Winter Bike Challenge

[Certifried]

@GuyContinental 36863 wrote:

Not that I don’t love the enthusiasm… but isn’t this getting a bit complicated? Multiple teams, platform-specific data entry (google docs)… Why not just use the BA club on Strava and heckle from there? Allows manual entry and it’s easy to summarize (individual) miles and hours by month.

Regardless, I’d love to participate in the VA-centric 75-150 mile/week bracket (whatever that may be)

The main reason I stopped participating in all those other challenges (National challenge, for example) is because I got sick of entering my ride data in a lot of different places. I just use Strava now, solved the endomondo ugliness, runkeeper spam, etc.

[Mikey]

@Bilsko 36861 wrote:

OK, since this is getting done, lets move on to the next agenda item: teams.

How do we want to do this?

First: Who’s participating? New Forum Thread where everyone responds with ” I’m in” ?
Second: Teams: # of teams and # of riders / team depends on total # of participants. Assuming about 12-15 participants, then 4 riders / team to begin so we get at least 3 teams?
Third: Team Composition: To avoid confusion and/or awkwardness, how about either pick 3 or 4 captains (like vvill’s recommendation) and then assign riders to those teams. Or just random assignment with balancing.

Sounds like we’re settled on points:
+10 per day ridden
+1 per mile

Any bonus points for specific rides? 2x points for riding during a declared snow emergency?

Start: Jan 1
End: April 30?

Other Details?

I would only run this event until March. By April it’s downright nice out. I would do 1 point per mile, 10 points per day, and 1 point for every degree below 20F (daily low recorded at National Airport)

For team balancing we could mention our normal weekly milage with our I’m in response, Like this: “I’m In -essigmw, 80 mi” and then allow the team captains to either pick or random. If we get additional teams wanting to join, they can grab anyone they want.

Or to get more teams we could do a “pro-am” like contest, team up Noobies, with Gristled veterans on 2 rider teams.

[TwoWheelsDC]

@Certifried 36862 wrote:

I was screwing around with MapMyRide. It seems you can create groups, personal challenges, and events. I didn’t see a way to share a personal challenge with others, but you can create an event. I don’t know if this would work, but if someone with more MMR experience is around, maybe they could figure out if this would work.

I gave up on MMR because, at least as of this summer, it never worked. I don’t mean that it was slow or clunky, I mean most of the page elements refused to load for on any browser I tried.

[ronwalf]

@GuyContinental 36863 wrote:

Not that I don’t love the enthusiasm… but isn’t this getting a bit complicated? Multiple teams, platform-specific data entry (google docs)… Why not just use the BA club on Strava and heckle from there? Allows manual entry and it’s easy to summarize (individual) miles and hours by month.

If we did data entry on Strava, it’d be easy for me to cobble together scripts to do the scoring (Strava has excellent external APIs).

[vvill]

@GuyContinental 36863 wrote:

Not that I don’t love the enthusiasm… but isn’t this getting a bit complicated? Multiple teams, platform-specific data entry (google docs)… Why not just use the BA club on Strava and heckle from there? Allows manual entry and it’s easy to summarize (individual) miles and hours by month.

Using Strava is an idea too, since it allows manual entry and as mentioned, has APIs – although I think it does require a start time and duration to be entered along with distance which will make entry more finicky for some users.

I feel that having multiple teams added a valuable extra element to just logging miles.

[Dirt]

Honestly, if there’s another kind of entry that I need to do, I’m probably not going to participate. I do 6 or 7 of these things during the season. The off-season for me is more than just doing things differently on the bicycle…. I take a break from a lot of the things that I do during peak season. I keep up with Strava and 2MC and that’s about it. I can tell that I’m torched on stuff because I’m at least 2 months behind on Flickr Bike180…. and I LOVE that one.

[rcannon100]

It’s not complicated – I promise – we are just discussing options.

If someone can figure out how to make this work on a STAVA or something, please – figure it out and then post the proposal.

The fall back is Google Docs – which I can do. It will be simple – I promise – but it will be manual entry.

I think multiple teams is a great idea. I sincerely believe this will end up being a small core feisty group, and as one person said, teams will help with the inevitable trash talking. Teams is no problem to set up in Google Docs (its just a spreadsheet).

[Arlingtonrider]

Strava is fine, but if we go that route, I’ll be asking for advice on which model of the Garmin Edge to purchase. Right now I don’t have any compatible devices, but have been thinking that it would be nice to have a nav tool.

A minute later: Just saw the note above that Strava allows manual entries. So I wouldn’t necessarily need a compatible device??

[GuyContinental]

@Arlingtonrider 36880 wrote:

A minute later: Just saw the note above that Strava allows manual entries. So I wouldn’t necessarily need a compatible device??

Manual entries work fine- it can be a touch awkward because you need to enter start time as HH:MM:SS but it’s not that tough. As for day to day use, I use the Cyclemeter App on my iPhone (paired with Wahoo ANT+ sensors) but if I were to do it over I’d probably do the Garmin 500…

[Certifried]

Strava works amazing with smartphones, if you have one. I almost wish I hadn’t bought my 800. One main reason I did was because it would do navigation, which has ended up doing it very poorly (remember my trip last HH?! lol). Since Google released cycling navigation a few months back, the 800’s only clear advantage now is the durability and waterproof.

[TwoWheelsDC]

@Certifried 36883 wrote:

Strava works amazing with smartphones, if you have one. I almost wish I hadn’t bought my 800. One main reason I did was because it would do navigation, which has ended up doing it very poorly (remember my trip last HH?! lol). Since Google released cycling navigation a few months back, the 800’s only clear advantage now is the durability and waterproof.

Well, you can’t program a TCX or GPX file into a smartphone…at least not yet. So a smartphone can’t replace cue sheets like a Garmin can. Even the 200 and 500 do breadcrumb trails that, to my knowledge, can’t be done with a phone…which again goes back to the TCX/GPX file issue. You’re right though that the 800 sucks at providing ad hoc directions and I haven’t even bothered attempting to use this feature on my 800.

Garmins also have ANT+ wireless for HRMs, cadence meters, and power meters. There are some iPhone add-ons that can replicate this, but I think if you have Android or WP7/8, you’re outta luck.

[Dirt]

@Certifried 36883 wrote:

Strava works amazing with smartphones, if you have one. I almost wish I hadn’t bought my 800. One main reason I did was because it would do navigation, which has ended up doing it very poorly (remember my trip last HH?! lol). Since Google released cycling navigation a few months back, the 800’s only clear advantage now is the durability and waterproof.

Battery life.

I didn’t like the nav on the 800 at first, but I’ve grown to really like it!

[vvill]

The Garmins etc also have pretty long battery life, at least 10 hrs or so, and are a good replacement for cycle computers.

If you use a smartphone only, relying on waiting on a GPS signal can be annoying. Of course, the same can be said of a Garmin, but if you do use a speed-cadence sensor in conjunction it will include the mileage you ride before the GPS signal is found. I think. The speed-cadence sensor is also nice to have if you happen to subject yourself to an indoor trainer.

(Also I don’t own a smartphone, and a Garmin is cheaper than a years’ service plan on one.)

Anyway, at this point it sounds like Strava may be the way to go for this challenge?

[rcannon100]

Can a STAVA user please answer a threshold question: can we set up a challenge on STAVA? Or can you propose a meaningful way of doing this thru STAVA.

I am hearing that people like STAVA for data upload – and I am hearing that it would be nice if we could use STAVA – but what I am not hearing is that we in fact can use STAVA.

Can we in fact use STAVA for the ELITE Cyclist Winter Challenge and how would that work (not whether we can upload data from a GPS, but can we set up a challenge)?

[vvill]

ronwalf said he could easily cobble something together using the Strava APIs. So I assume all we’d need is team lists (with Strava user IDs), and some basic rules, and he could go from there.

[Author]

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