightly more adventurous weekend rides - so mad Audax capers appeal to them. There are also many members of the audax community who meet me on a ride in 'Timbuktu' and we get along, and then we keep an eye on each other, to our mutual benefit I would hope.

I get questions occasionally- a recent one was 'how you you stay awake for a 600?' and I explained my strategy whilst trying to emphasise that we are all different, so what works for me, might not work for another...

When you get nice comments saying your rides are mad / mega / amazing etc it's a wonderful motivational tool, and it gets me out on the next ride....

For me it's also a bit of social networking and keeps me in contact with other riders I've met on the road.

I've been first back and also last. In the early days as I recovered from my bad accident my confidence was extremely poor, and my social skills were almost nonexistent. That's why I got a reputation for bouncing controls. I had to actually relearn how to talk to people, and initially I had a range of stock responses that I learned in advance and then used over and over. Many of you have no doubt heard them. I was on painkillers and antidepressants, and I probably boasted occasionally, but that was a symptom of my brain injury, and I hope you'll forgive me. As I've matured in this audax world I've learned to 'smell the roses'... and let's not forget that the idea is to ENJOY your ride, whatever that means to you...