Existential Thread: Or What is Freezing Saddles Really All About

[Steve O]

I’ve had several conversations lately with active members of this forum that prompt me to ask the question: What is Freezing Saddles? Why do we do it?
Is it:
– A game by, for and of this Forum
– A winter riding competition that just happens to be organized and run by this Forum

Unquestionably Freezing Saddles was born of this Forum and its original intent was to provide a fun, winter riding competition among members.

Last year, and even more so this year, there are a lot of people listed as players on the Freezing Saddles web site who have likely never logged in to the forum (other than to register), know nothing of beerneuring or vvill’s N+1 or really have any intention of contributing in any way. I have heard of some players who actually express dislike or disdain for the Forum. I have heard frustration about getting nothing but radio silence from “team members” when reaching out to organize an event or just to have an on-line conversation.

Most of the individual teams had a greeting thread back after the first happy hour. A number of players never bothered to even post a “hello” to their team members and, other than their miles being posted, haven’t interacted in any way. Are they playing the game? If so, why not have every bike commuter in DC with Strava click a button and have their miles posted to the web site? What’s the difference?

I like to think of FS as a tool to grow our community. I want to cast a wide net to bring people in. At the same time, I don’t think I want players in the game who have no interest in ever being part of the community. Where is the balance between a game being played by people who want to be part of the community and not being perceived as a clique?

Is this something that we want to try to fix? Or not?

I have a couple of ideas (one carrot and one stick), which I’ll save for later in the discussion.

Topic

[Tania]

Team 8 communicates entirely via a closed FB Group.

Just because you can’t see it, doesn’t mean things aren’t happening.

[ShawnoftheDread]

@TwoWheelsDC 135507 wrote:

Lottery system. $50 to get a number, and 250 numbers are chosen to take part in the competition. Proceeds go to the TwoWheelsDC N+1 Charity Fund, LLC.

If only you had suggested that before posting a pic of your Cinelli.

[dcv]

@ShawnoftheDread 135519 wrote:

If only you had suggested that before posting a pic of your Cinelli.

or his Triumph

[jrenaut]

@Steve O 135511 wrote:

[all the stuff Steve wrote]…

I like where this is heading, though most of these ideas are really difficult to automate and would require a lot of manual checking. Not to mention weeks of arguing over how many points each thing is worth and which side events become scoring events.

I get a lot out of this competition, but I’ve never even been close to the top team. I’m leading our team in points and I’d be no higher than 5th on any team in the top 5 right now. But I’ve been having a blast with family beerneuring, and I’ve never ridden this much in my life. I’ll beat my first FS total later this week. It’s gotten my wife more into riding, too (this is her first FS).

By the way, if people want to experiment with any alternate leaderboards where points can be calculated from the database, let me know, I can probably make one for you.

[DismalScientist]

@Steve O 135508 wrote:

This is a great discussion.

.

Is Freezing Saddles:

A) A winter bike riding competition in which players score points for days and miles of riding for themselves and for a “Team.” (Oh, and there might be some other stuff going on, too, but it may or may not matter to me)?

OR

A community of friends who love bikes, riding bikes, talking about bikes and sharing the joy of bikes, and have created a game of winter riding to make the fun they have together even more fun?

It definitely started as .

??????

You weren’t here the first year, were you?

[americancyclo]

I think Stevie’s idea about bonus points will create false situations where people value the points of an activity over the socialization that is the goal. Alternate ways of being competitive are welcome but I don’t think that is the best way. Maybe the pointless prizes have a team bonus at the ending ceremony?

What about larger teams? 20 teams is hard to keep track of. 10 would be much easier.

As far as data calls, is it hard to set up a schedule that calls for data based on ride frequency? Everyday riders get everyday data calls. If your only riding twice a week, maybe you only get weekly data calls. I know that a majority of my rides happen Tuesday to Friday so I’d happily forgo any data calls from Sat-Tuesday. Maybe that’s a huge programming PITA though.

As far as fun, it’s up to us to make it fun. That’s why when I think of a cool challenge, I usually give a prize for it. See last years Instagram prize I co-sponsored with Subby and the Kosen Dangi award.

[wheelswings]

I think Steve O, Steve C and others have articulated the issue well. Many of this year’s teams include folks who rarely log miles and have never said hi on the forum, on Strava, on Facebook, or in person. It would be great if more people actually engaged. I’m not sure how to solve this, though I really appreciate the ideas people are coming up with.

As for Steve O’s proposal, I’d agree with americancyclo… Actually I’d be uncomfortable with point awards for engaging in social activities, photos, etc. Call me old-fashioned, but I feel like these things should come from the heart, and to give them point values takes the fun out of it. Also I’d say that much of the homegrown genius and good humor of Freezing Saddles is not the sort of thing I’d want to quantify…. like when my teammate Snugglefestival took it upon herself to sew headbands and face-masks and distribute them at our Cap City Happy Hour (pure awesomeness). I know that my own participation could not easily be assessed in any metric either…things like ride title poems and cooking up silly prizes (more in the works). I sure as heck wouldn’t want to get points for these things. I like to do them because I love FS and because you are my friends. At the same time, I don’t do side bets or other activities ‘cause I’m a single mom who can barely keep her head above water.
However we decide to re-structure Freezing Saddles, I hope it will continue to encourage cohesion in the winter riding community but at the same time leave a lot of space for different forms of participation.

[Vicegrip]

Team Points. Miles and days. /

Pointless prizes. Anything goes. The more “anything” the better.

[cvcalhoun]

@americancyclo 135532 wrote:

What about larger teams? 20 teams is hard to keep track of. 10 would be much easier.

There are two problems with larger teams:

• No one individual’s points would have much of an impact on standing, so there isn’t much incentive to ride more. That’s been the issue with the National Bike Challenge–it really records what people already do, rather than giving them an incentive to do more.

• It makes it much harder for team members to get to know each other. The past couple of years, with teams of 9 or 10, we could usually get almost everyone on the team together for a meet-up. Now, we’re lucky if we get half the team. And if we got the whole team, it would be pretty much impossible to have general conversation, anyway.

I would rather have smaller teams rather than larger. That could mean having a smaller competition overall. Or it could mean having more teams. If we go for the “more teams” option, I’d like to see more emphasis on pointless prizes. With more teams, you’d have a smaller percentage of people on the first place team, so it would be more important to find ways to have fun other than winning the competition as a whole.

[Rod Smith]

Points for pints, coffee, instagram, falling down, etc.? No, no, no, no…

[rcannon100]

How about we award points based on posts spent kvetching about Freezing Saddles? Pontificating seems to be a core reason d’etre of this experience, and surely the entire point of mandating the Freds be active participants on the Forum is to ensure robust bickering.

[Steve O]

@wheels&wings 135535 wrote:

Actually I’d be uncomfortable with point awards for engaging in social activities, photos, etc. Call me old-fashioned, but I feel like these things should come from the heart, and to give them point values takes the fun out of it.

Actually I’d be uncomfortable with point awards for riding my bike. Call me old-fashioned, but I feel like it should come from the heart, and to give point values takes the fun out of it.
==================

We created this system–with points–to encourage people to ride their bikes more in the winter. Why is that any different than awarding points for encouraging people to sew buffs or go to a happy hour?

If awarding points gets me out riding my bike on a day when I otherwise wouldn’t, is it bad to award points for taking a photo of my ride and posting it when I might not have otherwise done it? Or ride to a coffee shop I wouldn’t have ever visited otherwise? I fail to see the difference.

[Bruno Moore]

@wheels&wings 135535 wrote:

As for Steve O’s proposal, I’d agree with americancyclo… Actually I’d be uncomfortable with point awards for engaging in social activities, photos, etc. Call me old-fashioned, but I feel like these things should come from the heart, and to give them point values takes the fun out of it. Also I’d say that much of the homegrown genius and good humor of Freezing Saddles is not the sort of thing I’d want to quantify…. like when my teammate Snugglefestival took it upon herself to sew headbands and face-masks and distribute them at our Cap City Happy Hour (pure awesomeness). I know that my own participation could not easily be assessed in any metric either…things like ride title poems and cooking up silly prizes (more in the works). I sure as heck wouldn’t want to get points for these things. I like to do them because I love FS and because you are my friends. At the same time, I don’t do side bets or other activities ‘cause I’m a single mom who can barely keep her head above water.
However we decide to re-structure Freezing Saddles, I hope it will continue to encourage cohesion in the winter riding community but at the same time leave a lot of space for different forms of participation.

I’m really, really uncomfortable with the level of points-based “you must be this Elite to ride” shiznit going on. That’s part of why the coffee “challenge” is so ridiculous; yes, it’s partly my guide to awesome people and places you can bike to, partly me soliciting tips for other awesome people and places, partly just me being weird, and partly me poking fun at the whole “let’s score points!” mentality. Look, we’re biking during snowstorms. Biking. In snowstorms. Are we really taking ourselves seriously? Why would we even want to?

Look, beerneuring is expensive. I did it last year, but, by the end, $5 a beer really put a hit on my (bike shop minion) budget. Even my weirdo coffeechallenge doesn’t quite sit right with me in every respect, even if I deliberately chose something cheeper and more work-friendly than alcohol; I don’t want to have any “pay to play” aspect to any part of FS if it can be helped. How can I reconcile my transit activism, my honest and sincere belief that riding a bike is something for all people, something liberating and freeing, something you can participate in regardless of class, race, perceived ability, gender identification, sexual orientation, employment status, or other category we use to discriminate, disparage, and destroy one another? How would imposing minimums, of any kind, increase the inclusiveness of our community? How do our endless “are ebikes real bikes? Do they count?” discussions, to take but one example, help our community, save to reinforce a notion that there are Real Cyclists™ and cheaters (nevermind that the cheaters with their electric assists may be carrying cargo, children, may be people with disabilities, elderly, or otherwise not be able to fully enjoy riding a bike without assistance)?

And now here we are looking for ways to limit our competition and keep more points totals. Looking for ways to winnow and exclude. We don’t want the Great Unwashed, the Uncommitted, the noncompetitive, the social for society’s sake; no, we need points totals!

It reminds me very much of the old John Forester idea that we need to give certificates for Competent Cyclists—the discriminatory idea that some people (in Forester’s world, physically Elite males on road bikes, who viewed their commutes as Serious Training for racing), people who have been properly trained and initiated, are Real Cyclists, and the rest, infantilized. It’s a return of the idea that we’ve been trying to kill, this idea of cycling as competition, rather than a part of everyday lived experience, something for every single person who wants to ride.

I’ve been reading many of Mary’s interviews with my former Inquisition teammates from last year on Chasing Mailboxes. Thing is, we still see each other pretty often, whether at TCM, Vigilante, Board & Brew, Proteus, or just on the trails. FS built us into a community. It’s a bit harder to do that this year—CT6 is spread out over two counties, after all, even if a bit more than half of us are in the College Park/Laurel area, and three within coasting distance of one another—but we still try. Do I want points for meeting Millie for coffee, or riding through the snow with Bonnie? No, not really. Don’t f’n care. The picture of my face covered in wool, or my borrowed bike dripping, or the stories I can tell baristas are worth so, so much more.

So here’s the deal. If we’re trying to keep this for the few, as a competition, one with standards to be observed, well, it’s been real, good ridin’ with y’alls, but I’m gonna have to call it quits. I can’t be part of that. It goes against so much of what I want a true cycling community to be, one that encourages the person who’s scared to ride and the person who’s scared not to. There is no place for elitism in our community, and, if we’re going to be placing point values on what should be joyful, slightly silly, and transformative, I’m out. We make a place for all, or we are nothing.

[hozn]

Well, I think the fundamental problem here is the competition is too large. Both technically, organizationally, and apparently socially. So if you have to limit it, how would you decide who gets in? I think dropping folks that don’t ride and don’t participate in any other way seems a reasonable place to start, no?

In any event, there will be a limit next year, I think it is clear. Likely that will simply be based on registration date, but it would be nice if there were some commitment for participants to actually participate.

I agree that we want to welcome newcomers and seasoned cyclists alike. But groups are always elitist; it is so by definition. You define yourselves by who you exclude, just as much as who you include. Perhaps we could start by kicking out those damn elitists…

[dkel]

@hozn 135549 wrote:

Perhaps we could start by kicking out those damn elitists…

I just caught myself before clicking “elite” for your post.

[Author]

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