Next phase of the Club league on RGT

Now that we have an outline of a plan from CI for getting back to competition we can start planning a bit further on ourselves. Unfortunately, all going well phase 4 is currently forecast as when competition of some sort can restart, so for us that is Thursday 23rd of July. It will be non contact TTs and Hillclimbs for at least the three weeks following that, leaving us even in the best case scenario without much of the Summer for road racing.

With that in mind I've drawn up a plan for 9 weeks of a Summer league on RGT with a mixture of race types and routes to give everyone a chance, starting with a Canary Wharf crit this Thursday.

This mini-league will be:
1, Open to all club members who have the appropriate kit;
2, Free of charge;
3, Just for fun and training, no prizes or maybe token medals or plaques for first three overall;
4, Mixture of circuits and race formats;
5, Routes and points system for the whole lot published before the start;
6, Handicaps related to virtual performances only so we don’t have to worry about anyone having dodgy turbos or miscalibrated Powermeters, those riders will just end up in the groups that fit their online ability.

The suggested routes and formats are:

R1,	May 21st.....	Canary Wharf	30 laps.....	DMS
R2,	.....28th	Cap Formentor	1 lap	CP
R3,	June 4th	Paterberg	4/6 laps	DMS 2 races/3 races?
R4,	..... 11th	8Bar	30 laps	CP
R5,	.....18th	Borrego Springs.....	5 laps	CP
R6,	.....25th	Pienza	4/5 laps	DMS 2 races/3 races?
R7,	July 2nd	Canary Wharf	35 laps	CP
R8,	.....9th	Stelvio	1 lap	Weight CP Or W/Kg?
R9,	.....16th	Borrego Springs	5 laps	CP

We could if people want use the Magic roads to do the Sallygap race instead of the Stelvio?

We will be using the standard points system from the club league, 17-15-13-11-9-7 points for 1st -6th and then 5 for everyone who starts.
Handicaps as they are now but to be tweaked week to week.

If anyone has any suggestions or requests for changes that they would like to see or any questions that I've left unanswered feel free to add them below.

The handicap groups after last Thursday are as follows, but everything is negotiable:

Limit:
Aoife Parker Hedderman,
Barry Redmond,
Beata Golczak,
Colum Bradley,
Dave Murnane,
Diarmuid Donnelly,
Gillian McDarby,
Jonathan Coffey,
Olga Buckina,
Zoheb Kahn.

Semi-limit:
Fergal Quinn,
John McCormack,
Ken O’Neill,
Kilian Doyle,
Michael Hanley,
Peadar Corbally.

Semi-scratch:
Brian McArdle,
Colm O'Neill,
Darran Kearney,
Diarmuid Collins,
Dick O’Brien,
Dmitri Griffin,
Fionn Sheridan,
Jonathan McKeown,
Jules Cantwell,
Killian O'Brien,
Martyn Holmes,
Paul Kane,
Robbie Dolan,
Shane Toman.

Scratch:
Dan Mulcahy,
Dave McLoughlin,
Henning Luebberding,
Ian Devlin,
Ian Donnelly,
Jamie Busher,
Luke Ginnell,
Michael Monahan,
Neal Hudson,
Padraic O'Flynn,
Shaun Kelly.

For our first round this Thursday we will be doing two separate races, one for Limit and Semi-limit, and a second one for Scratch and Semi-scratch. The L/SL race starts at 19:00, and will be 25 laps, followed by the S/SS race at 19:05 which will be 30 laps.

I’ll be taking separate sets of placings out of each of those races for each group, so you only have to worry about racing against the other riders in your group. That means you can either work with the riders from the other group or just ignore them, whatever suits you better.

The important thing is to make sure you enter for the correct race! The sign up link for Race 1 (Limit and Semi-limit) is here:

Part of the message is hidden for the guests. Please log in or register to see it.

And the link for Race 2 (Scratch and Semi-scratch) is here:
Part of the message is hidden for the guests. Please log in or register to see it.

This circuit is very straightforward with 4 corners and 4 short straights per lap, it’s fast racing, it is possible to take a lap, and very easy to lose one (or more).

If you get dropped don’t despair, and definitely don’t give up- my best recommendation is to catch your breath and get ready to jump on the bunch when they come around again- it’ll be quicker than you think. The minor placings on this circuit are often decided by who has given up the fewest laps so unlike any of the other circuits, on this one it is possible to be dropped and still ride yourself back into a good result.

What does DMS and CP stand for?
Thanks
Aoife

Hi Dave,

New to the club, Should be around tonight for a race. Can you put me in scratch please.

Dan wrote:

Hi Dave,

New to the club, Should be around tonight for a race. Can you put me in scratch please.

Done. Welcome to the club.

Round 1 placings, L/SL:

1, Peadar Corbally (SL);
2, Barry Redmond (L);
3, Fergal Quinn (SL);
4, Kilian Doyle (SL);
5, Ken O’Neill (SL);
6, Dave Murnane (L);
7, Colum Bradley (L);
8, Aoife Parker-Hedderman (L).

Round 1 placings, S/SS:

1, Neal Hudson (S);
2, Ian Donnelly (S);
3, Shaun Kelly (S);
4, Luke Ginnell (S);
5, Colm O’Neill (SS);
6, Killian O'Brien (SS);
7, Michael Monahan (S);
8, Darran Kearney (SS);
9, Dick O'Brien (SS);
Rest of the finishers to follow...

One suggestion I might make is to ask people to wear specific jerseys corresponding to category. It can be very hard to keep track of who is who, making it occasionally impossible to work out which (virtual) wheel to (virtually) follow, especially in races with multiple laps and therefore lapped riders.

If SS are all wearing white jerseys, for example, then you know what to do without having to deduce it from distances etc. Might make things a little less confusing at times.

Luke wrote:

One suggestion I might make is to ask people to wear specific jerseys corresponding to category. It can be very hard to keep track of who is who, making it occasionally impossible to work out which (virtual) wheel to (virtually) follow, especially in races with multiple laps and therefore lapped riders.

If SS are all wearing white jerseys, for example, then you know what to do without having to deduce it from distances etc. Might make things a little less confusing at times.

I like the suggestion Luke, it's hard to tell the categories apart. But telling riders within the category is important as well, not sure how we'd solve for both

The L/SL race was pretty straight forward. No serious attempts to break away. 9 starters stayed together at first, but were slowly whittled down to a group of 5 at the finish. Just 0.2 second covered the first 4 places.

Luke wrote:

One suggestion I might make is to ask people to wear specific jerseys corresponding to category. It can be very hard to keep track of who is who, making it occasionally impossible to work out which (virtual) wheel to (virtually) follow, especially in races with multiple laps and therefore lapped riders.

If SS are all wearing white jerseys, for example, then you know what to do without having to deduce it from distances etc. Might make things a little less confusing at times.

I was thinking the same thing for the while that I was watching your race, but in race 1 it looked like the opposite issue- almost all of the riders in there were wearing one of two different jerseys, and it was hard to follow who was who.

We can solve part of that problem by giving Scratch and Semi-scratch separate races for the next DMS- I didn't think we would get the numbers to allow separate races for each, but based on tonight's turnout we should be doing three separate races for the next DMS on Paterberg in 2 weeks time.

Neal wrote:

Luke wrote:

One suggestion I might make is to ask people to wear specific jerseys corresponding to category. It can be very hard to keep track of who is who, making it occasionally impossible to work out which (virtual) wheel to (virtually) follow, especially in races with multiple laps and therefore lapped riders.

If SS are all wearing white jerseys, for example, then you know what to do without having to deduce it from distances etc. Might make things a little less confusing at times.

I like the suggestion Luke, it's hard to tell the categories apart. But telling riders within the category is important as well, not sure how we'd solve for both

Alternatively, print out out a list of the names in the relevant groups and keep it beside you or tape it to the edge of your screen. During the race keep an eye on the names in the race list on the left of the RGT screen. You'll soon learn who's who, there aren't many to keep track of.

So far there haven't been enough riders in either Limit or Semi-Limit to give them separate races, but if there is enough interest then there is no problem in giving them each their own race- there has to be a minimum of five riders for each race though.

Are there a few more Limit riders who have tried it once and given up after getting shelled out who might come back for a Limit only race?

Are there any of the Semi-scratch riders who haven't placed yet who want a downgrade?

That's a cracking little circuit for racing. The two little "hills" plus the tight corners mean there is little opportunity for resting and it's pretty much flat out and a war of attrition.

A lack of attention from me on the back straight after about 6 laps saw me out the back with no chance of catching a fast moving group but being able to jump back on when being lapped means you still get to race for the full distance.

Scratch may disagree but on the flat circuits I prefer SS/S mixed as it helps bring us more athletically challenged (definitely not fat!) folks on a bit. Understand though it causes issues for scratch when lapping the field and lads jumping on and causing some confusion. Hilly races it doesn't make a difference to myself as once the road points up I'm straight out the back anyway :)

Darran wrote:

Scratch may disagree but on the flat circuits I prefer SS/S mixed as it helps bring us more athletically challenged (definitely not fat!) folks on a bit. Understand though it causes issues for scratch when lapping the field and lads jumping on and causing some confusion. Hilly races it doesn't make a difference to myself as once the road points up I'm straight out the back anyway :)

When we do separate races or a DMS it’s actually done for the benefit of the lower groups, giving them a chance to dictate the race instead of seeing who can best hang on to the big boys. For the Scratch riders it usually doesn’t matter who else is mixed in, as if you’re the strongest rider you’re going to drop them all anyway (barring technical issues obviously!)

Either way will work fine, just they give an advantage or disadvantage to different riders within each group. We can take a vote next week to see what the majority want and go with that.