Hangover 9/10/2007
A law enforcement no-show cancels Bear Mountain. If you listen closely you can hear the shredding of periodized training plans as we speak. Oh, to have your peak for an “A†race wasted! I have to wonder whether it’s karmic payback for having a Bear Mountain Race on Mother’s Day – are the people who do that race hatched from eggs?
If you want to put that peak to use, help out our Westwood friends and do Silvermine.
Igor Misicki wins in Prospect on Saturday. Carefully following the lead moto.
Jared Bunde wins a stage in the Tour of Nicaragua – how pro is that? Here’s a portion of the local write up translated via Babel Fish:
“…but it was Bundc (sic) that showed to more resistance and determination and mounted ‘to them’ to his companions of route more than four minutes and a little more to the squad.â€
More resistence, indeed.
Eugene Boronow also gains some UCI points by hitting 17th place at the Univest Grand Prix. Again, very pro…
And there’s nude pictures of Gabriella from High School Musical floating out there – I feel dirty even typing that.
Let me start this off by saying, you all suck. There, now my ego is in-check and I can sip my cappuccino.
Sounds like CRCA dropped the BALL on this one. I can only imagine if you gave the racers only a few weeks notice, how little notice did they give the park and the troppers.
Anonymous posters who attack the CRCA for the Bear fiasco and somehow try to link it to late registration need to get a life, a grip and some perspective. You should be ashamed of yourselves and your pathetic lives. Do you really need many weeks/months to register for and plan an amateur bike race in mid-September. Your attitude epitomizes the weak character of the NYC local peleton. Shame on you for making so many of us embarrassed to be a part of this “community”. Guilt by association is the worst. Please go back to your pathetic little existence and bugger off this site.
I choose to remain anonymous until you others come out and tell us who you are. Until then, you don’t deserve the courtesy. Bullwinkle was right though. Bunch of whiners you are.
i bet it’s just one douchebag who complains about bear registration, no photos from a park race, the CRCA, Empire, and about someone who should put on a race. that person can go eat me.
just because reg for riders opened late does NOT necessarily mean that permitting/etc. was also done late.
It’s been said before, people, stop complaining, if you want to fix the problem or see better ways to do it…step up, volunteer to be part of CRCA, or other org that put up races for us. They are volunteers but also love the sport and take pride in the racing themselves, from my interaction with them, they do the best they can to serve us. I bet you think you are so cool and too good for school.
And while I am at it what’s with the hate towards Empire? They have done a good thing for the local scene. If you are jealous, you can either train harder(no drugs pls) and try to make that team or create a team yourself so you can compete against them.
Give CRCA a break.
Waaaaaaahhhhhh!
Immature thread warning.
Not as good as Marco’s of course, but it was a fun day (albeit hot)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/11347487@N06/sets/72157601926668639/
NYC got mad props by Eustice on the telecast; it should be on the web at wfmz.com (I think that’s right) to watch in full.
Alan
has anyone done westwood’s silvermine time trial previously? i have done only 1 before and it was fun. this one looks a bit longer. will i be ok on my road bike? how long of a race do you think it will be? should i take water?
i tried looking online but i couldnt find an image of the course map.
thank you.
Silvermine is an easy, dead flat course. You don’t need water – Just a 55×11!
Go to bike Reg and they have the course and description. The pave is not great and the course is tough based on my experience riding it over to the Bear Loop. Should be fun and challenging.
http://results.westwoodvelo.com/silvermine/2007/silvermine2007.jpg
I am not on CRCA but they seem to do alot of good for NYC cycling and I have no complaints. With that said, I have one request/recommendation for 2008. Please do not hold the Spring Bear Mtn Race on Mothers day. Most of us have mothers or Wifes who are mothers and some are mothers. I missed the spring race this year do to the holiday conflict and then the fall race was unfortunately cancelled. This one request would make alot of people very happy even if the race was the Saturday before Mothers day. Thank you.
We don’t really have a choice as to when to run this race. The schedule is full of very popular regional races from New England, upstate New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania both before and after Mother’s Day. And with the registration rates being in the mid 90’s for the last 2 years (registered riders for the number of spots available), it doesn’t appear to be too much of an issue with a majority of the riders.
That being said, if there is an opportunity to move this race away from Mother’s Day, I would like to take advantage of it if I can. But it takes more than just declaring the date of next year’s race; the park would have to be on board (there may be another event that weekend), some other race might want that weekend and some conflict resoultion would have to be negotiated.
I’ve got several things I’ll be working with the CRCA on for the spring ’08 race, and this is one of them. I’ll do the best I can to get this race away from Mother’s Day, but please note that if it can’t be done, we have done this race before on a holiday and done quite well doing it.
Alan
Why not move the Mothers’ Day race one day earlier? That wouldn’t raise issues with regional race schedule.
A conflict with Jiminy Peak pretty much rules out moving Bear up a week. Moving up 2 weeks conflicts with the Sturbridge/Palmer weekend. Moving the race back conflicted with the Tour of Ct. The Tour of Ct. was on the calendar the last 2 years even though it wasn’t held. There is also a triathlon in Harriman that weekend. We might have issues with the Park police being able to do both events.
When the first Sat in May, Jiminy’s date, fell on May 7, we moved from the race up a week. Sturbridge/Palmer were also a week early, so there was no conflict. There is zero chance to get Jiminy to move just as there is zero chance to get Housatonic to move to avoid a conflict with Harlem.
The Saturday before conflicts with Sterling.
Maybe the CRCA could moove the Mothers day holiday? coule Someone do that – it seems that would fix al;ot of problems with this race and this bitching
Depending on your ability, you might not be competitive on a road bike as the course has a turn around i.o.w. uphill section become downhill section on the return and there’s quite a few flat sections too. Winning times will prolly be in the low 30 (31 min or so). If you are going to use a road bike, take water but if TT bike, loose the water.
I see how you dont want to conflict with Jiminy (great race) and even Palmer and Sturbridge (ok races) but Sterling. I would guess that most would choose bear over Sterling if they had to make the choice. Oh and the Tour of CT is a lost cause… The Saturday before Mother’s day would be ideal. We could race Saturday and then relax and eat Sunday. I am keeping my fingers crossed.
With enough notice I would not object to moving or even removing the whole mothers day thing.
You think people will go as low as 30 or 31 minutes at Silvermine? That’s like 29 mph over a tough course.
regarding conflict with Sterling, that isn’t a big issue in terms of most riders, though having the two races on the same day would slightly reduce the number of women and p-1-2s.
It’s a big issue in terms of officials and especially Alan Atwood who is a key person for both races
One other thing — as Mike Green said, when Jiminy fell on a weird day one year CRCA moved the spring Bear to avoid a conflict. That almost hurt us in two ways. One is that April is damn cold in Harriman, and the earlier date was risky.
And then in terms of regional scheduling some of the upstate guys in NYS started trying to get us to keep the race off the mothers day weekend the following year, saying since we hadn’t had it one year maybe we should keep it away. Those guys do not pay as much attention to the New England (and NJ) schedules as we do.
CRCA should be very careful about moving the race – in particular only move it to date that is relatively stable for several years and not have the race sort of “floating” from year to year.
I prefer the epic-ness of Bear in bad weather so really enjoyed the cold rain of April 2005. That said it was cold rain the prev. May as well.
JT, are you actually saying f/u to Mike Green? That’s not nice. So many words, so very confusing…
not Fuck You
Hey any results of That Bank of America Race in Del that was paying $6000.00 for the Pro 1,2,3 and 1500.00 for 3/4?
There’s a highlights show in some markets and also web video supposedly – see the left bar at
http://www.spartacycling.com/
David Taylor won the P/1/2/3
Ted Neu and Scot Willingham got into the winning move in the 3/4 race, but were beat in the sprint.
A quick look at past results shows that very few riders choose both events. The race should be moved to Saturday of Mothers Day weekend, assuming USCF can sport enough officials. This is a “stable” date. I suppose some New Englanders might choose to do Bear instead of Sterling given the opportunity to do Bear on a non-mother’s day, but not enough to matter.
David the Mac Daddy of Cookies McCook
won the 6g shootup
Sorry, I meant 31 or 32 minutes when I said low 30’s. I think 31 is just over 28mph. Last year’s speed was around 28mph I think (Arnal) and this year there will be Gisler (best time in NJ State TT), Will O’Donnell and others so the times might be fast.
And the “very few” riders in the recent past have included a rider or two who was top five in the p-1-2, and one or two top women
Who cares about this? Do something real outside instead of celebrating some made up Hallmark holiday. Leave the race on mothers day if necessary.
The point of this site is to offer suggestions and gripes. If the race was Saturday it’d be harder to do that.
Though maybe we could have guys saying “Why does CRCA have a race on the same day as another good regional event? Doesn’t anyone look at the calendar?”
Actually that’d be sweet gripe/suggestion, so maybe the club should move the race so we could try that one out.
sounds like a guy who appeared on the planet without the aid of a mother and whose lone wolf act has him going it all alone. heck, why do you even need an organized race? just set your own course and race against your own clock.
I wrote an article about the challenges specifically associated with preparing for the Spring edition of the Bear mountain race. Too long for a post, so I sent it to ‘info@nyvelocity.com.’ Hopefully of some use. Kind regards.
The concept that you can’t have 2 races in a single region on a single day is absurd. Especially considering field limits. I’m sure there’s enough demand for Sterling and Bear to both fill or near fill. Especially that early in the season when people are jonesing to race.
….eh, uh I would lika to seea that article.
NAAT!
The people who wrote in below are simply trying suggest improvements for next season. No one is really bitching. 99% of the racers who do Bear are affected by the Mother’s day conflict. If you have a wife and kids try blowing that day off to race Bear Mtn when you are likely to be up at Jiminy the weekend before. This may be a hallmark holiday but its an important holiday to most of us – way more important then racing Bear. With that said, we would all love to be able to race and spend Mother’s day with our loved ones. I don’t think having Sterling and Bear on the same day would be a big deal. There are plenty of races that conflict throughout the season (Naugatuck and North NJ Crit both great crits) and Harlem and Housatonic to name just a few.
Just celebrate mother’s day one day earlier than usual. You’ll avoid all the crowds. Also, if you are a a good son/husband the rest of the year, your mom/wife won’t care that you are a day off celebrating.
that’s simply stupid
At least start the race in the morning. Why the late starts?
is a 10am start to a 100 mile race “late”
Then don’t go.
As Alan pointed out, the race has full or near full fields anyway
Start it at 9am. Then everyone is home by 2.
Where do you live?
It’s interesting to look at race times and other aspects only from one’s own perspective.
….is a big deal.
The great thing about Bear is that it draws from lots of areas outside NYC, including a significant draw from New England. Sterling is a very popular early season race and Bear would lose most if not all of that New England crowd should we chose to go on that day. And due to the budgetary needs of this race, along with not being able to obtain sponsorship because of park restrictions, reducing the available pool of riders to register would cause this race to go into the red, and none of us can afford that.
So for that reason alone, I can tell you right now that so long as I am involved in the planning of this race that Bear and Sterling will NOT take place on the same day.
The only “hope” out there is a potential move to the weekend after, which in ’08 would be May 18th. But research needs to be done to make sure that there are no significant conflicts with other races AND that we’re not trumping on any other park events. I would not hold my breath on the date getting changed, but it’ll be looked into.
Alan
Although Hallmark invented it, Mother’s Day, not the day before, is sacred in my family, both for my mother and wife. Family comes first. I guess I’ll never do Bear spring which made last weekend even more disappointing. No malice towards CRCA, just bad luck.
if she’s that much of a retard that she MUST celebrate Mother’s day on a Sunday and can’t possibly celebrate it on the preceding Saturday. As far as your mother, a phone call should be enough. What kind of momma’s boy pussies are you guys anyway?
Just as we shall all burn Tony Slokar, so must we burn the mothers who ruin Our Day in April.
Alan should take a look at the fields. Sterling got some top riders last year, none of whom did Bear. The overlap is very small.
Full fields and inconvenienced families are not mutually exclusive. Anonymous postings should really be disabled.
Wellons in the women last year
Mazur was second in the Sterling P-1-2 the day before he won Harriman. That was five or six years ago.
W/o looking at the lists I’d guess it’s 5 men p-1-2 and 3 or 5 women p-1-2-3 overlap, plus five officials and perhaps 5-15 racers in other fields.
splitting hairs.
Bear spring has great attendance to consider changing it because some whiner on this site says it conflicts with Mother day is really silly – besides – you can always take mom out to dinner or whatever
With regard to what you were saying about Bear scheduling a few posts back…is sponsorship explicitly forbidden in all cases for events at Harriman? Or is it an issue where the permit costs are too hight to make it worthwhile?
If you guys can’t figure out how to keep your families happy and race bikes, that’s your problem.
Not if we can help it.
Otyherwise I’d offer up Robert’s Steakhouse as title sponsor for both Spring and Fall Bear.
Why would I care about anyone else’s perspective? It was a suggestion only.
9 AM makes the most sense. Certainly what they did in the spring made a lot less sense, most Cats started well after 11.
I know, I know, I’ll save you the brain power and say it for you “Get on the Board, do something, become Dir of open racing, marshalling etc etc, blah blah blah”
There are 2 problems with sponsorship.
1.Park does not want sponsor banners and other stuff displayed.
2.There are very few spectators to see the banners.
Advertising sponsors on bikereg, web sites etc. in promoting the race seems doable. not showing banners at the race isn’t that big a hit since everyone in the race will know about the sponsors.
With photoshop we can get sponsor logos in race pictures.
The race has fairly wide recognition so there might be some attraction for sponsors.
Technically Silvermine is a sponsored race since TradeManage is a for profit company and is listed as a sponsor.
“With photoshop we can get sponsor logos in race pictures. ”
You’re kidding right? You’re not suggesting building a relationship with sponsors and faking images to make them think they get exposure, right?
of an anon posting
“Why would I care about anyone else’s perspective?”
no all upfront. same as sponsors who pay for images on sporting event telecasts that are superimposed and not seen by live audience.
between “the park does not want” sponsors
and
the park forbids commercial sponsorship of events.
that’s what I’m curious about
honest and upfront, but funny – superimposing ads on photos of races on cycling websites
I’m not sure that masses of spectators are necessary an issue…every large race in new england I’ve been to in the past couple of years had a number of bike industry sponsors present, with gear set up in tents; that sort of thing, in which case the target audience consists of racers, rather than non-racing spectators.
What are you trying to do with sponsorship? What is wrong or important to change about the event as it currently is? There’s a decent turnout, nearly full fields (in the spring at least) and good racing. There’s a place for events like that – events for riders.
And who is going to get the sponsorshp?
because one of the points raised was that budgetary concerns influence the schedule, and it’s unclear to me how park policy constrains sponsorship money.
Bear Mtn New Years Day race. That would be hot!
The park will not allow us to hang any banners or advertisments of any kind, so that greatly devalues a sponsorship proposal for anyone. Sure you could stuff flyers in envelopes and put logos on flyers, but how much is that really worth? And is that amount worth the extra time and effort needed to fulfill those obligations? If we can run the race without any sponsorship dollars, I’d rather do that they tax the volunteers that do help anymore than they already are for just a few hundred bucks.
Alan
P.S. – To anon poster @ 9/10/2007 3:30:00 PM – I don’t care if there only a handful that would miss out, I’m still not putting Bear on same day as Sterling. I want the most riders I can get; going on the same day as Sterling does not give me that. Not happening, move on………
To anon poster @ 9/10/2007 6:10:00 PM — the reason for the “late” starts is that I offered 7 fields last year; you cannot put 7 fields on a 14 mile loop at the same time; too crowded and I don’t want fields to catch, especially with the park as tough as it is with yellow line rule. So I had to find a way to stagger the starts. By starting the 3 lap races with the 7 lap race (pro men), I am able to get those groups done and then send off the 4 lap races in a manner so there’s no more than 5 fields on course at one time and fields will least likely to get together. It’s different than most races, but it allows me the flexibility to offer the additional fields. With 46 juniors signing up last year, you bet your kiester I’m doing the same lineup next year, and maybe even creating a cat 4 masters race so I can avoid the 40+ rider waitlist I had last year.
Also, the 10am starts allows folks from distance to leave their homes early in the morning and be able to get to the race, without having to find a place to stay if they don’t want to spend the money. Not a plethera of hotels out in that area.
Alan
this is really pitiful. really, really sad.
http://www.genesisadventures.com/v3/main.php?left=triathlonnav&head=triathlon¢er=race_2007%20EnduraSport%20New%20York&flash=triathlon
Clearly you can have sponsored events at Harriman.
Alan also seems a little off base about the Sterling/Mother’s Day conflict. Mother’s Day is a real problem for many. I don’t know how Alan determined that Sterling costs more riders than Mother’s Day.
is the decision about when to hold the race, CRCA’s or Alan’s?
CRCA is a membership organization. If members feel strongly about changing the date, it should be changed. If they don’t it won’t be changed.
I give Alan all the credit in the world, but you should adjust your tone. I have no issues with the dates, etc. but the race is the Club’s race, not your’s. Until you were to poll the members, you would have no idea if we really would rather have it on a date other than mothers’ day. it might not mean much to many, but for most of us, we spend the entire season depriving our wives and children of our company. thats pretty darn stressful to begin with. Then, to top it off, on the one day of the year where the world says we’re supposed to honor and cherish our wives for what they bring to the table, we end up saying “its 8am, gotta go, see you around 4pm. have a good day without us. Happy mothers’ day”.
i personally would suggest that if we had 50, 100 less riders, but the membership wanted it not on mothers day, then thats how it should be. I will say that amongst those I know, i know about 10 people who didnt do it because they couldnt do that to their families. i think you might in fact do better.
but the sum of it is….while you do a darn great job in all these areas, its not your race. unless i’m mistaken, its the club’s race and we all have a say.
“Until you were to poll the members, you would have no idea if we really would rather have it on a date other than mothers’ day.”
CRCA is a membership organization, but I’m glad the club doesn’t run by polls of members. If it did all we’d have in NYC would be A & B races and men’s 1-2-3 and 4 races. That’s it. With little coordination with regional racing or broader racing needs or goals.
The leadership of CRCA tries to look at the big picture.
I should mention that a lot of clubs – like HVCC upstate which puts on Unionvale – don’t even focus the open races they put on on their members. They serve cycling and have a larger proportion of their members actually making the race happen relative to numbers in the event than CRCA does.
“Mother’s Day is a real problem for many.”
Since their is limited space on the road and the race fills in every men’s field and there are good-sized fields in the women’s race, and they get enough marshals and officials, what does it matter?
“on the one day of the year where the world says we’re supposed to honor and cherish our wives for what they bring to the table, we end up saying “its 8am, gotta go, see you around 4pm. have a good day without us. Happy mothers’ day”.
Again, I’m not sure why people doing the race and still feeling inconvenienced by it is such a difficult concept to grasp. It really wouldn’t be such a hardship to run the race on saturday, or to at least put the masters (the guys who stand to get the most grief) in the earlier time slot on sunday. It’s a good and important race and guys do it for that reason. That still doesn’t mean they don’t get a boat load of crap for doing it. So yeah, it matters to people. Maybe not you, but to belittle other people’s opinions is ridiculous.
More like “Don’t care” and “Doesn’t matter” – the event goes well anyway.
Riders can choose to go or not.
“It really wouldn’t be such a hardship to run the race on saturday”
Well, we’d need a different team of officials and a different helper person like Alan Atwood
“or to at least put the masters (the guys who stand to get the most grief) in the earlier time slot”
What about masters driving from several hours away? 10am and 11am are nice start times – allows reasonable travel both coming and going.
The masters race fills every spring. If it’s such a hardship to miss mothers day, those guys can miss the race.
I’m willing to bet that the increase in registration that would result from holding the race on Saturday, and not on Mothers Day, would far exceed the loss in registration that would result from a conflict with Sterling. Sterling has a very low tri-state area showing. And Bear historically attracts few riders from the Northern and Eastern ends of New England.
Perhaps Alan is concerned about the potential loss of registration at Sterling if the races were held on the same day. I can see why Alan wouldn’t want to step on the Sterling promoter’s toes. But that would be a bit misguided. The laws of supply and demand would permit both races to still fill up. Especially with field limits and, dare I say, early registration. In May, there is way more demand for quality races than there is supply. Look at all the wait lists.
Seems to me that the only legitimate concern is whether USCF can sport that many officials on one day.
Alan does more for our selfish little hobby than perhaps anyone around here. We shouldn’t flame him on this site. Especially anonymously. But he should consider what is being said on this thread, which is the only intelligent debate we’ve seen on this site since Coach L first introduced us to his intensive visualization techniques.
Good advice from proprietary. Alan should change his tone.
Not having enough officials is a legitimate argument for not conflicting with Sterling, but worrying that the race will go into the red because of losing 1 or 2 riders from Sterling is unhinged.
“but worrying that the race will go into the red ”
Did anyone say money is the issue? If I was running this race, and you told me I’d lose 5 women and 5 riders from the p-1-2 due to the date switch and just have a different bunch of guys in the other fields which would fill anyway, I wouldn’t switch it.
Good argument except there aren’t 5 p/1/2 men nor 5 women who do both races.
It would be nice if the Nerac guys and Mark McCormick came down for Bear, but they don’t. Maybe because it’s Mother’s Day.
It doesn’t seem that many people are upset about the Mother’s Day date.
Everyone has their priorities
heheheh
http://www.gsmengoniusa.com/_news/2007/091007.htm
Hey, how about this, Fuck bear mountain. Get over it. Go do a real race. Or sit in front of your computer until next years spring bear pre-reg opens so you can get that oh so coveted spot!
results and photos here:
http://www.pburgcrit.com/
Jared soloed away from the field, 60km into a headwind, for a stage win at an international stage race in which he finished 6th on the GC.
that’s BAD ASS WHITE BAR TAPE SHOES AND SEAT “PRO”
as for the Harriman race – it is a race just like any other and subject to circumstances sometimes out of the organizer’s control. Just because it has a hill doesn’t mean it is your right as a NY Metro cyclist to do it.
people are way to agro for this time of year. kick back, have a beer. season’s over.
YEAH!!! It’s a circuit race. Just a crit in a fancy wrapper. Like Central Park on steroids. Big whoop.
National Grandparents Day
http://www.grandparents-day.com/
I just asked my wife (mother to be) and she said no prob I can do spring bear!
Did someone say something about nude pictures of Gabriella?
If you don’t have time for your mother/wife year round do you really think spending mother’s day with her is enough?????
I’m not a fan of the mother’s day racing date but it is what it is. If you can’t celebrate the day before or another weekend (and maybe go the extra mile for this accomodation) then you either have time management issues or are married to a total ball breaker and have no spine. I doubt there are many guys who train 10-20 hrs per week but are banned from riding on Mother’s day. If she’s that much of a ball breaker you’re probably not training much anyway and are just packfill. No one cares what the packfill thinks when the race is already hugely popular. If organizers were just trying to maximize the total number of racers, seperate women and junior fields would disappear. Since that’s not the case and there’s no obvious date to move bear to, deal with it. Too many whiners here taking out their angst since all they can say at home is yes honey, yes dear, of course I will.
If you have anything constructive to suggest to those who put all the effort into these events, how about sending a private email to the appropriate person. Its a shame people like Alan, Ken, Tony etc. have to publicly defend their decisions and motivations to anonyomous assholes.
I disrespect my family as you are suggesting, my brothers might break my legs. They already consider most cyclists finocchio anyway. Da family comes first.
get together with your pals, buy your wives and mothers gift certificates to a day spa and tell them it’s a ‘girls only’ event. then sneak off and do the race, take ’em out to dinner afterwards.
That’s brilliant!
from websters
wife- 1.ballbreaker,
best post ever by dime bag. speaks the truth.
Results
1 George Hincapie (Discovery Channel)
2 Frank Pipp (Health Net)
3 Domonique Rollin (Kodakgallery/Sierra Nevada)
4 David Canada (Saunier-Duval Prodir)
5 Andrew Guptill (Colavita)
This is a suggestion that doesn’t have anything to do with Mother’s day. (Hope folks arn’t disappointed).
Judging by the time it takes to fill the field, it appears that the most popular field for the Bear Mountain race is men’s cat-4. How about doing two cat-4 fields with an age split at 32 like they do at the GMSR (cat4A younger guys, cat4B older guys)?
I’d be surprised if you didn’t get full fields for both. I suppose that there might not be enough time available to add another field to the schedule, but it seems like a reasonable idea otherwise.
william: limited number of fields possible on course. adding additional field of cat 4s means cutting another field.