If You Know - You Know

 In celebration of the twentieth year of this blog, I have a few tales to tell. This post is one of them. This series will occur off and on throughout this anniversary year, I hope to illuminate some behind-the-scenes stories and highlights from the blog during this time. Enjoy!

A scene from the start of the 2015 Gravel Worlds

In 2016 I was asked to attend the Iowa Bicycle Summit and their events director's meeting. It was the only time in the 15 years I was organizing gravel events that I had been asked to attend that meeting, which looking back on it now, seems like a gross oversight on the part of the Iowa Bicycle Coalition, who organized this event. 

I still remember sitting there and hearing all the "horror stories" concerning how one should put on a cycling event. Of course, I was a very non-traditional promoter, and much of the trappings of "normal cycling events" was not part of what I did or ever wanted to do. 

But the thing that struck me was how big events get bogged down in details that most event attendees never grasp. You will hear people gripe about an event after they have ridden in one, perhaps, and maybe even you have done this, but the "other side" has a LOT of headaches and thankless minutiae to wade through that, frankly, I don't think many of the complainers would ever face up to wading through. 

It's a long story, and I haven't got the time, nor the space, to detail it all out here, but suffice it to say that I have experienced these things and I have heard from other event directors about these things. If you know - you know. It's a really hard thing to express to those who have never put on an event before in the cycling realm. 

That said, if you have read these pages over the years, you probably have somewhat of an idea of what I mean. I'll leave it at that. It is definitely something that has influenced the blog.

The Blackborow DS on Marky-Mark Trail.

I noted also that in 2016 we had some of the best snow we've ever had for fat biking. I thought 2011 was really good, but then for the next four years it was always that "sugar-snow". You know the type - Snow that is granular and will never set up to support flotation by fat bike tires. 

Well, we hadn't really had any snow for fat biking during the Winter of 2015-2016 until the beginning of February. Then we had about two perfect weeks before the weather turned mild and I started going out to ride gravel more and more. We may have had a few weeks here and there since that time where fat biking was decent, but this snow was perfect. 

I feel like fat biking has been so hit and miss around here the last five years or so that the desire for many to try it has waned quite a bit. Many fat bike races see no snow here anymore, and if they do get some, it is wet and muddy along with that. 

It has caused fat biking content here on the blog to be a rare thing, at least on snow, so until that changes, I really think that my fat bikes are kind of a luxury item, and not so much a necessity. Maybe I should convert the Ti Muk into a 29"er full rigid MTB with a Rohloff hub. 

I'd probably get more out of the bike from doing that than I am now!

Friday News And Views

Luke Hoffman, Executive Director of the Iowa Bicycle Coalition. (Image courtesy of the IBC)

 Iowa Bicycle Coalition Hires New Executive Director:

Recently the Iowa Bicycle Coalition announced the hire of Luke Hoffman to fill its Executive Director position after former Executive Director, Mark Wyatt announced his departure. The Iowa Bicycle Coalition, an organization that promotes safe cycling in Iowa, educational programs, policy change at the government level, and growing a support community amongst cyclists in Iowa, now looks to Mr. Hoffman to drive these initiatives. 

Hoffman, a life-long cyclists from Iowa, will transition into the executive Director role with the aid of former Executive Director, Mark Wyatt who is staying on briefly to smooth out the change in leadership. Hoffman is already hard at work learning about the influencers and important issues in the Iowa cycling scene. 

Comments: The Iowa Bicycle Coalition mostly has been felt, in my experience, as the organization that implements changes at the Iowa Statehouse level through lobbying. The organizer also generally has a big presence at the Iowa Bicycle Expo, with their Iowa Bicycle Summit, usually held in January in Des Moines, Iowa. I spoke at the Iowa Bicycle Summit in 2017. 

Mr. Hoffman has already reached out to me, which I found pretty impressive since I don't generally see myself as being "that big of a deal", which...... I probably should, but I don't, generally, so the call caught me by surprise a bit. But since I've started working at The Cedar Valley Bicycle collective my aims have been more in alignment with what the Coalition is all about, so this is a good thing. 

Good luck to Mr. Hoffman in his endeavors! I loo forward to possibly meeting him at some point in the future. 

Time to dig back into this.

Second (Third? Fourth?) Chances:

You may not have noticed but I have not been using a GPS computer for cycling since early Summer. Boy! I gotta say that the rides I have gotten in have been just fine without that frustrating device. 

But a recent chat with a local runner in the Cedar Valley has me thinking I need to either figure this out or move on and never be a part of you folks that use GPS stuff. Well....at least not until things get figured out better.

See, the local runner, unprompted by myself, brought up a lot of the same things that drives me nuts about GPS units. His experiences were very similar to mine, plus he had some that were maybe more related to running that I did not have experiences with. 

But the chat did serve to bring to mind that I need to definitively figure out where I am headed in the near future. Either I use these things or I do not. I want to make up my mind and move on. The issue cannot be left undecided or I will end up wondering "what if" and that's no good. 

So, here are a few reasons I do not need GPS: Training, racing, navigation, data, and communication. I can do all of that stuff without a GPS at all. Would GPS computers like the Wahoo I have make things easier? Maybe..... It hasn't so far though. 

You might be thinking that I definitely need a GPS to do an event with. No, not really, I don't. While it is true that many race courses guidance is only provided via GPS, those tracks are almost always made available far ahead of the event on sites like Ride With GPS, and guess what? You can download cues for those, or, most likely, I'd write my own up and use the hard copy during the event. 

Oh yeah, and I don't do Strava or anything like that. I find that to be totally uninteresting. 

You might think that a GPS computer distance data would be more accurate than my hard-wired computer. Actually, that answer is "no" as well. Even my running friend, who used a traditional distance roll-out device to set up a quarter mile interval training route, has seen GPS not get the 1/4 mile splits correct on several other runners GPS units. And my roll-out measurement on my computer yields results that have consistently been dead-on with Iowa DOT mile markers. So, no- you don't need a GPS for that either. 

So the scales are tipped heavily against GPS in my view. Not only that, but I still have not been able to get one to work consistently well enough to be convinced otherwise. But I am going to try again. Stay tuned....

Speaking Of Technology...

The landscape for logistics for long, ultra-endurance events is changing due to technology. It's something that seems obvious when you stop to think about it. 

Maybe the pandemic put this sort of an idea on people's radar, but whatever it was, finding food and water became a heck of a lot easier than ever. It used to be that if you missed a store during open hours you were out of luck. But not anymore!

Riders have figured out how to leverage technology to gain an advantage over the long distance cycling challenges which are "self-supported" type events. Phone apps are one way this is being done. 

Call ahead and have an order placed outside in a bag with your name on it. Boom! When you get there, you have some savory vittles and maybe water waiting for you. Of course, it's risky. The village mutt might take advantage of your late arrival, but hey! It's take that risk or go without. 

Want to geek out on exactly how far down a rabit hole people go with regard to this? Check out THIS LINK and be amazed. Heck, I don't even understand half of that! It does reinforce my assertion that people will find every way possible to make an event easier within the rules, and sometimes outside of them.

Redshift Sports Expands Seatpost Offerings:

Redshift Sports makes a nice suspension seat post, but it only came in one diameter- 27.2mm. Well, now that will no longer be the case going forward. 

Redshift ShockStop Seatposts will now come in a few popular sizes and in some longer lengths. This should be of particular interest to fat bikers who ride in Winter on post-holed trails as this sort of seat post will totally change your riding. 

It should be noted that some of the sizes will not come into stock until late December of this year and January of 2024. You can check these out HERE. Note- This is the original ShockStop seatpost. The "PRO" model does not come in any other size but 27.2mm. 

Comments: Besides my take on these posts for snow riding with fat bikes, the ShockStop seatpost is a really well done suspension post. I like that the original is adjustable. You can make it really compliant or stiffen it up as much as you'd probably ever need to. (I mean, if you're going to make it nearly rigid, why bother at all) 

These are also a great post for bikes that do not have a lot of exposed seat post and allow some "give" to those riders with bikes like that which you wouldn't otherwise have available to you. Of course, these aren't for everyone, but this is a nice expansion in offerings for a suspension seat post in terms of sizes.

That's all for this week! Have a great weekend and get out for a ride if you can!

Iowa Gravel Expo/Bike Party v2 Report

Schwag table at the Iowa Gravel Expo/Bike Party

Last year N.Y.Roll and I put on what N.Y.Roll dubbed as the "Iowa Gravel Expo/Bike Party". I was asked to help promote and facilitate it as the speaker. Our focus was to bring a light to the gravel scene and shine that also on beginners, or what we sometimes call "gravel curious folk", who wonder about gravel riding and if it is for them.

I figured it was only going to attract a few locals. If we got 35 people, or so I thought, it would be considered a success. Now, I have to say that N.Y. Roll thought it would be much better attended than that and in the end, he was right. We had standing room only and something like 85+ people up there!

So, with such an attendance and enthusiastic response afterward, we planned on doing the Expo again the following year. This attendance issue brought N.Y. Roll and I a lot of concern, and we were constantly bouncing ideas off one another for months leading up to the next Expo. Possibilities such as having vendors, maybe some media, and of course, a bigger venue than we had for "Year One". However; in our efforts to keep the event local, we were met with several road blocks.

Things like parking, alcohol serving limitations, how to cater food, space costs, and location of venues all were huge roadblocks for our event as we had meager resources for such big plans. To be sure, Cedar Valley Cyclists and Europa Cycle & Ski, both financial supporters in our efforts, plus our first year and eventual second year host, Doughy Joey's Peetza Joynt, are to be commended for stepping up to the plate and helping us. Without them, nothing would have happened, but the resources we had, as wonderful as they were, didn't have the horsepower to launch the event to the levels we were thinking.

Attendees were treated to free Doughy Joey's Peetza courtesy of our sponsors.

In the end, the attendance issue really became our perceived biggest problem and the one that kind of has pushed us toward a new idea for this event going forward. That will be discussed later. The end result was that we came up with the idea to have two sessions and to kind of corral people into choosing one or the other to attend and we ran with that. This allowed us to use the same venue and its benefits. It ended up working out really well with comfortable amounts of room for everyone in both sessions. Had we run one session as we did our first year, the room wouldn't have held everyone that attended this year. Blame that on fire codes. It is what it is.

So, we had eleven presenters, some from first time events, and all are Iowa based events. We had BikeIowa.com, one of our sponsors, who sell the Pogie Lites I reviewed, and have a great calendar of Iowa based gravel events on their site as well. We also had a great presentation by Andrea Cohen of the Gravel Scouts. Both sessions were well received by attendees and everything went pretty smoothly. We had some nice schwag handouts with cool stickers, chain lube samples from DuMonde Tech, and slap koozies from Bike Iowa.

Doughy Joey's staff kept the pies coming and the beer flowing and accomplished all that smoothly and unobtrusively. The venue was excellent in that way. I think we maybe could have used a small P.A., but that would have brought it's own issues and we would have had a different set of problems there since the upper room we used isn't sealed off from the remainder of the public space there. All in all, it was the best it could have been. N.Y. Roll and I are grateful to the staff and owners of Doughy Joey's for allowing us the opportunity to put the event on.

Dan from the Snaggy Ridge 105 telling us how the gravel based event has affected Tipton, Iowa.

The takeaways I gathered from this Expo were many. I learned more about how gravel cycling events are benefiting small towns like Tipton, Alden, and Lynville, Iowa. I learned how initiatives to promote healthy living are affecting people in Grinnell, the Iowa City area, and Alden Iowa and this from gravel based events and organizations. I saw event directors with a lot of experience rubbing shoulders with inexperienced directors and LOTS of shared information was dispersed during the Expo. We also hosted Mark Wyatt of the Iowa Bicycle Coalition, and his ideas along with those of Scott Sumpter of Bike Iowa are going to help shape what the Expo will become in the future.

Which brings me back to the point I alluded to earlier. The point about attendance. On one hand, we cannot really facilitate more people using the venue we have used. It is limited and we understand that. The event has potential to help more cyclists and event directors. It has the potential to help civic organizations and local governments to promote rural Iowa. The event has growth potential in terms of businesses involved in cycling and gravel cycling in particular. The potential is not going to be realized where we are now, so things must change to get this event where it has the potential to go.

What will that look like? Well, I cannot say for certain. We heard a lot of ideas, and there has to be more people brought into this to help guide the future of the Iowa Gravel Expo. One thing is for sure, maybe two- That is that Waterloo/Cedar Falls is probably not where the event will end up, although there is one idea floated out there which would make the event "multi-centered", so to speak. The other thing is that N.Y. Roll's and my guidance in this event is not enough, and has the distinct possibility of ending. It's something that has to be on the table for this idea to grow, and in my opinion, the idea is too good to be limited by my and N.Y. Roll's limited resources.

In the meantime, what N.Y. Roll and I have started is a success. We think, and many others do as well, that it is an awesome concept that has great potential. I know that I will be involved in the short term, at the least, in where the event goes from this point.

THANK YOU: Sponsors- Europa Cycle & Ski, Cedar Valley Cyclists, Dave Roll, Riding Gravel, Bike Iowa, Doughy Joey's Peetza Joynt, Andrea Cohen/Gravel Scouts, Scott Sumpter/Pogie Lites, The Event Directors, DuMonde Tech, Mark Wyatt/Iowa Bicycle Coalition, and most importantly- all the attendees who came to learn more about Iowa based gravel events!

Iowa Gravel Expo/Bike Party v2 Report

Schwag table at the Iowa Gravel Expo/Bike Party

Last year N.Y.Roll and I put on what N.Y.Roll dubbed as the "Iowa Gravel Expo/Bike Party". I was asked to help promote and facilitate it as the speaker. Our focus was to bring a light to the gravel scene and shine that also on beginners, or what we sometimes call "gravel curious folk", who wonder about gravel riding and if it is for them.

I figured it was only going to attract a few locals. If we got 35 people, or so I thought, it would be considered a success. Now, I have to say that N.Y. Roll thought it would be much better attended than that and in the end, he was right. We had standing room only and something like 85+ people up there!

So, with such an attendance and enthusiastic response afterward, we planned on doing the Expo again the following year. This attendance issue brought N.Y. Roll and I a lot of concern, and we were constantly bouncing ideas off one another for months leading up to the next Expo. Possibilities such as having vendors, maybe some media, and of course, a bigger venue than we had for "Year One". However; in our efforts to keep the event local, we were met with several road blocks.

Things like parking, alcohol serving limitations, how to cater food, space costs, and location of venues all were huge roadblocks for our event as we had meager resources for such big plans. To be sure, Cedar Valley Cyclists and Europa Cycle & Ski, both financial supporters in our efforts, plus our first year and eventual second year host, Doughy Joey's Peetza Joynt, are to be commended for stepping up to the plate and helping us. Without them, nothing would have happened, but the resources we had, as wonderful as they were, didn't have the horsepower to launch the event to the levels we were thinking.

Attendees were treated to free Doughy Joey's Peetza courtesy of our sponsors.

In the end, the attendance issue really became our perceived biggest problem and the one that kind of has pushed us toward a new idea for this event going forward. That will be discussed later. The end result was that we came up with the idea to have two sessions and to kind of corral people into choosing one or the other to attend and we ran with that. This allowed us to use the same venue and its benefits. It ended up working out really well with comfortable amounts of room for everyone in both sessions. Had we run one session as we did our first year, the room wouldn't have held everyone that attended this year. Blame that on fire codes. It is what it is.

So, we had eleven presenters, some from first time events, and all are Iowa based events. We had BikeIowa.com, one of our sponsors, who sell the Pogie Lites I reviewed, and have a great calendar of Iowa based gravel events on their site as well. We also had a great presentation by Andrea Cohen of the Gravel Scouts. Both sessions were well received by attendees and everything went pretty smoothly. We had some nice schwag handouts with cool stickers, chain lube samples from DuMonde Tech, and slap koozies from Bike Iowa.

Doughy Joey's staff kept the pies coming and the beer flowing and accomplished all that smoothly and unobtrusively. The venue was excellent in that way. I think we maybe could have used a small P.A., but that would have brought it's own issues and we would have had a different set of problems there since the upper room we used isn't sealed off from the remainder of the public space there. All in all, it was the best it could have been. N.Y. Roll and I are grateful to the staff and owners of Doughy Joey's for allowing us the opportunity to put the event on.

Dan from the Snaggy Ridge 105 telling us how the gravel based event has affected Tipton, Iowa.

The takeaways I gathered from this Expo were many. I learned more about how gravel cycling events are benefiting small towns like Tipton, Alden, and Lynville, Iowa. I learned how initiatives to promote healthy living are affecting people in Grinnell, the Iowa City area, and Alden Iowa and this from gravel based events and organizations. I saw event directors with a lot of experience rubbing shoulders with inexperienced directors and LOTS of shared information was dispersed during the Expo. We also hosted Mark Wyatt of the Iowa Bicycle Coalition, and his ideas along with those of Scott Sumpter of Bike Iowa are going to help shape what the Expo will become in the future.

Which brings me back to the point I alluded to earlier. The point about attendance. On one hand, we cannot really facilitate more people using the venue we have used. It is limited and we understand that. The event has potential to help more cyclists and event directors. It has the potential to help civic organizations and local governments to promote rural Iowa. The event has growth potential in terms of businesses involved in cycling and gravel cycling in particular. The potential is not going to be realized where we are now, so things must change to get this event where it has the potential to go.

What will that look like? Well, I cannot say for certain. We heard a lot of ideas, and there has to be more people brought into this to help guide the future of the Iowa Gravel Expo. One thing is for sure, maybe two- That is that Waterloo/Cedar Falls is probably not where the event will end up, although there is one idea floated out there which would make the event "multi-centered", so to speak. The other thing is that N.Y. Roll's and my guidance in this event is not enough, and has the distinct possibility of ending. It's something that has to be on the table for this idea to grow, and in my opinion, the idea is too good to be limited by my and N.Y. Roll's limited resources.

In the meantime, what N.Y. Roll and I have started is a success. We think, and many others do as well, that it is an awesome concept that has great potential. I know that I will be involved in the short term, at the least, in where the event goes from this point.

THANK YOU: Sponsors- Europa Cycle & Ski, Cedar Valley Cyclists, Dave Roll, Riding Gravel, Bike Iowa, Doughy Joey's Peetza Joynt, Andrea Cohen/Gravel Scouts, Scott Sumpter/Pogie Lites, The Event Directors, DuMonde Tech, Mark Wyatt/Iowa Bicycle Coalition, and most importantly- all the attendees who came to learn more about Iowa based gravel events!