Organising TTs

disgruntledgoat

I'm interested in putting on, initially, some club TTs later this year as a trial run for, hopefully, runnin gone or more of them as Open events next year and the ideas I have currently are a loop of Thirlmere and a series of hill-climbs (Honister, Newlands and Whinlatter).

For a club only event, do I need to do anything more than notify people where to turn up and get 2 people to time them and one to push them off? All help aprpeciated.

Simon Notley

Is your club affiliated to the CTT? If not, then I think you will need that. I'm not sure if it is illegal to run a TT without the CTT, but I've never heard of one.

I suggest you talk to your District Secretary

http://www.rttc.org.uk/Contact/District ... fault.aspx

I have a feeling that the event will have to be registered and a risk assessment undertaken on the course (traffic levels, hazards etc). I'm not sure exactly what is involved, but I don't think it's too much effort. There is a little more to it than just telling people to turn up though.

dennisn

Does any kind of sanctioning body need to be involved? Do you have any sort of liability insurance? For yourself and others who help work the race? Will you have everyone sign a waiver? How about road marshalls at intersections and or the turnaround?
Do you have at least two good stopwatches in case you screw one up? You'll be the object of a ton of complaints if you don't get ALL the times correct(trust me on that).
Is there a portion of road that riders can warm up on while waiting for their start time?
Is the start line off to the side of the road enough for traffic to get by(and not get so pissed off at you for blocking the road that they call the police, which you definitely don't need)? Do you need to paint the course with arrows? Or is it simple enough(out and back) to not need to do this? Don't assume that everyone knows the course. Do you have someone willing to drive a sag vehicle? Not absolutely required but a nice touch.
Anyway, I could go on and on. Let me know if you want me to. Good luck. It does take a bit of work.

Dennis Noward

Pokerface

dennisn wrote:

Does any kind of sanctioning body need to be involved? Do you have any sort of liability insurance? For yourself and others who help work the race? Will you have everyone sign a waiver? How about road marshalls at intersections and or the turnaround?
Do you have at least two good stopwatches in case you screw one up? You'll be the object of a ton of complaints if you don't get ALL the times correct(trust me on that).
Is there a portion of road that riders can warm up on while waiting for their start time?
Is the start line off to the side of the road enough for traffic to get by(and not get so pissed off at you for blocking the road that they call the police, which you definitely don't need)? Do you need to paint the course with arrows? Or is it simple enough(out and back) to not need to do this? Don't assume that everyone knows the course. Do you have someone willing to drive a sag vehicle? Not absolutely required but a nice touch.
Anyway, I could go on and on. Let me know if you want me to. Good luck. It does take a bit of work.

Dennis Noward

Respectfully Dennis - as you are in the USA - you may find the rules and regulations for running a club TT in the UK are a little different.

Goat - the simple answer is you could run your club events without letting anyone else know if you wanted. But you might be leaving yourself and your club open to liability issues if someone was to get hurt.

You could contact wither British Cycling (www.britishcycling.org.uk) or the CTT (www.ctt.org.uk) for more info on registering and insuring events. The CTT deal with time trials. The cost to insure an event is minimal and would cover you in case of injury, etc.

Or - you can do like our club does and just run the event for whoever shows up.

dennisn

Pokerface wrote:

dennisn wrote:

Does any kind of sanctioning body need to be involved? Do you have any sort of liability insurance? For yourself and others who help work the race? Will you have everyone sign a waiver? How about road marshalls at intersections and or the turnaround?
Do you have at least two good stopwatches in case you screw one up? You'll be the object of a ton of complaints if you don't get ALL the times correct(trust me on that).
Is there a portion of road that riders can warm up on while waiting for their start time?
Is the start line off to the side of the road enough for traffic to get by(and not get so pissed off at you for blocking the road that they call the police, which you definitely don't need)? Do you need to paint the course with arrows? Or is it simple enough(out and back) to not need to do this? Don't assume that everyone knows the course. Do you have someone willing to drive a sag vehicle? Not absolutely required but a nice touch.
Anyway, I could go on and on. Let me know if you want me to. Good luck. It does take a bit of work.

Dennis Noward

Respectfully Dennis - as you are in the USA - you may find the rules and regulations for running a club TT in the UK are a little different.

Goat - the simple answer is you could run your club events without letting anyone else know if you wanted. But you might be leaving yourself and your club open to liability issues if someone was to get hurt.

You could contact wither British Cycling (www.britishcycling.org.uk) or the CTT (www.ctt.org.uk) for more info on registering and insuring events. The CTT deal with time trials. The cost to insure an event is minimal and would cover you in case of injury, etc.

Or - you can do like our club does and just run the event for whoever shows up.

I know what you're saying and our club used to have races for "whoever shows up".
In a way that's still true. However, in the last 10 or 15 years a bit of lawsuit paranoia
has crept into the club. This was not a bad thing, as it got us to take a good look at what COULD happen in this lawsuit crazy world. We run club races every Thursday night from
April to September and while crashes and other incidents have been few and far between they do happen at least once or twice a season. I don't know about you but when my name is listed as a club officer or the club race director I feel a whole lot better
knowing that we are covered, by the U.S.C.F., with very good liability insurance. I don't even want to think about being named in some lawsuit where someone wants all I've got
(which isn't much) because their son, daughter, husband, wife, or whomever got injured,
or worse, in a race. Call it paranoia if you will but we run our club races under USCF rules and with USCF insurance(which we pay for). All passed on to the members of course. Just like politicians.


Dennis Noward

Chip \'oyler

disgruntledgoat wrote:

I'm interested in putting on, initially, some club TTs later this year as a trial run for, hopefully, runnin gone or more of them as Open events next year and the ideas I have currently are a loop of Thirlmere and a series of hill-climbs (Honister, Newlands and Whinlatter).

For a club only event, do I need to do anything more than notify people where to turn up and get 2 people to time them and one to push them off? All help aprpeciated.

You need to get in touch with your CTT District Secretary who will put you in touch with the right person. For it to be run legally, even a club event needs to be agreed by the local committee, with a very precise course description (as per the ones on the CTT Site) along with a risk assessment. Your course, it is a new one, will be issued with a course code. If your new course is on a 'fixed' distance i.e. 10 miles, 25 miles etc then it will also need to be measured.

After that it is just a case of getting 2 people to time and a pusher off.

Good luck with your events

dennisn

Chip \'oyler wrote:

disgruntledgoat wrote:

I'm interested in putting on, initially, some club TTs later this year as a trial run for, hopefully, runnin gone or more of them as Open events next year and the ideas I have currently are a loop of Thirlmere and a series of hill-climbs (Honister, Newlands and Whinlatter).

For a club only event, do I need to do anything more than notify people where to turn up and get 2 people to time them and one to push them off? All help aprpeciated.

You need to get in touch with your CTT District Secretary who will put you in touch with the right person. For it to be run legally, even a club event needs to be agreed by the local committee, with a very precise course description (as per the ones on the CTT Site) along with a risk assessment. Your course, it is a new one, will be issued with a course code. If your new course is on a 'fixed' distance i.e. 10 miles, 25 miles etc then it will also need to be measured.

After that it is just a case of getting 2 people to time and a pusher off.

Good luck with your events

I strongly disagree with you statement "After that it's just a case of getting......"
Safety must be your first concern, nothing else matters in this race until all the safety issues have been resolved to the best of your abilities. A serious injury or death could
result from not devoting, at least, a sizable portion of your time to this area. If I kind of sound like I'm lecturing I guess I am. I feel very strongly about racing safety and with good reason. Don't mean to preach, just making a point.

Dennis Noward

Chip \'oyler

Er Dennis - did you read my post?

I mentioned that a 'Risk Assessment' is needed. Doing this properly will highlight what safety concerns there will be with the course.

My 'flippant' line - "After that it's just a case of getting......" was just intended to mean that after the hard work of sorting the 'paperwork' out the rest of the organisation would be easier. Of course they will need marshalls, signage etc that will be highlighted by the risk assessment. But the beauty of TTing in the UK is that they are a damn sight easier to organise and sort than mass start bunch racing. And I do have some personal experience of organising TTs - I've sorted 10 of the buggas in the last three years.

Or there is another way - you could orgainise your events under the auspices of the TLI. But I don't know much about sorting these!

dennisn

Chip \'oyler wrote:

Er Dennis - did you read my post?

I mentioned that a 'Risk Assessment' is needed. Doing this properly will highlight what safety concerns there will be with the course.

My 'flippant' line - "After that it's just a case of getting......" was just intended to mean that after the hard work of sorting the 'paperwork' out the rest of the organisation would be easier. Of course they will need marshalls, signage etc that will be highlighted by the risk assessment. But the beauty of TTing in the UK is that they are a damn sight easier to organise and sort than mass start bunch racing. And I do have some personal experience of organising TTs - I've sorted 10 of the buggas in the last three years.

Or there is another way - you could orgainise your events under the auspices of the TLI. But I don't know much about sorting these!

Sorry, didn't mean to offend but obviously I did. Once again , sorry. In my defense
I am a safety "nut case" to say the least. Sometimes to the dismay of more than a few racers in the area.

Dennis Noward

disgruntledgoat

Thanks for your input guys... The hill climb courses obviously would require less risk assessment than the circuit of Thirlmere, given they are simply on whacking great hills with no junctions on the ride or turning onto it.

The circuit will require a little more thought I would imagine, but it would be a fantastic ride, not a standard distance, but losts of twisty, quiet road and then a fast 5 mile blast along the main lakes road. I'll ring/e-mail CTT today!

Chip \'oyler

disgruntledgoat wrote:

Thanks for your input guys... The hill climb courses obviously would require less risk assessment than the circuit of Thirlmere, given they are simply on whacking great hills with no junctions on the ride or turning onto it.

The circuit will require a little more thought I would imagine, but it would be a fantastic ride, not a standard distance, but losts of twisty, quiet road and then a fast 5 mile blast along the main lakes road. I'll ring/e-mail CTT today!

The Thirlmere Circuit sounds interesting. When you make it an Open event, will you include it as part of the Lakes and Lancs SpoCo?

knedlicky

I don’t know who arranged this or how, but some of the TTs I’ve done on narrow roads have had the road, or at least the lane in the direction the riders were travelling, closed off for through traffic during the event. Seeing if this is possible might be worth considering, especially since the Thirlmere road is windy, so often a bit ‘blind’ ahead to cars, and the pass roads are anyway fairly narrow.

When they weren’t closed off, or only partially, along some TT routes there were often temporary signs at regular intervals warning cars that a cycling event was taking place– which I think a good idea and which I haven’t seen mentioned in other posts above.

Denis mentions having a warm up area for riders while waiting. I think both at the beginning and the end, you need an off-road area, like a parking lot or minor track, where riders can gather respectively before and after riding the TT. They need a gathering area at the start between warming-up and actually starting, one after to recuperate and chat.

I’d think twice about including the Honister. I’d say it was too steep for a typical Hill TT event, and especially if the TT is to cater for a wide range of abilities. Remember, if you go strictly by the rules, any rider who dismounts on a hill climb has to be disqualified.

Chip \'oyler

knedlicky wrote:

I don’t know who arranged this or how, but some of the TTs I’ve done on narrow roads have had the road, or at least the lane in the direction the riders were travelling, closed off for through traffic during the event. Seeing if this is possible might be worth considering, especially since the Thirlmere road is windy, so often a bit ‘blind’ ahead to cars, and the pass roads are anyway fairly narrow.

When they weren’t closed off, or only partially, along some TT routes there were often temporary signs at regular intervals warning cars that a cycling event was taking place– which I think a good idea and which I haven’t seen mentioned in other posts above.

Denis mentions having a warm up area for riders while waiting. I think both at the beginning and the end, you need an off-road area, like a parking lot or minor track, where riders can gather respectively before and after riding the TT. They need a gathering area at the start between warming-up and actually starting, one after to recuperate and chat.

I’d think twice about including the Honister. I’d say it was too steep for a typical Hill TT event, and especially if the TT is to cater for a wide range of abilities. Remember, if you go strictly by the rules, any rider who dismounts on a hill climb has to be disqualified.

'Cycle Event' signs are always put up at any junction that joins the course and periodically along the course in all our clubs events.

And I did mention signs in my previous post.

Pokerface

dennisn wrote:

Chip \'oyler wrote:

disgruntledgoat wrote:

I'm interested in putting on, initially, some club TTs later this year as a trial run for, hopefully, runnin gone or more of them as Open events next year and the ideas I have currently are a loop of Thirlmere and a series of hill-climbs (Honister, Newlands and Whinlatter).

For a club only event, do I need to do anything more than notify people where to turn up and get 2 people to time them and one to push them off? All help aprpeciated.

You need to get in touch with your CTT District Secretary who will put you in touch with the right person. For it to be run legally, even a club event needs to be agreed by the local committee, with a very precise course description (as per the ones on the CTT Site) along with a risk assessment. Your course, it is a new one, will be issued with a course code. If your new course is on a 'fixed' distance i.e. 10 miles, 25 miles etc then it will also need to be measured.

After that it is just a case of getting 2 people to time and a pusher off.

Good luck with your events

I strongly disagree with you statement "After that it's just a case of getting......"
Safety must be your first concern, nothing else matters in this race until all the safety issues have been resolved to the best of your abilities. A serious injury or death could
result from not devoting, at least, a sizable portion of your time to this area. If I kind of sound like I'm lecturing I guess I am. I feel very strongly about racing safety and with good reason. Don't mean to preach, just making a point.

Dennis Noward

Dennis - I have to again point out that the culture in the UK is a little different than in the US. It's not a country with a hair-trigger for lawsuits like the US. More often, if something DOES go wrong, people have a tendency to take blame themselves, rather than sue the pants off someone else.

So, in some ways - it IS a matter of doing a little due diligence to organize the event and then just showing up and going at it.

Our club TT's are run on busy roads with no signage, one marshal and one timer. Now - I've actually lived in the US (and Canada) and know how different things are there. But over here they seem to take a much more relaxed attitude towards these things.

But, as others have pointed out - there is a correct way to do these things, and the correct way involves doing a proper risk assessment, having the correct marshals and signage, etc. Safety first and all that...

knedlicky

Chip \'oyler wrote:

And I did mention signs in my previous post.

Oh okay, Chip!
I took the single word ‘signage’, without elaboration, in your earlier post to mean signs for the riders (e.g. in advance of, and also then at, a junction where they had to turn), not warning signs for other road users.

celbianchi

Phil
They sound good events.

The autumn hill climb circuit is perhaps my favourite part of the season, so some new ones over your way would go down a treat.

One thing I'd recommend from a riders perspective, are any of them close enough together that you can make them a 2 stage HC race 2 hours apart?

The HC fields are generally the same suspects, for some reason a lot of both competent testers and roadies don't like them (can't think why )

Keep us posted as to progress.

I am toying with the idea of trying to put on a decent 2 stage over this way

disgruntledgoat

We thought about that a couple of years ago.


All three HCs are in a big line. To ride all of them in a row would only take about 45 minutes including descents and the road inbetween... SO yeah, that would definitely be an interesting event with classifications for each hill and overall.

Definitely ringing CTT now!

Chip \'oyler

disgruntledgoat wrote:

We thought about that a couple of years ago.


All three HCs are in a big line. To ride all of them in a row would only take about 45 minutes including descents and the road inbetween... SO yeah, that would definitely be an interesting event with classifications for each hill and overall.

Definitely ringing CTT now!

Holme Valley Wheelers used to run a great TT which went up Holme Moss and Woodhead which then finished in Holmfirth. They used to run a fastest descent prize down to the finish - which would be a good prize for your combined hiilclimb. You would only need seperate timekeepers on the top and bottom of one of the hills. This then gives the heavier riders something to aim for

Naz

To run a CTT sanctioned club event you need to register the event with the local CTT district up front. In my case I had to register my 2009 club events (Kingston Wheelers CC club 10s on Wednesday nights) with London South in October 2008. So I would plan to hold them next year as I suspect the calendar for 2009 is now fixed.

Even for club events there's a fair bit of admin involved, CTT application, police notification forms, startsheets etc. If it's a new course that's a whole new load of admin, I would recommend using existing courses and getting used to running the events first?

chrisw12

Just finished my second event (organising) today and what a relief it's over!

Some great advice given on here which should bring home the message that putting on an event and doing it properly/safely is not an easy task.

My advice would be, if you are in a club, then next year offer to run an event for your club or help out with one of their events. Do not jump in at the deep end and just ask your ctt committee if you to put on an event on a new course.

I'm not trying to put you off as the sport desperately needs new promoters to step up imo, but for your own sanity, learn the ropes first.