Ha ha ha ha ho ho ha ha he heeeee!

rolf_f

http://www.rapha.cc/gb/en/shop/manchester-to-london-challenge/product/MTL01?cm_mmc=email-_-0403114-_-textlink-_-AAA

Rapha Manchester to London Challenge (the Challenge being can anyone really be that dense).

Oh my. Haa haa hee ho chortle chortle. I mean, really. They want you to pay £150 plus raise £750 for a charity you might have no personal interest in and for that you get to ride from Manchester to London. It's just a Sportive ffs. Not even especially long (at least not by Audax standards - the seasoned Audaxers would be expecting the route markers to work both ways so they can cycle home after).

They are trying to make a challenge of it by having a sort of race between Northern and Southern riders aggregated times but surely nobody in the North is going to sign on to this?

Of course, it could be a bargain as you do get a cap which probably has a retail price of £250.......

veronese68

I thought this was going to be about the David Bowie classic The Laughing Gnome.
£150 is a bargain, you get a Rapha cap included in that, and a badge if you do a training ride.

The Rookie

Sounds like a great idea, you pay £150 to the organisation of the event so Rapha get their advertising for free as they will probably break even or even make profit out of it! And most people wont even go to the party as its not at the same time as the event.

jamesco

Great, now cycling is being co-opted for fund-raising, the same as running has... Mandatory fund-rasising sucks the fun out these kind of events for me, and for a lot of other people, too. Are they going to make participants personally-liable for any shortfall, the same as for the London Marathon?

£150 entry fee and a work/social network that will provide another £750 - it's almost like you could accuse Rapha of loving only those with lots of money...

The Rookie

jamesco wrote:

Are they going to make participants personally-liable for any shortfall, the same as for the London Marathon?

At least in the LM you can pick your own charity! Here Raper are forcing one on you that would also happen to benefit (somewhat indirectly) the founder/CEO or Raper as his son has autism.

It would serve them right if no-one took them up on the 'kind' offer.

anonymousblackfg

Do not underestimate the numbers of people under their spell, quite an amazing feat of style over substance.

goonz

Veronese68 wrote:

and a badge if you do a training ride.

Which you can quite easily buy off ebay for a couple hundred quid.

notsoblue

Wow, what a bunch of grumpy old men.

If people want to buy a meticulously curated cycling lifestyle off the shelf, let them. It does you no harm. All this will be on the day will be a bunch of people who like cycling riding together. There will just be a greater than average instagram output. How can anyone on here begrudge that?

CiB

Veronese68 wrote:

I thought this was going to be about the David Bowie classic The Laughing Gnome.

Thought it was about The Laughing Policeman personally, but that's probably an age thing.

It is a bit much requiring entrants to raise large amounts as a condition of entry. My employer occasionally does bike-related charity events, but they also require us to commit to raising a huge sum of money and I'm not prepared to ask friends, family & colleagues to cough up a lot of money so that I can indulge on a flight of fancy on the bike.

gbsahne001

goonz wrote:

Veronese68 wrote:

and a badge if you do a training ride.

Which you can quite easily buy off ebay for a couple hundred quid.

and a cap

greg66_tri_v2.0

Rolf F wrote:

It's just a Sportive ffs. Not even especially long (at least not by Audax standards - the seasoned Audaxers would be expecting the route markers to work both ways so they can cycle home after).

A Northern person wrote:

Eee, bah gum. 200 mile? Bloody nowt, I tell thee, I rides that, and more, mind, to t'work and back again ev'ry day. And mah bike has no saddle, no tyres and no bloody handlebar neither. Soft bloody suthern bast'ds, the lot of yer. When I were a lad, we had to get up before we went t'bed, live int tree on moors, and there were nowt to eat 'cept for yer own fingers, and even them yer had t'pay for ...

Etc, etc, etc.

For most cyclists, 200 miles in a day is a long ride. It's certainly a long sportive.

Kieran_Burns

CiB wrote:

Veronese68 wrote:

I thought this was going to be about the David Bowie classic The Laughing Gnome.

Thought it was about The Laughing Policeman personally, but that's probably an age thing.

It is a bit much requiring entrants to raise large amounts as a condition of entry. My employer occasionally does bike-related charity events, but they also require us to commit to raising a huge sum of money and I'm not prepared to ask friends, family & colleagues to cough up a lot of money so that I can indulge on a flight of fancy on the bike.

I still have that email you sent (I seem to remember mine was about as polite...)

Kieran_Burns

Greg66 Tri v2.0 wrote:

Rolf F wrote:

It's just a Sportive ffs. Not even especially long (at least not by Audax standards - the seasoned Audaxers would be expecting the route markers to work both ways so they can cycle home after).

A Northern person wrote:

Eee, bah gum. 200 mile? Bloody nowt, I tell thee, I rides that, and more, mind, to t'work and back again ev'ry day. And mah bike has no saddle, no tyres and no bloody handlebar neither. Soft bloody suthern bast'ds, the lot of yer. When I were a lad, we had to get up before we went t'bed, live int tree on moors, and there were nowt to eat 'cept for yer own fingers, and even them yer had t'pay for ...

Etc, etc, etc.

For most cyclists, 200 miles in a day is a long ride. It's certainly a long sportive.

You can tell you're a Southerner. There's no t in '

bobbygloss

How can the organisers enforce a minimum sponsorship amount? If for example, you turn up on the day with only £500, are they going to refuse to give you a start number? In which case, you have to give back the money you've collected, and that doesn't help anybody.
Or you ride anyway, and find your own food / B&B etc.

cookeeemonster

Bobbygloss wrote:

How can the organisers enforce a minimum sponsorship amount? If for example, you turn up on the day with only £500, are they going to refuse to give you a start number? In which case, you have to give back the money you've collected, and that doesn't help anybody.
Or you ride anyway, and find your own food / B&B etc.

No, you make up the shortfall - part of the T&C's, same as london to brighton, ride london 100 and many, many more events where you sign up for a charity place.

I dont like that but to be fair to the charities, they have to buy the places and obviously want to make the most of it as that's their job (making as much money for their charity as possible).

owenlars

I have to say that I am a fan of Rapha so I quite clearly have no intelligence whatsoever. However this does look like a bit of an own goal. Although I bet a fair few turn up for it. At 150 quid I would be tempted to take the train! :oops:

owenlars

I have to say that I am a fan of Rapha so I quite clearly have no intelligence whatsoever. However this does look like a bit of an own goal. Although I bet a fair few turn up for it. At 150 quid I would be tempted to take the train! :oops:

mroli

This is all really sour grapes above.
*disclaimer - I like Rapha stuff and also run my own charity*

Firstly, no-one from Rapha is MAKING you ride this Manchester to London. They are putting on this with the intention of raising money for a charity close to the CEO's heart.

The £750 sum is set as a suggested minimum to raise for charity. This does not seem out of scale with the amount of money that charities are asking for (example) Ride London places. I know, because we have had charity event places in the past, that if you do not set a suggested minimum that people will often just raise the minimum and then you just clear the entry fee that the charity had had to pay for. This is a bit of a choker (especially for small charities) where you are reliant on that income coming in to make it possible to support the projects you need/want to.

This is an event that Rapha are organising for people to do. £150 is pretty steep, but there are plenty of sportives charging £40-£50 out there and they do not start at Manchester Velodrome and end at the Olympic velodrome. I should imagine the foodstops will be pretty good, there is mechanical support and in the event the organisation stuff costs less than £150 then that'll go to the charity. I have done some Rapha stuff before (HoTN) and it has always been very well run and reflective of the brand.

They want big spenders in, because they want to raise money for charity. If you have a problem with the cost of this ride - I suggest you look at the cost of rides run by "The Pack" which includes such luminaries as Will Carling and some of the Sky team. Day rides, with no money to charity cost up to £1k.

Rapha put a load of money back into the sport at all levels - from helping organising stuff like the Urban Hill Climb and the HoTN, to supporting charity requests, to the sponsorship of the RCJLT and Sky teams to helping with the organisation and sponsorship of a 3/4 cat race as part of the ERRL this year and lots of other stuff that they have bubbling over.

And as you say - no-one is forced to do this ride. For £150, if you wanted, you could self navigate and raise money for your own charity. And that is a reason why I won't be doing the ride, because I need to raise money for our charity, not Simon Mottram's chosen charity, but I certainly do not begrudge him trying to improve the lot of autistic kids.

Oh and an "anytime" single from Manchester to London is £160!

spasypaddy

i agree with mroli

majormantra

The Rookie wrote:

At least in the LM you can pick your own charity! Here Raper are forcing one on you that would also happen to benefit (somewhat indirectly) the founder/CEO or Raper as his son has autism.

Really? Really Rookie?

I read an article recently in which someone suggested that primary school-style changes to words automatically lost you an argument. Like talking about "David Scameron" or "President Obummer" in politics. I'm inclined to agree.

jamesco

mroli wrote:

This is all really sour grapes above.

Nah, sour grapes is when you can't get something and so you say it probably wasn't worth having; this isn't a case of sour grapes, just irritation with obligatory fund-raising being attached to every event. I hope everyone that participates gets what they want out of it.

CookeeeMonster wrote:

to be fair to the charities, they have to buy the places

Wow, that's an eye-opener - who are the real beneficiary of these events?

mroli

jamesco wrote:

Nah, sour grapes is when you can't get something and so you say it probably wasn't worth having; this isn't a case of sour grapes, just irritation with obligatory fund-raising being attached to every event. I hope everyone that participates gets what they want out of it.

CookeeeMonster wrote:

to be fair to the charities, they have to buy the places

Wow, that's an eye-opener - who are the real beneficiary of these events?

No fundraising attached to the majority of what Rapha do eg Hell of the North, Urban Hil Climb, sponsored races. Admittedly some cold hard corporate profiteering out of sales of goods.

Ride London places for Charities cost charities significantly more than the £48 that private entries cost. Run by the same company that run the London Marathon.

rolf_f

Greg66 Tri v2.0 wrote:

Etc, etc, etc.

For most cyclists, 200 miles in a day is a long ride. It's certainly a long sportive.

Oh absolutely - you are right. But for a lot of the people who might be interested in this ride, it isn't going to be long enough to justify raising £750 - particularly for a charity they might have no interest in. 220 is more than I've ever done - but not enough more that I could expect anyone to sponsor me for it. I know I'd do it so what am I being sponsored for? To do my hobby. That's not good enough for £750. I wouldn't sponsor me to do that. It would have to be something much better.

mroli wrote:

This is an event that Rapha are organising for people to do. £150 is pretty steep, but there are plenty of sportives charging £40-£50 out there and they do not start at Manchester Velodrome and end at the Olympic velodrome.

Hmmmm. I've ridden Manchester and watched the Olympic track cycling at Stratford. I can't get excited about paying a premium for a sportive that gets me free access to the car parks of either.

This isn't sour grapes or anything. I could afford it (except the sponsorship obviously rules me out anyway) but why would I do that when I can get the same experience from a £4 entry fee Audax? Where is the justification for paying 37 times as much. Crikey - I could Audax every weekend for 9 months for the same money! And the company would probably be a lot better too! (No disrespect to the Rapha riders but Audaxers are cool!).

mrfpb

I do a sponsored ride for a special needs charity (SOS!SEN) once a year, so I looked at Rapha's chosen charity and was seriously annoyed by their website. They claim Ambitious about Autism is the national charity for children and young people with autism. My underlining. No they're not. I have worked with people with autism for twenty years, and I have an ASD child, and I've never heard of them before. They are a charity doing good work in a small part of London. Why would anyone outside their area (eg people in Manchester) want to support them when there are national charities such as the National Autistic Society? or local charities where they live (like the one I support)?