Now what? (Or how we can all elbow in on Sunyata)

[Steve O]

Registration has closed, and Sunyata now has the thankless task of devising teams. This is when the rest of us all create on-line havoc bombarding her with suggestions and useless ideas, which she may then choose to ignore.

Issues to determine:
– Number of teams
– Players per team
– Assignments
– Substitutions/additions

(raises hand) I’ll start!

My past years’ analyses, flawed as they were, seem to indicate that all the work put into devising “fair” teams is only marginally better than randomly choosing them. In fact, random beats* other systems a significant portion of the time (about 30%).

So my suggestion is to run a randomized selection system, say, 10 times and then pick the one that spreads the highest point riders out the most. I suspect that will be as good or better than any more complicated system.

There was positive response to the idea of keeping the spread closer by adding substitute players to the last place team along the way. I have ideas about this I will share in a subsequent post.

*”beats” means the spread from first to last is smaller

Topic

[cvcalhoun]

@Vicegrip 130522 wrote:

Thanks for the time and work on this!

Unasked for random thoughts. More teams is not a bad thing. Teams big enough that one rider does not kill it for the rest but small enough that each rider matters.

I would also vote for more teams, not bigger teams.

[S. Arlington Observer]

Now, if I can just remember to turn on the damn Strava. I usually get about half way through the ride before I remember it. Luckily my usual routes don’t vary a lot so I can add an accurate manual entry. But I prefer to get all the feedback from the App. Not sure what I’m going to have to do make it second nature to turn it on when I head out.

[Sunyata]

@S. Arlington Observer 130583 wrote:

Now, if I can just remember to turn on the damn Strava. I usually get about half way through the ride before I remember it. Luckily my usual routes don’t vary a lot so I can add an accurate manual entry. But I prefer to get all the feedback from the App. Not sure what I’m going to have to do make it second nature to turn it on when I head out.

Post-it note on your handlebar?

[Sunyata]

Okay folks! After three-ish days of slaving away over the registration info, the team assignments are done! If someone registered AFTER 11:29 am today, they were not assigned to a team (sorry ).

The name tag czar has the info and is currently slaving away making beautiful name tags for the kick off Happy Hour.

And no, you can not bribe me with beer to get an early glimpse of the teams.

However, you CAN bribe me with a brand new Carbon Salsa Warbird! :p (Kidding… Sort of.)

I tried to get everyone that did not want to be on a local team on a mixed team, but unfortunately a few of you (not many) were assigned to a local team. Everyone that wanted a local team was put on a local team. You are welcome. 😎

There ARE more teams this year and the teams are slightly bigger than last year (but not by much). So it will still be personal and fun and you will definitely be able to make a difference in how your team does.

And despite being bribed by dcv, I did not put him, Vicegrip, Rod Smith, and ewilliams0305 on the same team. I put myself, Vicegrip, Rod Smith, and ewilliams0305 on the same team. (Kidding… or am I?)

Anyway, get in a few last miles for 2015 and get ready to ride tomorrow! The skies are going to clear up and the SUN is going to come out!
[ATTACH=CONFIG]10317[/ATTACH]

[dcv]

@Sunyata 130686 wrote:

And despite being bribed by dcv, I did not put him, Vicegrip, Rod Smith, and ewilliams0305 on the same team. I put myself, Vicegrip, Rod Smith, and ewilliams0305 on the same team. (Kidding… or am I?)

[dkel]

@dcv 130690 wrote:

Dude, that looks just like you!

[GovernorSilver]

Thank you, organizers, for your work on Freezing Saddles.

[Anonymous]

@Steve O 130420 wrote:

I won’t be surprised if we hear more from people along the way. Also, some of the slackers may not mind being added to a team part way through, since at that point expectations will have changed and any additional points added to a last place team will be welcomed rather than criticized for not being enough.

Or we could try conscription.

At the rate we’re going, we’ll have enough to put another team together by happy hour…

[Sunyata]

Just wanted to give everyone a heads up regarding team captains:

There were not enough folks that checked the box about team captains to go around (and the way the team assignments went, some teams had two people that checked the box and some had none).

So, in order to facilitate the making of Strava teams, I assigned each team a Captain (if they checked the box) or an Acting Captain (if they did not check the box and they are not new to Strava) that has already RSVP’ed to the Happy Hour. Once the team assignments are made and the Strava teams are formed, each team can then battle it out amongst themselves to figure out who will be the Captain. Perhaps a pointless prize to the team that has the most epic showdown?

[Rockford10]

@Sunyata 130914 wrote:

Perhaps a pointless prize to the team that has the most epic showdown?

Watch what you wish for.

[jrenaut]

@Sunyata 130914 wrote:

Perhaps a pointless prize to the team that has the most epic showdown?

Like doing hill repeats, where the first person to quit becomes captain? I like it.

[Sunyata]

@jrenaut 130916 wrote:

Like doing hill repeats, where the first person to quit becomes captain? I like it.

And this is why you guys are awesome.

[Author]

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