Whatever happened to the Secret Control?

[damerell]

What model Carradice do I own?

Newton longflap.

[Ivo]

On the continent there still are secret controls. I have them at about half my rides (which ones I won't tell ).  Quite often I'm manning them myself.

[frankly frankie]

AUK's current stance is that routes (routesheets) are advisory, not compulsory.  So secret controls make no sense.

However some Organisers have the stance that their route (routesheet) is compulsory.  Generally this can only be 'enforced' (yeah right) by the use of secret controls (real or virtual).

So a compromise position has been reached, as already described by Mal.  Any leg of a route can be made compulsory by the addition of a secret control, somewhere in that leg, and this can be declared on the brevet card if that is what the Organiser wants.  Very few events do this but it could in theory do away with multiple infos (spit).

The (very old) system of "there will be a secret control somewhere on this event so follow my routesheet or else" is just crap, sloppy, lazy organising, and good riddance.

[The Mechanic]

We know where you live!

[CommuteTooFar]

I use secret controls on Ride 'Round Rhondda.  Locks the ride down nicely in the uncontrolable areas.  If I stand in my usual place  there is no chance of me missing the riders. I greet them with a cheery "steep isn't it?" This is a fair weather secret control.  If it is pissing down the controller is absent, but on a sunny May day it is quite nice watching the cyclists proceeding up the lane to the crossroads with me on it.  As they leave I warn them "Not far now, be careful on the descent."  This year I may stand somewhere else to keep  the riders on their toes, one complained that I was in the same place as Jim Roberson last time he rode.

I have a problem with my other secret control.  He has a distil fracture of his clavicle.  Need to find someone else. This is the important secret control to stop people riding straight up the A470/A4054 or A473 or the lane at the back of Church Village.  The usual position only stops the first of these, but that ensures the hard climb is taken.

[JStone]

... If it is pissing down the controller is absent...

The controller might be absent, but the route sheet presumably still states that there's a secret control on this stage. So the riders struggle on through the rain, getting increasingly anxious that they've missed the control ... 

[CommuteTooFar]

I normally tell them when no one is there, I am a rider myself and have endured route sheet paranoia on many occasions.