Anyone doing any Meridas this year?

streako

I will hopefully do Selkirk and Penrith, but I am thinking of doing Ruthin too.

Anyone done Ruthin?

stubs

Yes ruthin is in my own opinion the best of the meridas the facilities are good and you are almost in the centre of ruthin for the pubs and the takeaways for that essential pre ride carb loading I havent done the 75 or 100 rides but the 50 is a lovely ride not too technical so you can really get your head down and go for it
Penrith last year was a new round and the 50 was hard for me because I was coming back to fitness after a bout of illness but I am hoping to give it a proper go this year ( hope they have sorted out the bogs at the campsite last year they were digusting) I missed selkirk last year cos of illness but I did it in 2006 and it was a blast

the fig roll proof that god is a cyclist and she wants us to another lap

Sikora

I live on top of the Clwydian Range. Saw hundreds of cyclists go past my house last year. Didn't know anything about the Merida then.

Johnclimber

Ruthin for me.

Did the Penrith one last year and it was crap, never again in the area if the Lakes.

streako

The Penrith wasnt too bad. There was just that daft double-climb that had everyone off and pushing.
Apparently there was trouble getting access to the land due to RSPB and other organisations worried that MTB'ers making a 10ft wide strip of trail would wreck the area.

Selkirk was more of a MTB'ers course, but I didnt enjoy as much as I should, being hungover still from the day before the day before!

I think I'll get my application in for Ruthin.

MilitantGraham

I've entered Builth for the Saturday night and Sunday rides.

clanton

C U at Builth! Also doing night marathon - great fun.

MilitantGraham

Looking for the results and pictures. I thought they'd be there by now.
Is there a link I've missed ?

clanton

I'd have thought you'd be trying to block Sunday out of your memory! ;-)
The night ride Saturday was fantastic, course quite dry and fast, really great fun. I thought though that having two photographers with flashes blinding you just before the only dropoff of the whole ride was somewhat ill-advised!
Sunday was TOUGH. Wet and muddy and slow. Enjoyed it but seriously hard work.

The photos usually go up on the Sleepmonsters website. Probably won't be there yet though.

titus4t

Pics from both the events are now available at:

http://rightplacerighttime.co.uk/

The photographer is still the same (me - though now joined by another for the Meridas), the search / sales system is still the same (still the sleepmonsters back end) but now through my own website.


Jon Brooke

MilitantGraham

Has anyone downloaded the Excel version ?
You should be able to sort the list by finish times to find your position. I realise the organisers are not allowed to publish them this way.
If you have, could you let me know where I was as I haven't got Excel.
Phillips, Graham. 149 on saturday, 1288 on Sunday.
Thanks.

Jon, you seem a bit steep on your prices.
It's your business and you know your overheads and set your own profit margin, but how many pictures do you sell at £3.45 - £7.45?
Maybe you could team up with the organisers and have some sort of pre paid deal in with the entry fee.
I think most people would pay an extra £1 at time of entry for the promise of a couple of photos, I know I would, but I'm not paying over £3 for one web quality picture.
If most of the riders took up the £1 deal you could easily clear over £500 for a weekends work.
Just an idea anyway. Whenever people complain to me about the cost of transport I always answer "Buy a lorry and set up your own transport business then if you think they are making that much profit" so I won't be offended if you tell me to buy a decent camera and do it myself, but maybe, just for one event, you could try it.

gk141054

Graham, you were 309th out of 764 for the Sunday

112th out of 246 for the Saturday.

In future, get yourself openoffice and you can check yourself, lazy git!!!

G

titus4t

Graham, given that you're now using a pic of yourself from Sat night on your profile, I must be doing something right? Anyway, just about to PM you with fuller answer re' your suggestion.

Jon

gk141054

titus4t wrote:

Anyway, just about to PM you with fuller answer re' your suggestion.

Can you not post it up here? Surely its nothing private and I too would like to know the answer.

baccodaddy

there was someone taking photos in the forest but cant see pics anyway even spoke to the guy as he took my picture .does anyone know who that was as it was my girlfriends first ride and she really wanted a picturebut cant find one for her ?

MilitantGraham

Thanks gk, someone else has told me about openoffice since I posted, so I'll be downloading that.
I take it that 764 finishers on Sunday is everyone regardless of what distance they did ?
I intended to do the 75km, but had a five month old Crank Brothers pedal fall apart 43km in to the ride so struggled back home on the 55km route.
Anyone know how many did each distance ?

There's nothing really secret or private in Jon's PM, gk.
I'll blag free pictures where I can, but I won't post other people's PM in public, so I'll leave it to Jon to answer here if he chooses.
One thing he mentions, that I thought of myself after I posted earlier, was that charging people in advance for a picture wouldn't work. What if they just happen to be at the back of a bunch every time they go past a photographer and never get in the picture ?

How about a compromise, no additional charge for a photo, but a promise that they will try and take one of everyone at least once and the photographer gets paid directly by the organisers out of the same budget that pays for the pasta party, free drinks and bananas, prize draw lights & bike etc. ?

MilitantGraham

A couple more thoughts since last night.

I didn't mean to sound quite so critical in my first post on this subject. I really would like to find a solution that's to everyone's advantage.

I've been told that for many other types of events, photographers will often charge far more for their services than http://rightplacerighttime.co.uk/ so maybe I'm looking at this from the wrong perspective.
I've been to far more steam rallies and vintage vehicle shows with my old army breakdown truck than I have raced in MTB events. At these type of shows the spectators outnumber the participants by 100s to 1 and most of them take a camera. There are dozens of pictures of my truck all over the web which I can download for free if I want.

No matter how much you love mountain biking, there must come a point where you are not going to drive 100s of miles to spend all day standing on a freezing cold wet mountainside taking photos, then go home and spend hours sorting and cropping the photos without a decent reward at the end of it.

I think my last suggestion could work.
Most events have a list of benefits advertised; free camping, free pasta party, free T shirt or whatever.
How about Free photos with a little disclaimer "Every effort will be made... can't promise we will get you... etc."
Put up a sign 100m before the photographer so team mates can bunch up and solo riders can get themselves in a clear spot for the best picture.
All the riders get a free photo, the photographer gets a guranteed income for his days work, the organisers get another benefit to advertise their event.
Everyone wins, there must be some reason I haven't thought of why it wouldn't work then. :roll:

titus4t

gk,

Basically I don't want to get into a public discussion about my business because actually there's only one person who really understands how it works and that's me - needless to say, as with Graham's transport analogy, it's not as simple as you might think. Happy to enter into a discussion in general terms though as I'm always interested to hear what people think about event photography and I am constantly trying to improve on what I do - for example, for this year I have found another photographer to come to Merida events with me so that we can give you lot a greater choice of pics to buy.

I did point out to Graham that BikeMagic used to sponsor the Merida event photos and give them away on their site, so his idea has been tried - it does of course mean they in turn have to find a sponsor willing to fork out for the photographers time and it all gets a bit complicated.

stubs

I would willingly cough up for a photo of myself at the meridas but I have only been shot once in 5 meridas it must be one of 2 problems

A I am so fast I am just a blur or
B I am so slow he has given up and gone for a tea break

what do I have to do to get my ugly mug on the web :?

gk141054

stubs wrote:

but I have only been shot once in 5 meridas

Bloody army firing ranges

titus4t

stubs,

I find it a bit hard to believe I only managed to get your picture 1 time in 5 - unless you were really going out of your way to ride close behind someone else when you came past me.

It may be that your number wasn't showing or not clear. I'm afraid in that case the answer would be to browse the relevant galleries - although there will soon be a feature on my website to search for ONLY the pictures that have no number showing, which might make it easier to find your pic (if there is one).

Also, which course do you do? At the moment I try to find the best spot I can before the courses split up so that I can try to get at least one shot of everyone. Then I usually look for somewhere more interesting to get a second pic of the riders on the longer courses. This year I have someone working with me at the Merida events so we should do better at getting a wider range of pics for people to choose from.

If you really want to make sure I get a good pic of you I would suggest that you hang back from the rider in front when you see me, and you could ask if I got you as you come past - if not just do a quick spin round and ride past me again!

Jon

stubs

I usually do the 50k course but I start at the back of the pack with my sister who does the 25k courses and ride with her till the split point last year at ruthin you got a shot of my sister who is waving but I am behind her head down looking at my gears wondering what that clicking noise is

In 2006 at selkirk I was riding along having just overtaken a group of lads when they all of a sudden shot past me going for it leaving me wondering why they bothered when I overtook them 2 minutes later

I found out later that that was were you were I really must pay attention in future but to be honest i am in a world of my own when i am riding the president of the US could get shot in front of me and I would vaguely remember a bit of fuss

slimbob

I've entered my first Merida up at Selkirk, for some reason I decided it would be good to do the Sportif on the Sat too so in for 100miles road, 100km mtb. I've entered my g/f too, haha. Might be a bit of downgrading the distances at registration!! :?

MilitantGraham

Slimbob, I don't know if all Meridas are laid out the same, but at Builth everyone started together and followed exactly the same course up to about 45km.
You could leave it right up until the last second before deciding whether to turn left for the 55km route or right for the 75.

slimbob

I like the sound of that!