PPA What can they Do?

[Guest Frail4Life]

Your Question.

[Guest Frail4Life]

We as a community need to offer our youth of Today a SAFE and HEALTHY sport and way of life.

 

Website up and working?

New Timing Company?

New Seeding system?

[Guest coenie]

HUH? Did you ask them these questions? Was this their repsonse?

[Guest Frail4Life]

HUH? Did you ask them these questions? Was this their repsonse?

 

YES 

 

frail2010-06-02 20:46:19

[rpedro]

Its time to strike !!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Tankman]

They obviously have no clue!

 

 

 

1. there was no update for over 3 months??

 

7. haha - yea right!

 

8. I saw a car pull out in front of a bunch at Simonsvlei

 

9. he/she was missing the point of the question, water tables at end of the ride not the beginning is what is needed

 

11.  How do the development/idiot riders get into the league?  Do we really

need to open that can of worms again?

 

12. real cyclist want longer routes 120km plus, not shorter

[Woofie]

My comments in Red

 

1.    Website up and working' date=' No Error? Yes, all sections are up and running.

 

Ok, maybe right now it is up, but I have given up trying to use it because it wasnt right

 

. Seeding Update, When? Still happens on a monthly basis, unless there was a problem with the event data (not suitable for seeding; not enough participants etc) eg Malmesbury

 

Not going to even bother commenting.....

 

 

 

2.     New Seeding system, Old is outdated? David Clarke constantly revises the seeding calculations and indeed did so again after the Cycle Tour

 

We need to see the actual calculations now. You also cant base 150 000 cyclists in this country on 1 race. You need to balance it out more like the super seeding ladder.

 

4. Cyclist Banned, White Line? Yes they do get disqualified and a report will be presented as to many were DQed in the last season, after due disciplinary procedures are followed. At last count these were more than 100. We can perhaps include this sort of info in the emails to database.

 

Yes they do in the league sections. But I have never seen one DQ'ed where I am. Riding at F/G/H group things get pretty nasty with monster size groups. People are everywhere. I have seen so many times where people just just just missed cars. The whiteline rule needs to get pushed harder everywhere. It is just for safety.

 

 

 

5. More respect for Think Bike, Do they get a Salary? No they do not get a salary as such, but a R300 contribution per bike gets paid to ThinkBike to cover their fuel etc costs. Most cyclists are very appreciative of the difficult work they do. PPA carries these costs in order to assist with safety at events.

 

We all like having the guys helping. More needs to be done to encourage more support and help. Maybe we should marshal them on their breakfast runs on our bicycles? haha

 

6. Not Allowing Bunches to join, Creating a danger? Care is taken to keep bunches apart, but you cannot lengthen the gaps between starting groups any more than we already do as it will take too long to get some road events out. Sometimes bunches simply ride negatively/slowly and then you cannot prevent the next bunch from catching. League bunches that have officials with them, are not allowed to join and are policed as such

 

This is a major, major problem. With the current seeding system, there is a major bottle neck (too many people) at F,G,H,I groups and these groups are often together at races and with 100+ riders with no road closure and slow medical support / not enough marshalls, it gets very nasty. They need to maybe even prevent sub groups from joining as well. Maybe down to like J or something. We will need more marshalls to control this but it is more needed here than it is needed in the league groups.....

 

 

 

7. Cycle Accidents, caused by "new Cyclist" wrong seeding? None

 

This will always happen. People make mistakes.

 

8. Demarcated parking areas, not at Finish Line? The issue has been addressed after Simonsvlei and has not occurred again. The onus is also on cyclists to obey parking and other marshals. Having said that, no parked cars at Simonsvlei actually interfered with the finish line and did not cause any accidents

 

 

 

9. Water tables with Coke or Powerade, not at 10km but last 10 / 5 km? Organisers try to keep costs and entry fees as low as possible, and adding more water points would add more costs. A 750ml bottle of water should last a cyclist more than an hour / 25km. We also recommend that cyclists carry two water bottles, which should be enough to almost complete the Cycle Tour. If cyclists stop and fill up at all water points, then they should never run out of water. In hot conditions, additional water is delivered to water points and marshalling and sweep vehicles normally also carry additional water. Coke and Powerade cost money, which would again add to the entry fees, which organisers try to keep as low as possible ? Coke sponsors only the cup at the finish, anything else needs to be bought

 

I do agree with them. We need to keep costs down. Most people will finish the race with what you are carrying. Maybe some coke or something at the last water stop will be nice but only the back markers will use it though.

 

10. Team / parents vehicle, One allocated for backup in each or every third bunch? No. Traffic authorities are very specific on this, and has indeed advised us that we need to cut down even more on support vehicles for league events. The support vehicles simply cause too many traffic hazards; cyclists need to be self-supportive, or get picked up in the official sweep vehicles if they have mechanical problems. PPA cycling marshals also assist

 

I do agree. The less cars on the road the better. Accidents happen. And when it is a 2 ton ball of steel it will take out the whole group.

 

11. NEW cyclist Must Qualify to ride Long, First short route to Qualify?    That is why seeding is done

 

Initial seeding yes, but horrible at lower groups.

 

12. More short route options If possible, yes. Most routes already use the short route options in the area and there are not necessarily more routes available. In some cases, organisers have tried shorter routes but, due to lack of participation, gave those up again as they were not utilized sufficiently and added to overall event costs - More routes mean more marshals and traffic, more water points and logistics, i.e. increased costs

 

 

 

, No need for Day Licence? PPA members and cyclists who belong to any club or affiliate of CSA, do not need to pay any day license fees. For non-members, CSA has agreed that no Day License is needed for UNTIMED routes, which you?ll see in the email to database every week ? some short routes are not timed and for those, no Day License is needed.

 

[/quote']

 

Well UNTIMED routes are not races then. The CSA wants alot for doing very little in this country.

[Bikalot]

do this again, leave the question in black writing and put the answer in red,bit confusing as it is

[rpedro]

11.  How do the development/idiot riders get into the league?  Do we really need to open that can of worms again?

 

There are certain qualifying criteria and I would like to believe that counts for all irrespective. Unfortunately you get fast idiots and they come in all flavors :-)<?: prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Like I said.....it?s time to strike..........amandla !!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Christopher Brunsdon]

I will not be renewing my PPA membership this but instead will join another org (not here to hijack this thread).

 

At least these guys are present at races, even though many are PPA organised, and they actually do good things.

 

After the Argus MTB, seeding is a wank. I did enough races to get at least a seeding and they dumped in the last group.

 

[Woofie]

I will not be renewing my PPA membership this but instead will join another org (not here to hijack this thread).At least these guys are present at races' date=' even though many are PPA organised, and they actually do good things.After the Argus MTB, seeding is a wank. I did enough races to get at least a seeding and they dumped in the last group.

 

[/quote']

 

 

 

No, not a hijack.

 

We have been griping over here as well.

 

https://www.bikehub.co.za/forum_posts.asp?TID=81074&PN=11

 

 

 

I am not going to renew my membership until I really really have to. I am a roadie so what other choice do I really have?

 

 

 

But if enough of us stand together and dont renew our memberships they will quickly wake up and realise that they need to sort their cr@p out.

 

 

 

We need to put together a list of the few top complaints and resolutions (maybe like 5 or so) that we need addressed.

 

We need to get this going quite quickly before people start thinking about league etc.

 

 

 

We almost need a "union" for cyclists.

 

Every big organization out there has a group protecting the interests of its members and sadly we almost need the same thing now.

 

The ppa was meant to be the face of cycling to the public, looking at why the cycle tour started etc.

 

But in recent years what are they really doing now?

 

Now and then when a cyclist dies on the road we have a little one liner in the newspaper from them.

 

 

 

Time to stop griping.

 

 

 

Go and read the other post.

 

 

 

Choose your top complaint(s) and how you think we can fix it and then we need to start a new thread and work with some ideas.

 

We dont have the time and money to start a new cycling company, so the only option is to force the ppa to make changes.

 

 

[Guest coenie]

 

I will not be renewing my PPA membership this but instead will join another org (not here to hijack this thread).

 

At least these guys are present at races' date=' even though many are PPA organised, and they actually do good things.

 

After the Argus MTB, seeding is a wank. I did enough races to get at least a seeding and they dumped in the last group.

 

[/quote']

 

what / who are you joining?

 

[Guest Frail4Life]

Waiting for your issues.

[firewolf]

anybody else get an "Error 404" report type thing when trying to access personal seeding via the ID number route on the PPA site?

[Guest Frail4Life]

anybody else get an "Error 404" report type thing when trying to access personal seeding via the ID number route on the PPA site?

 

 

 

All the time. One of the issues.

[Guest Frail4Life]

Please post your complaints.

 

 

 

I have contact PPA with some complaints have a look at their reply. Not satisfied.