Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by David Berry on November 8, 2009 at 4:19pm

Yes, a couple of interesting things that I noticed.

First, the first 200 km brevet is in early May, not late April. So there is only two weeks between the 200 km and 300 km.

Second, it looks like they are offering a 200 km each weekend there are brevets. I think this is a good idea, so maybe some folks who can't make the initial 200 km or aren't ready to try the longer brevets have some more options.

I'm interested in what the route changes may be. I am assuming they are going to do something with those roads around Verona? I wonder if they will try to avoid Verona all together. I know last year Verona said they didn't want any arrows painted on their roads.

Permalink Reply by Joe on November 9, 2009 at 2:30am

Yeah, I wouldn't mind it if we avoided highway M coming into Verona one bit, most of the route from Oregon to Verona seemed pretty busy to me. And the 200's, that might increase the rider numbers, not everybody wants to ride 250 miles in a day.

Permalink Reply by mike w. on November 9, 2009 at 7:26am

i didn't mind the traffic on M near Verona too much, at least there's enough room at the shoulders. That long drag up and over that cemetery along there was one of my least favourite stretches, though. For me, the real pain along the 300 began beyond Verona and ran all the way to Sauk.

i'm none too fond of the stretch of Hwy 51 near Stoughton, and another outside of Milton -Hwy26(IIRC.)

The other stretch of the other CR M between Delevan and Milton is a place very much like Hell due to the open country and wind...

Arrows in Verona weren't much of an issue on the 300 since the older Permanent arrows were still visible.

Joe said:

Yeah, I wouldn't mind it if we avoided highway M coming into Verona one bit, most of the route from Oregon to Verona seemed pretty busy to me. And the 200's, that might increase the rider numbers, not everybody wants to ride 250 miles in a day.

Permalink Reply by Joe on November 9, 2009 at 8:07am

Well the real pain did begin there for sure but I remember a little headwind up to Verona that day too.... ;)

mike w. said:

For me, the real pain along the 300 began beyond Verona and ran all the way to Sauk.


Joe said:

Yeah, I wouldn't mind it if we avoided highway M coming into Verona one bit, most of the route from Oregon to Verona seemed pretty busy to me. And the 200's, that might increase the rider numbers, not everybody wants to ride 250 miles in a day.

Permalink Reply by mike w. on November 9, 2009 at 3:55pm

"A little" headwind? LOL i believe it was at least a half-gale! Nearly blew me off the bike once or twice.
The wind on the April 200 was no joke, either.... it shifted on me into a headwind both ways!

Joe said:

Well the real pain did begin there for sure but I remember a little headwind up to Verona that day too.... ;)

mike w. said:

For me, the real pain along the 300 began beyond Verona and ran all the way to Sauk.


Joe said:

Yeah, I wouldn't mind it if we avoided highway M coming into Verona one bit, most of the route from Oregon to Verona seemed pretty busy to me. And the 200's, that might increase the rider numbers, not everybody wants to ride 250 miles in a day.

Permalink Reply by David Berry on November 9, 2009 at 6:37pm

I think County M to Verona was universally disliked by about everyone. On the 200 km, it was pouring rain while Jon and I were going down that stretch. So we got a lot of splatter from all the traffic. Plus, the shoulder is pretty tore up. So a different route into Verona would be great.

I actually kind of like the turnaround to be in Verona. It is a town of some size, so if you need something (like a bike shop) they have that.

I was able to get all of my wind tunnel testing for the year done on the 300 km last year.

Permalink Reply by Joe on November 10, 2009 at 3:04am

Oh yeah, I had almost gotten over the terror of heavy rain, heavy high speed traffic, poor visibility, and a flat on the stretch of M last year LOL! Struggling to hold a wheel, shivering, thinking "damn I wish I had a cycling cap about now" and "how nice dry gloves would feel. Good times! :)

Permalink Reply by mike w. on November 10, 2009 at 3:19pm

Got into a change of dry clothes at Verona on the 200. That and the hot soup i got at a Speedway in Stoughton made all the difference.

Joe said:

Oh yeah, I had almost gotten over the terror of heavy rain, heavy high speed traffic, poor visibility, and a flat on the stretch of M last year LOL! Struggling to hold a wheel, shivering, thinking "damn I wish I had a cycling cap about now" and "how nice dry gloves would feel. Good times! :)

Permalink Reply by Rob Mohler on November 26, 2009 at 6:21am

A couple of us are going to Wisconsin in mid-December to look for new routes. I'd like to hear your thoughts before we go look at some different roads.

One idea is to look at routes heading west toward Mount Horeb and running a counterclockwise loop out to Dodgeville, New Glarus, Brodhead and back to Delavan. I believe there used to be brevets that passed through Oregon, which would allow us to bypass Verona. (David Berry - your comment about bike shops in Verona is well noted.) RUSA rules offer the biggest challenge with a route heading northwest out of Delavan. If RUSA sees any potential shortcuts, they require a secret or informational control to prevent cheats..hence the informational controls in the 2009 brevets. (Not that I've ever known someone to cheat, but these are the rules.) County M makes life difficult from this perspective since it cuts a pretty sharp northwest path.

I like the idea of offering many 200ks during the season. It's highly likely that riders just getting into the sport are going to receive a very cold, and rainy, reception if the only 200k is in early May. ...better to give them a chance at a warm weather 200k.

Permalink Reply by David Berry on December 3, 2009 at 6:13pm

One thought here Rob. All of the rides don't have to be the same. I mean, this year, the 300 km was basically an extension of the 200 km. The 400 km used the first 150 km of the 300 k before going off on its own. I like the 400 km route, and I would like it to be similar. But why can't that first 200 km be something different. Maybe you are right, we head out New Glarus way. Maybe we head down towards Beloit and into Illinois.

I see a couple advantages to this. First is obviously variety. For those of us who will ride multiple brevets, this would be nice. It might also encourage someone who is only ready to do 200 k brevets to do multiple brevets since the routes and challenges will be different. Second, for those of us doing multiple brevets, navigation would be a little different on each route. We wouldn't be able to have the route memorized by the 400 k. And navigation is supposed to be an important part of randonneuring.

Of course, this is more work to develop more routes, so you and the leadership of GLR need to balance that out. I think some different routes for the different dates might be worth consideration though.

Rob Mohler said:

A couple of us are going to Wisconsin in mid-December to look for new routes. I'd like to hear your thoughts before we go look at some different roads.

One idea is to look at routes heading west toward Mount Horeb and running a counterclockwise loop out to Dodgeville, New Glarus, Brodhead and back to Delavan. I believe there used to be brevets that passed through Oregon, which would allow us to bypass Verona. (David Berry - your comment about bike shops in Verona is well noted.) RUSA rules offer the biggest challenge with a route heading northwest out of Delavan. If RUSA sees any potential shortcuts, they require a secret or informational control to prevent cheats..hence the informational controls in the 2009 brevets. (Not that I've ever known someone to cheat, but these are the rules.) County M makes life difficult from this perspective since it cuts a pretty sharp northwest path.

I like the idea of offering many 200ks during the season. It's highly likely that riders just getting into the sport are going to receive a very cold, and rainy, reception if the only 200k is in early May. ...better to give them a chance at a warm weather 200k.

Permalink Reply by Joe on December 4, 2009 at 2:34am

Variety is nice but I like that they were built on one-another. For example, with the 300K it really "began" in Verona, 400K kinda "started" in Sauk City, for the 600K you just rode the 400K again and then it "really started". At least....for a guy trying to work his way thru his first series it made it a bit easier. But different routes would be fine too, I guess I'll be happy either way :)

Permalink Reply by Bill Watts on December 18, 2009 at 10:57am

I would be interested in hearing from anyone who might be interested in sharing a room in Delavan. I am planning to do 300K on May 1 and 15, 400 on June 5 and 600 on June 26. I'm coming from Indianapolis, am quiet, and am just interested in getting a good night's sleep before and after rides.

Bill Watts

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