Trans Iowa: Answering Some Questions

Since I announced "The End" of Trans Iowa, there hasn't been an outcry for the event to return, there hasn't been a lot of direct communication concerning it, and honestly, the whole ending of it went over way better/easier than I thought it was going to go. Why? Pfffft! I have no idea at all. 

So much for that. Now what?

 Well, there were a few questions. Questions like, "Have you considered passing TI on to another director? Would anyone be willing to take on the daunting responsibility?", which was asked in a comment last week. I'll be honest, I've been asked this before, and there has even been a person who asked who was interested in taking Trans Iowa on. It sounds like a good way to extend this into the future. However; one must put on their "reality glasses" and give this some serious thought before thinking it "will" work. It could work......maybe. Given the right person.

I have been asked about how many hours it took to do what I did every year. That's a fair question. I mean, how much time can such a simple, stripped down event take? It maybe looks easy from the outside. While I cannot tell you an exact number of hours, I can give you an analogy which maybe will help you understand this.

Dairy farmers used to have to get up and milk cows twice a day, every day, at the same hours every day. My uncles and Grandfather were dairy farmers. They never went on vacation unless they could hire out a guy or two to cover their daily chores. That's what putting on an event like Trans Iowa is like. You think about it all the time. When you want to get away from it, you can't. You have to give up that race or ride in October to do recon of the course. You don't go on the pub ride because you are thinking and planning a new course, and it never stops. You are doing Trans Iowa stuff all year. It just intensifies starting in October and doesn't stop intensifying until May. Then the cycle starts all over again.

These things don't write themselves. It takes a lot of time and effort to do these right.

So, maybe there is a person willing to do this. Then there are the cue sheets. These represent hours and hours of thought and labor.  Just coming up with a new course every year is a daunting task, and then you have to drive it to verify it. Yes.....you HAVE TO DO IT THIS WAY. There is no tech short cut, no Garmin app, no way you can just sit there on your ass and think you can have a good course, free of dead ends and truncated roads, if you try it any other way than to actually put your eyes on the course. After 14 years, I know what I am talking about here. And that takes time, money, and, not to forget, wear and tear on your vehicle. Plus- you have to have a vehicle friendly to Level B road travel. Your Mustang? Not going to cut it. Oh! And let's not forget that you may have to get out there multiple times to get the course right. This all just to get good, accurate cues. That doesn't cover getting the roster set, registration, communications with riders and sponsors, making bits up like roster sheets, waivers, number plates, pipe cleaners, pens, clipboards, etc.

Maybe one person could do it that way....... Which leads me to the next question: "Do you fear that it might morph into something you never wanted?"

Answer: No. I don't "fear" that, I know it would happen. And ultimately, this is why Trans Iowa could not work without someone of like mind to myself. Because almost anyone else would do a LOT of things to make it easier on themselves. Why wouldn't they? I would expect a new RD to set a permanent course, which would help eliminate a lot of recon, they would have GPS files for downloading to eliminate cue production costs, put the course out ahead of the event, and then I would expect that this RD would charge you money to enter this event to cover an insurance policy which would cover his butt in case something happened to a rider. Then I would suspect that it would be nothing at all like Trans Iowa anymore. 

Either that or someone willing to do it the hard way, to preserve the spirit of the event, would have to take it over that would continue everything just the way I had it. They wouldn't care about money at all. They wouldn't be afraid to stick their neck out and bet against the odds of being sued. My personal opinion is that this will never happen. But if someone out there says, "This event is like the old Trans Iowa", then you better beware, because I am willing to stake my reputation on the fact that it won't be anything like the way I did things. Now, they might say it is "better" than TI was. Fair enough, but that is a different flavor, not "the same" as TI was.

That may sound pompous, conceited, or may sound like braggadocio, but in my opinion, those are facts. It will be a super rare person that would take on a burden like TI was and run it the way I did. Time will tell if I am right about that.

So, it is not my current intention to "hand over" the event, or that there will ever be an event called "Trans Iowa" ever again. I just want it to go away, personally. I don't have any problem with that idea. Things end. Time moves on. Trying to "keep the dream alive" is an idea that almost always ends up in a watered down, twisted version of the way (whatever it was you want to use as an example) started out. I'm just not interested in perpetuating that sort of an idea by endorsing anyone else's try at this.  

I hope that answers some questions out there.