2017 Freezing Saddles Thread #1

Slackers yes but veterans only. sometimes you need to take some time off. E-bikes. Yes but I think there should be a max distance per E ride. Elf?-Oh-Hell-No. This is a social and group oriented event. There are many ways to upload a ride. Find one that is more than manual miles only.

@cvcalhoun 147891 wrote:

For the record, the rules last year were supposed to be that only people who registered by the cut-off would automatically be on teams. Those who registered later were supposed to get on only a) to balance out teams so each one would have the same number of players, or b) to replace people who dropped out. You were the one who let people on without regard to that. So if we just enforce the existing rules, we should be fine on that part of it.

Ugh. I guess that is what I get for trying to be accommodating to people who wanted to join in. Maybe I should stop being so nice. :confused:

Anyway, be that as it may, it was a giant pain in the ass in what was already a giant pain in the ass. So I am glad that everyone concurs that a hard date should be set and stuck to.

As for the participant number cut off, I like that idea if it makes things easier of Hozn (it obviously makes it easier for me, but sometimes, it is not about me).

As for the slacker issue, I gave my 2 cents, but like Bob said, it honestly makes no difference to me, so whatever the majority wants, the majority gets (or something of that sorts).

I also like the idea that if you do not log a ride within the first 7-10 days of the competition (without a valid excuse), you do not get placed on a team. I am not so sure I like the thought of participants getting dropped later in the season if they fail to meet a minimum mileage goal. I mean, I do like it, but I also think it will be frustrating to replace a participant that late in the game. We can however, make a disclaimer that it they fall below that threshold, their team captain has the right to make them run errands for them by bike all day on the coldest and windiest day of the year.

@Sunyata 147965 wrote:

I also like the idea that if you do not log a ride within the first 7-10 days of the competition (without a valid excuse), you do not get placed on a team. I am not so sure I like the thought of participants getting dropped later in the season if they fail to meet a minimum mileage goal. I mean, I do like it, but I also think it will be frustrating to replace a participant that late in the game. We can however, make a disclaimer that it they fall below that threshold, their team captain has the right to make them run errands for them by bike all day on the coldest and windiest day of the year.

I agree; I think once that “it’s real now!” date passed, there’s no more shuffling of teams. That just sounds like a pain in the butt. I think folks that ride above some threshold (maybe that’s “0”) in the beginning of the competition are “in the game” and if they they decide to bail out, they’ll just have to suffer the wrath of their team and probably end up owing everyone beers at happy hour.

I would propose, though, that final team decisions be postponed a bit to validate the participants so that you don’t have to do the work twice — i.e. even if the suggestion of having the first 7-10 days be considered a qualifying round for placement isn’t adopted. But that’s your call, since you’re doing the team distribution. Once everyone is registered with the scoreboard app (even if we don’t end up handling registration in the app) we could also have it propose team assignments based on some system we determine for calculating handicap (e.g. look at previous competition period or look at previous X days or previous X months — or look at the strongest weeks of riding that user put out during the year, etc.).

I also wonder if we should setup a mailing list (e.g. google group) for the competition and add everyone to that when they sign up — or if the Strava club(s) and forum suffice for communicating with the group. I get the sense that people don’t check the forum, but I know that one of the goals was to try to get people headed over to the forum more, so it might undermine that object if we make too many alternative communication channels.

@hozn 147955 wrote:

I didn’t read this closely enough when I originally replied and suggested that you could borrow a phone from someone. I guess I am surprised there are people that don’t carry a phone, and even especially on rides. That is quite the resistance effort!

I have a cell phone, but it is a dumb phone (7 or 8 yr old flip phone). It is pretty rugged, I can make and receive calls and texts. I do not need much else. It really is for emergencies and figuring out why someone hasn’t made it to a meeting point yet. (and, apparently, for airlines to tell me that the plane I am boarding is delayed). I do resist a lot, but safety is still important. Tracking my location and posting it somewhere is not.

Yes, if it is difficult to keep manual entries, then I am likely not going to be participating a lot. I’ll still be on the trails, however.

you’ll still be able to participate on the forums and happy hours!

@hozn 147983 wrote:

This is way OT, but I’m sure you know that carrying around a phone means “they” can track your location, pretty accurately (GPS just adds a little bit of additional granularity, but with all the towers around here, I imagine tower-measurement based location is pretty accurate). So the telco company/s & the gov’t know where you are, so the more realistic thing you still have some control over is whether your location information is exposed to arbitrary members of the public; Strava itself does provide some ability to safeguard that data from the public.

Continuing OT for a moment to clarify what kind of nut job I am (I contend that no one can claim to be completely sane). No tin foil hats for me. I have a good understanding of technology – I develop aspects of it for work, and get tracked in all sorts of ways at work. I have no issues with the 911 system knowing where I am, nor the Government as a whole. There are safeguards in place to stop the gov’t from doing bad things to the populace and they are trying to do good things (succeeding is a different story and defined differently by all, but the intent is for good), and ways to get those ways changed if we do not like them; I do know that there is no perfect system and accept that. The telco will have that info too, but there it is. I have more issues with corporations and general web sites having all my information. The goal of corporations is to make money not public good, and many disregard privacy or go cheap on protection for financial reasons (there are many good corporations, but many bad ones, e.g., recent Wells Fargo issues which is essentially ID theft from someone you trusted). There are fewer ways to get corporations to change, partially due to proof of it being difficult (gov’t just needs lots of loud voices/money). Since my information on systems not under my control (universities, healthcare systems, gov’t systems, banks, etc.) has been hacked multiple times over the years by criminals and other countries’ governments, I prefer to limit how much information is out there.

I would not be surprised if someone were to hack into Strava (or worse, and hopefully not likely, someone in FS just checking everyone out) and figure out where someone lives and when they are likely to be out and take advantage of that. This is the exposure I am trying to limit. We all need our own paranoias to protect ourselves in some manner. This is mine. I have pushed the group for allowing me to follow this while being part of FS, but that isn’t working. So be it. I accept it.

@akbald01 148202 wrote:

unless we agree to start earlier

Delete your account.

I think December has been about as balmy as March.