Dragon Ride-UCI Golden Bike world series status not deserved

Caer caradoc

After reading this thread and the other two related Dragon threads on unresponsive organisers and selfish riders, I am glad that I was too late to enter this event. I have had my fill of rubbish sportives. Sad to say but the story of the Dragon is yet another nail in the my sportive coffin.

Instead I am looking forward to the Cotswolds Audax on the 19th, which will hopefully be free of dodgy timing chips, rubbish feed stops, frequent crashes, expensive entry fees, overcrowded and boring roads, selfish queue jumpers, wanabee racers and profit maximising organisers. It is almost a cliche.

Once upon a time I had such high hopes for sportives but now it is alas. What a terrible shame for all those people seeking a genuinely good day out. This thread and various others has totally killed off my interest in the sport.

etapecymru

Been directed here by a poster who emailed me directly (thanks Gethin) & probably setting myself up but am one of the organisers behind www.etape-cymru.co.uk the new major closed road event in N Wales on 9th October, 2011.

I have done Dragon Ride for past 3 years (not this year) & have always found it v good and must state categorically that I do not have anything bad to say about the Dragon Ride.

I am curious to know though- if not too cheeky to take peoples time - what are the 5 main gripes in order that people have about the organisation of sportives in general

ie is it lack of parking, toilets, waiting at start line, feedstations, after ride food etc

Any suggestions to resolve the gripes would be interested to see.

I will post this on other threads as well.

Many thanks in advance

oldwelshman

bendertherobot wrote:

GeorgeShaw wrote:

They made the tactical error of sending everybody through the "village" which exited at the head of the queue by the start/finish. What are you going to think about doing when you see a queue of thousands to your right and the badly marshalled start right in front of you ...?

Interestingly (or not) they closed the McDonalds entrance (locked shut). This would have added people in the "right direction" again.

They need a more remote, and bigger, start area. Llandow airfield would work well.

I fed back similar back to organisers and Llandow would be good, or maybe Aberavon on the coast, why not sphia Gardens Cardiff and get road block for exit and return ?

Krys

Livid almost covers it...*grin*. I was, and am, furious!

dombo6

Dunno what all the fuss is about. Turned up with me mates at 0750, parked up, quick slash in the car park against a hedge, saw the queue, snuck in near the front, got going by 0800, sucked wheel for the next 8 hours, dumping all my empty gel wrappers along with some red bull cans along the way, met up with mates at finish, went home. Roll on Dragon 2012!

de_sisti

Dombo6 wrote:

Dunno what all the fuss is about. Turned up with me mates at 0750, parked up, quick slash in the car park against a hedge, saw the queue, snuck in near the front, got going by 0800, sucked wheel for the next 8 hours, dumping all my empty gel wrappers along with some red bull cans along the way, met up with mates at finish, went home. Roll on Dragon 2012!

Get this person on stage at the Apollo. Dead funny.

itisaboutthebike

what are the 5 main gripes in order that

Here goes..................

1. Expensive entry fees
2. Having to wait ages to start
3. Goody bags with nothing in them and useless medals
4. Foul tasting water at feed stops
5. Organsiers that don't learn from thier mistakes................
6. Uninteresting routes
7. Timing chips that actually work
8. Queing to park (linked to 2 above)
9. And the list goes on.......................

And for you 'A' level cycling question..............................

Audax Sportive - compare and contrast.

itisaboutthebike

1. Expensive entry fees
2. Having to wait ages to start
3. Goody bags with nothing in them and useless medals
4. Foul tasting water at feed stops
5. Organsiers that don't learn from thier mistakes................
6. Uninteresting routes
7. Timing chips that actually work
8. Queing to park (linked to 2 above)
9. And the list goes on.......................

Oh and by the way ............

must state categorically that I do not have anything bad to say about the Dragon Ride.

Ron Stuart

Wish I had a fiver for every word that has been written for but mainly against this years Dragon Ride.

Gazzaputt

Got to say this was on my list of events for next year but there is noway I'd waste the petrol money traveling from Kent, accommodation cost and entry for a half baked event.

applebrown

This is the second dragon ride for me,the first being the infamous 2007 when bike degreaser was drunk in mistake for gels....The rest is history.
2011,s event has learnt little or nothing about the running of a first class event.There is so much wrong with this event of which a great deal has been covered in recent posts.The brecon beacons have great selection of roads to call on,but why did we have to ride to the first climb on such a poor busy main roads in and out of towns and villages and the lack of imagination in climb choice,for me this event was training for the maratona and the etape,where the organisers have the ability to get 8500+ riders away in less than an hour.
My final rant is regarding the amount of gel wrappers discarded roadside,ive never seen so much including punctured inner tubes on any other event.
What puzzles me is why you would want to consume a gel at only 5miles into an event,suggest you folks look at your training and hydration.
As for the self proclaimed U.C.I premier status for the Dragon Ride,suggest Lou Lusardi gets his head out of the clouds..........

napper

Considering all the moanining that's going on, perhaps someone could explain to me it's ongoing popularity, and why it sells out virtually "overnight".

Just interested really - I've never ridden it, and unlikely to, now.

applebrown

Yeah,good question,im not sure of the answer, but events like the fred whitton sell out fast but restrict numbers so as to offer us punters a totally great expirience for a reasonable entry fee.Less is more i think!!!
One thing that does puzzle me is what input wiggle have when they endorse an event,or do they purely view it as a cash cow.Would be interesting to know how much it cost wiggle to gain 4500 names and email addresses,didnt cost them much by the quality of the goody bag..

nferrar

I've done 2 Dragon Rides now, first in 2009 and this one.

Car parking - much better this time, think I arrived around 7:15am and only queued about 10 minutes.

Toilets - I'm glad I can stand up to pee

Start queue - I forgot my base layer so was cold as it was but I turned up at the start line at dead on 8am, figuring I'd probably have a 30-45 minute wait. I actually got going at 9:33am which was crap (and I was shivering by then but that's my own fault I guess ). They do need to get people off quicker.

Timing Chips - I like the idea of the disposable numbers with integrated chips, mine worked fine to but yeah they need to fix the failure rate

Feed stations - bit uninspiring but think they added apple pies and jam tarts from the 2009 event so not too bad, not like I want a 3-course meal laid out for me anyhow. The one at the top of the Bwlch was a bit dangerous though, I was going pretty fast when I went around the bend to be confronted by a road full of queueing cyclists

Route - hmm bit conflicted on this one. Did the Medio in 2009 and it was tough (I'm sure it did the Bwlch once from each side + the Rhigos), this time it seemed a bit tame (Bwlch once as the only major climb). However as I'd not done over 40 miles in training before I was kind of glad it was tame - would have been disappointed if I'd been fitter though. I used to live not far from the route area and agree with others there are much more interesting options.

Goodie Bags - marketing tat more like but I guess better than nothing

Cost - bit of a rip-off but then most sportives are, at the end of the day it's up to you whether you want to pay it

intheshed

My 4th Dragon and will probably persevere with it next year despite this year's fiasco as it's reasonably close to where I live. But to tempt new participants or retain previous ones I would:

Ditch the coastal section (1000s of cyclists and Sunday coastal traffic don't really mix and I wouldn't describe it as a particularly picturesque part of the uk coastline). Take us straight up into the mountains. Develop a 'signature' Gran Fondo' route of at least 200km that takes in a wider variety of climbs in the more remote areas as well as the established favourites such as Blwch and Rhigos - how about the climb out of Heol Senni over to Ystradfellte they had us doing some years back for starters? Beef up the medio route in terms of climbing and bump it out to around the 85 mile mark again like 2010. If it's just one more organisational headache then scrap the corto and focus on the other two routes. Ditch the plastic goody bag and the pointless free samples and give us a t-shirt, a bottle, something vaguely useful or peg back the entry fee. Cap the numbers - give less people better pre/post ride and feed stop experiences and send them home, ready to spread the good word.

I'll be back...I think!

derek48

intheshed

That has to be the most sensible and constuctive set of suggestions to improve the Dragon that I have read. Agree with everything you say, but would also add an improvement to the feedstops and starting procedure, which aren'y a patch on many other events. Having completed four Dragons, I decided that I wouldn't be back next year, but if the organisers are listening and implement your suggestions, I would think again.

Meds1962

This was my second dragon, last year being the first.
Although we did the Bwlch twice from the same direction I didn't mind as we knew the route from the outset, also the Rhigos seemed a lot easyer than last year following a tougher first climb.
My timing chip didn't work so I used the link and gave the firm an approximate time of 9hrs as I knew the group I was in finished in 9.05. They have now given me a time of 9 hours so it sems I finished 5 minutes before I got there!! A bit pointless if giving them a fair stab at finding the information only results in them confirming what you told them.
Overall I enjoyed it again, feed stations were better stocked than 2010 and I carried plenty of gels so as not to depend on the stations.
The start does need to be better controlled though, at least being funnelled past the travel lodge last year meant queue jumping was less of an issue.

speshsteve

the earlier you start the better, if you started the grand fondo from 7.00 this would spread out the starters and reduce the queues...simples

SRS Events

Gazzaputt wrote:

Got to say this was on my list of events for next year but there is noway I'd waste the petrol money traveling from Kent, accommodation cost and entry for a half baked event.

why would you travel all the way to Wales to do a sportive when you have plenty in the South East ?

dodgy

If I lived in Kent, I'd be doing sportives in France

SRS Events

Yes dodgy good point like the Ronde Picarde in September


An excellent end of season Cyclosportive based in Abbeville in France.

http://www.srs-events.cc/trip2/holiday-details.htm

Gazzaputt

SRS Events wrote:

Gazzaputt wrote:

Got to say this was on my list of events for next year but there is noway I'd waste the petrol money traveling from Kent, accommodation cost and entry for a half baked event.

why would you travel all the way to Wales to do a sportive when you have plenty in the South East ?

Because Kent doesn't really give the mountain training Wales can.

Hill repeats get very boring.