You might be right. It sure is looking like a circus.
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âWe want to racers to be free to just race instead of worrying about overly burdensome rules so we came up with our own overly burdensome rulesâ
How different would the race be if they just said âno supportâ but backed off on all that other BS? They wouldnât be able to fully enforce it, but thereâs no way they can fully enforce the âno seeing your loved onesâ crap that theyâre currently saying.
Seems like this is the reason that Barkley Marathons guy kept everything so secret for so long.
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Kyle remember that this is not truly a race with anyone in charge
The âofficial websiteâ hasnât been updated in years, the last results are from 2011 http://tourdivide.org/
Itâs just a few hundred nerds showing up on a date in Banff and a few thousand playing Internet calvinball about it. Thereâs a lot more people riding the route on their own schedules.
Itâs simple consensus between riders and veterans, with some Salsa marketing mixed in
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So you canât get DQd, you can just get nerd raged?
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I think you can get Dâqed alright. Lael has been Dqed multiple times for not following the course. The only real results are on trackleaders.com and I donât know if itâs possible to change what that says, after the event. I started watching Josh Ibbots movie the other day, but only got a few mins into it. He was the guy Lael alluded to wrt another film crew at the same time she was riding.
DQed by whom?
Not sure, I assumed it was the Matt dude. There was a course change and she didnât check online before she started, so hadnât uploaded the correct course. I imagine thatâs why she did it again within 2 months, plus she had breathing problems in her first attempt. She doesnât talk about it in any interviews but I remember reading about it in her blog at the time. It was on her first attempt.
This is correct. Lael actually never had a real TD race finish. From Nick Carmanâs blog:
via the radivist:
âMatthew says he isnât the race organizer, the TD doesnât have one. He just picks a start date, sets the track each year, organizes Trackleaders, receives letters of intent, is in communication with racers, makes detours on the route if needed and has the ability to relegate riders from the race.â
fuckinâ lol
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I have to imagine thatâs largely an attempt to avoid any liability if something goes really sideways.
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Tell that to the judge
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Look I fixed it.
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There seem to be lots of rules for something thatâs supposedly leaderless. Reminds me of an anarchist convention I went to once.
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next youâll be telling me that anarchists are actually petty authoritarians.
TD and related seem as if theyâre at the point where they either acknowledge that theyâre popular events with semi-pro racers and a dedicated fan following or quit putting the race (no dude itâs not a race itâs techncially just a lot of people who happen to be riding in the same direction) on if itâs stressful. Pretending that itâs just some buddies having a good time is disengenous
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oh, it absolutely is an âattemptâ
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I think this is exactly why the Oregon poopback folks stopped running that literal shitshow. When you have a grand depart with like an event name and everything it somehow becomes a direct reflection of you personally if any participant acts a fool
The TD guy is just obstinately plodding on about it even though the event as it exists would carry on without a ââârace organizerâââ rules lawyering people year after year
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Iâm not sure how these things work in Oz, but in NZ, we donât have suing. There is no charge for the Tour Aotearoa, you just have to cover carbon credits for getting to the event, and make a donation to a charity of your choice. You have between 30 and 10 days to complete it. If you go under 10 days you get scratched. If it is obvious via your tracker that you didnât have 6 hours rest each night, you will get scratched. Because there are multiple 100 rider waves over a couple of weeks itâs more of a time trial if you are competitive. I can only think of one guy who got DQed for not taking the breaks and bullshitting about it. My main worry is that given that it has now become very mainstream that a newbie will get run over on a road segment. The organizers will not be liable under our laws because of the no entry thing I believe.
do you get people waiting in the bushes until the 10 day mark hits so they can cross the line?
What are we looking at here?