[Event] Cape Town Cycle Tour 2019

[Pure Savage]

Saw some Savages on Chappies this morning as it was getting light.

 

Nice lads. Post Argus is the best time on the roads.

I even made it into the group this morning!!

[Shebeen]

Copy. Paste. Copy. Paste. Copy. Paste. Copy. Paste. Copy. Paste...

No wizardry. 

I had to delete duplicates because I have no way of differentiating between riders with the same names. And I didn't quite get that right so there are some wobblies in the data that I should sort out sometime. As it currently stands, 14341 data points for riders who rode both this year and last.

wow.

so at 20 000+ finishers, with 100 entries per page, you did 200+ copy and pastes..for 2019 and 2018?

 

Surely there would be a way to write a script to suck the data off the web, come hubbers with skilz help a brother out here!

[Long Wheel Base]

I think I saw that its the new BMW 8 Series ?

Sounds right. My Mom was on the side of the road watching at the end of the blue route and she said it was a new sports car that she hadn't seen before. I asked if it was the new M5 and she said no it only had 2 doors.

[HelloRyanFowler]

wow.

so at 20 000+ finishers, with 100 entries per page, you did 200+ copy and pastes..for 2019 and 2018?

 

Surely there would be a way to write a script to suck the data off the web, come hubbers with skilz help a brother out here!

 

Ja, it was tedious. But I don't even really know what a script is. And I figured that several hours of copying and pasting would give me the quickest results. That was after I called up Racetec to ask if they could send me the data. It was a long shot. They wouldn't budge. Fair enough. They must have their hands quite full after the CTCT, what with all those cyclists phoning in to complain about that infernal rattle of the timing chip.

[FootballingCyclist]

I even made it into the group this morning!!

You okes surely have a special cave up there with like a special trap door...

[Pure Savage]

You okes surely have a special cave up there with like a special trap door...

I wish, if I am late I do pop over the Nek to join them on Chappies.

[dirtypot]

They must have their hands quite full after the CTCT, what with all those cyclists phoning in to complain about that infernal rattle of the timing chip.

 

Three easy solutions:

1. Take the clip part off the chip and cable tie the chip directly to your fork leg
2. Take the clip part off the chip and thread the chip onto a strap on your shoe
3. Put a little cable tie around the chip on the clip

All of these have the lasting effect of completely eliminating the annoying rattle. 

[Wayne pudding Mol]

I’m not a statistician. Now that we have that cleared up, have a look at this data:

Chart 1 shows the performance of 2019 CTCT cyclists relative to their 2018 performance, across race times.

Fastest 2019 cyclists to the left; slowest to the right.

Cyclists who did better than last year to the bottom; cyclists who had a bad run this year, up you go; cyclists who held their 2018 time sit on the 1.0 line.

So bottom left is fast and chuffed, while top right is slow and disappointed.

The dotted line shows the trend: it slopes upwards, i.e. the slower the rider, the greater the toll that the wind took. The first riders home were somehow impervious to the wind. The slower riders really felt it.

Chart 2 is a detailed view of the area covered by the trend line in Chart 1.

Chart 3 shows performance variance per start group. On average, all groups got pretty much equally battered by the wind – the trend line is nearly flat.

Any theories on why the faster riders, not the earlier riders, were less affected by the wind?

I was hoping that this data would allow me to claim that, despite coming in 20 minutes later than last year, I had put in a better effort this year. Sadly, the data disagrees. I came to this conclusion by offsetting my 2019 time by the average variance for my finishing time. This gave me a number that I could compare directly with my 2018 result.

Here’s the formula: 2019 race time / (0.8556952984 x 2019 race time + 0.9321198196). The result is an indication of the time you could have expected had there been no wind.

I’ve worked on the assumption that the 2019 wind was more or less consistent throughout the day and that 2018 was a peach with little to no wind all day. Are these assumptions reasonably accurate?

I scratched a little into differences across ages and genders but I didn’t pick up anything striking.

Gaps / errors in my thinking? Let me know.

How was your overall position relative to 2018?  my time was relatively flat but my position improved by 3300   - I would guess being 20 minutes slower made your position slightly improved on last year - I think I read another statistic earlier in the thread that made an extra 20 minutes in 2019 the average 

[Milosh]

So forgive a quick rant 

 

I have loved the Capecycle tour the last two years and did 2019 with my young son, seeing the guys with multiple tours on their backs get us motivated.

 

We did it on hardtail mountain bikes with nobblies and had a hard ride with wind and rain but toughed it out to finish in 7:21 within the cutoff proper vasbyt stuff 

 

Now I am told that as we did not do it in 7 hrs it is a DNF.

 

I have got around all the other moans and groans about the event, wind or no wind, water or no water, event prices, goodie bags, seeding ,  bike transport cost, flight costs etc all bla bla bla and taken in my stride but this I cant and doubt I will be spending money on this again. 

[dexterdent]

Ja, it was tedious. But I don't even really know what a script is. And I figured that several hours of copying and pasting would give me the quickest results. That was after I called up Racetec to ask if they could send me the data. It was a long shot. They wouldn't budge. Fair enough. They must have their hands quite full after the CTCT, what with all those cyclists phoning in to complain about that infernal rattle of the timing chip.

 

I used the following method to download results from Racetec quickly and easily:

 

https://www.mattmasson.com/2014/11/iterating-over-multiple-pages-of-web-data-using-power-query/

 

If you follow the procedure carefully you should be ready to run a query to download all results from any Racetec-timed race. It takes a couple of minutes to get all the data once you have set it up, and it won't take more than 5 mins to change race/year.

[MudLark]

The cut off was not hours but a particular time of day – 5 PM.

 

See here: https://www.capetowncycletour.com/on-the-route/

 

So if you crossed the line before 5 PM, you should be okay. If you crossed it after 5 PM, it might be a problem. But also see the cut off times along the route at the above URL.

[HdB]

We did it on hardtail mountain bikes with nobblies and had a hard ride with wind and rain but toughed it out to finish in 7:21 within the cutoff proper vasbyt stuff 

 

Now I am told that as we did not do it in 7 hrs it is a DNF.

I do hope this does not discourage you or your son from trying again.

But, the 7 hour cut-off for an official result is according to their rules:

"2.11. Riders are required to complete the Cycle Tour course within 7 (seven) hours to be awarded a result and finishing certificate unless the race organisers determine otherwise."

 

The "unless the race organisers determine otherwise" - not sure how one would go about motivating it to them - with the wind and rain later riders faces it MIGHT be possible, but probably a long shot.

 

Well done to you both on finishing despite the wind and rain though!

[Spoke101]

Sounds right. My Mom was on the side of the road watching at the end of the blue route and she said it was a new sports car that she hadn't seen before. I asked if it was the new M5 and she said no it only had 2 doors.

Sounds like you have a very cool Mom!

Edited March 14, 2019 by Spoke101

[Jehosefat]

So forgive a quick rant 

 

Now I am told that as we did not do it in 7 hrs it is a DNF.

 

That's basically every race I have ever done. If you start earlier than the last group and make all the cut-offs you will be allowed to finish but if you take longer than the last group is allowed you won't get an official time. I'm pretty sure that's a standard thing in races...

[dannygirl]

So forgive a quick rant 

 

I have loved the Capecycle tour the last two years and did 2019 with my young son, seeing the guys with multiple tours on their backs get us motivated.

 

We did it on hardtail mountain bikes with nobblies and had a hard ride with wind and rain but toughed it out to finish in 7:21 within the cutoff proper vasbyt stuff 

 

Now I am told that as we did not do it in 7 hrs it is a DNF.

 

I have got around all the other moans and groans about the event, wind or no wind, water or no water, event prices, goodie bags, seeding ,  bike transport cost, flight costs etc all bla bla bla and taken in my stride but this I cant and doubt I will be spending money on this again. 

 

I feel for you.  

 

As HdB said, the seven hours cut-off is a stated rule - BUT the race organisers have flexibility to push it out...  It seems as though the cut-off time was raised to 8:00 in 2009 (looking at Racetec).  Perhaps they will still make some allowance for the wind and rain?  

 

Edit:  2010 seems to have been pushed out to 7:30 - this year's wind was (to my mind) quite similar. Perhaps a case to be made?

Edited March 14, 2019 by dannygirl

[bbbbburton]

I used the following method to download results from Racetec quickly and easily:

 

https://www.mattmasson.com/2014/11/iterating-over-multiple-pages-of-web-data-using-power-query/

 

If you follow the procedure carefully you should be ready to run a query to download all results from any Racetec-timed race. It takes a couple of minutes to get all the data once you have set it up, and it won't take more than 5 mins to change race/year.

 

I created a script to extract all the data for an event in just a few seconds without any hassle (im not sure how easy power query is), so if you or anyone else wants data for events, DM me and I can send you a csv or json file with the results.