Gauteng Road Race Championships

[Danger Dassie]

The main reason, and this has been the issue for years, well before covid. Provincials are not communicated, advertised or marketed well. At all. 
Where they have, which is rarely, they’ve been well attended by both supporters and competition. 
I saw and heard more about WP than anything about Gauteng where I live.

KZN and WP have often been the most consistent overall. Gauteng could perhaps take a page from MTB in the last year or so. Can also appreciate how difficult it can be with all the BS politics and bureaucracy.

[Fred van Vlaanderen]

6 minutes ago, Danger Dassie said:

The main reason, and this has been the issue for years, well before covid. Provincials are not communicated, advertised or marketed well. At all. 
Where they have, which is rarely, they’ve been well attended by both supporters and competition. 
I saw and heard more about WP than anything about Gauteng where I live.

KZN and WP have often been the most consistent overall. Gauteng could perhaps take a page from MTB in the last year or so. Can also appreciate how difficult it can be with all the BS politics and bureaucracy.

Agreed. I didn’t even know it was now.

[Frosty]

I wonder how much belonging to a club, vs not, plays a difference in knowing what happens? We have 3 members that receive all the communication from Gauteng Cycling, and we share that with club members.

Perhaps it’s also because we are on the club WhatsApp group.

But then I look at another club with a lot more members than my club, yet they only have a handful of members that race. The ratio between racing vs riding is probably between 1:10 and 1:20. Seems people just want to ride their bikes. 

We had a 6.67% turnout this weekend (3 out of 45 club members).

[stringbean]

I think it’s basically same story everywhere.WP champs we had 8 elite ladies and that included a coupler vets that chose to race elites.Attakwas had only 12 elite ladies in class.

I don’t think organisers realise how guys are struggling out there.

If you add entry fee,petrol etc just to get to start line guys are going to be very picky what races they enter.Wonder how many people will make it down to oudtshoorn for SA’S.

 

[Zeffer]

454 entries for this weekend makes it the biggest field since Gauteng champs 2019 at Union Buildings.

And a bit bigger than SA champs 😉

[Zeffer]

3 hours ago, Frosty said:

I wonder how much belonging to a club, vs not, plays a difference in knowing what happens? We have 3 members that receive all the communication from Gauteng Cycling, and we share that with club members.

Perhaps it’s also because we are on the club WhatsApp group.

But then I look at another club with a lot more members than my club, yet they only have a handful of members that race. The ratio between racing vs riding is probably between 1:10 and 1:20. Seems people just want to ride their bikes. 

We had a 6.67% turnout this weekend (3 out of 45 club members).

Nice Frosty.

I am all for the club structures looking after its members.

The 2023 Gauteng colours policy was sent out to all clubs. Would be interesting to see how many clubs do send it to the members though.

[wattnow]

10 hours ago, stringbean said:

I think it’s basically same story everywhere.WP champs we had 8 elite ladies and that included a coupler vets that chose to race elites.Attakwas had only 12 elite ladies in class.

I don’t think organisers realise how guys are struggling out there.

If you add entry fee,petrol etc just to get to start line guys are going to be very picky what races they enter.Wonder how many people will make it down to oudtshoorn for SA’S.

 

It still blows my mind that SA Champs is held in Oudtshoorn. I recall the SA champs in Pretoria in 2019, the crowds were huge, the number of entries seemed postive and then we go an move it around to a little town that is not central to much. If you want to have it in CPT then have it in CPT, not somewhere that makes logistics a nightmare. Just my 2 cents. 

If CSA want to grow the numbers/sport, make it easy to participate.

[warick_wrx]

14 minutes ago, wattnow said:

It still blows my mind that SA Champs is held in Oudtshoorn. I recall the SA champs in Pretoria in 2019, the crowds were huge, the number of entries seemed postive and then we go an move it around to a little town that is not central to much. If you want to have it in CPT then have it in CPT, not somewhere that makes logistics a nightmare. Just my 2 cents. 

If CSA want to grow the numbers/sport, make it easy to participate.

Bloem would probably be fair to all !

[Holmsie]

17 minutes ago, wattnow said:

It still blows my mind that SA Champs is held in Oudtshoorn. I recall the SA champs in Pretoria in 2019, the crowds were huge, the number of entries seemed postive and then we go an move it around to a little town that is not central to much. If you want to have it in CPT then have it in CPT, not somewhere that makes logistics a nightmare. Just my 2 cents. 

If CSA want to grow the numbers/sport, make it easy to participate.

I'd argue that Oudtshoorn is fair to all. It's out of everybody's way. 

[Spinnekop]

8 hours ago, Zeffer said:

Nice Frosty.

I am all for the club structures looking after its members.

The 2023 Gauteng colours policy was sent out to all clubs. Would be interesting to see how many clubs do send it to the members though.

Well........I am part of two of the biggest clubs in Pretoria.
None was received.

The whole colors policy is a joke in my opinion.  Looking at other sports cycling is different and it does not favor the consistent strong riders. 
I got my colors both in TT and road.  So it doesn't phase me.

Other sports would have provincials as a SELECTOR and MUST-DO race for SA champs.  If you don't get selected for your province, you can't go to SA's.  It has to be an honor to compete at SA champs.
Then you might get entries again for provincials.  You don't just race for "colors" that, in my case means a thingy on my garage wall.......you race to be selected for your province to go to SA's

My 2c

 

 

[Frosty]

8 minutes ago, Spinnekop said:

Well........I am part of two of the biggest clubs in Pretoria.
None was received.

Maybe you should ask your club(s) why you aren’t receiving the information. The mail starts with “Please distribute to your club members.”

I agree that racing at SA’s should be based on being selected for one’s province. Likewise, we have regions too, so Provincials should be based on regional selection too. Regionals can use the normal races to base their selections.

[Zeffer]

15 minutes ago, Spinnekop said:

Well........I am part of two of the biggest clubs in Pretoria.
None was received.

The whole colors policy is a joke in my opinion.  Looking at other sports cycling is different and it does not favor the consistent strong riders. 
I got my colors both in TT and road.  So it doesn't phase me.

Other sports would have provincials as a SELECTOR and MUST-DO race for SA champs.  If you don't get selected for your province, you can't go to SA's.  It has to be an honor to compete at SA champs.
Then you might get entries again for provincials.  You don't just race for "colors" that, in my case means a thingy on my garage wall.......you race to be selected for your province to go to SA's

My 2c

 

 

Valid points on colours.

It used to be like that. you were selected for SAs. Dont know why it changed - might well have been numbers.

So the road commission is working on sometihn like this. For youth SAs, the SA champs is also an interprovincial competition. Riders are selected, provincials is a required race, and a winning provinces is awarded a floating trophy. Gauteng won it 2020 and WC 2021.

One of the challenges with this, even at that young age, is riders want to race in club/sponsored kit, not in Gauteng kit - we overcame that with provincial sox - great initiative. Every province riders are recognisable by their provincial socks. Quite cool.

Maybe one day we can try that for elites/vets too.

Apology for the overshare but there are people behind the scenes slaving to improve things in babysteps so your points are noticed Spinnekop.

[Underachiever]

38 minutes ago, Holmsie said:

I'd argue that Oudtshoorn is fair to all. It's out of everybody's way. 

Better than Hoedspruit.....

[Popit]

1 hour ago, wattnow said:

It still blows my mind that SA Champs is held in Oudtshoorn. I recall the SA champs in Pretoria in 2019, the crowds were huge, the number of entries seemed postive and then we go an move it around to a little town that is not central to much. If you want to have it in CPT then have it in CPT, not somewhere that makes logistics a nightmare. Just my 2 cents. 

If CSA want to grow the numbers/sport, make it easy to participate.

Wattnow , I heard the reason it is in Oudtshoorn is cause they were about the only province that put their hand up to hold the event . I was told Gauteng /Gauteng North didn't even apply . Not at all sure if this is true , but it does sound like there could be some merit to it .

[wattnow]

3 minutes ago, Popit said:

Wattnow , I heard the reason it is in Oudtshoorn is cause they were about the only province that put their hand up to hold the event . I was told Gauteng /Gauteng North didn't even apply . Not at all sure if this is true , but it does sound like there could be some merit to it .

That is possibly even more more mind blowing then.... Having no idea on the actual costs behind it all but my assumption would be it wouldnt cost that much more than hosting provincials? So Gauteng for example just hosted us in the cradle, how much more would it cost to have SA champs there?

Im sure there must be a lot of complexities behind the scenes that we are all not aware of. Well I hope so because if not then it doesnt make sense.

[babse]

13 hours ago, Danger Dassie said:

The main reason, and this has been the issue for years, well before covid. Provincials are not communicated, advertised or marketed well. At all. 
Where they have, which is rarely, they’ve been well attended by both supporters and competition. 
I saw and heard more about WP than anything about Gauteng where I live.

KZN and WP have often been the most consistent overall. Gauteng could perhaps take a page from MTB in the last year or so. Can also appreciate how difficult it can be with all the BS politics and bureaucracy.

why is this?

lack of funding? 

lack of paid and responsible people in the right positions?

 

I did the WC event 2 weeks back. Ran like an event in the 90s. No online info (im not on FB), entry needed to be filled out on paper and sent to a certain person and then there was no timing system. I never made the official results posted a week and half later and not even bothered to query. 

 

The very next week, the Winelands Cycle Race is Marketed, communicated and run proper with decent timing (racetec).