By now you’ve heard about some changes coming to big bicycle events this summer. What do these changes mean for you and your bike friends? Join us on December 1 for a special opportunity to get informed and have all your questions answered by official representatives of RAGBRAI and Iowa’s Ride.
Schedule
Noon – Doors open, beer and pizza sales start
1 PM – RAGBRAI presentation and Q&A (Anne Lawrie)
2:30 PM – Break
2:45 PM – Iowa’s Ride presentation and Q&A (TJ Juskiewicz)
4:15 PM – Have a beer with your team and discuss what you learned
6 PM – Event ends
No admission fee. Everyone is welcome.
40 Replies
Anybody that is planning on attending this meeting should consider wearing their helmets if the beer is going to be flowing.
Hope this gets recorded/video. Inquiring minds….
What HE^ said.
Anne Laurie will be there to announce the new Ragbrai team.
This may also include positive news on registration numbers. -opinion only-
TJ is going to struggle to sound even remotely relevant.
At least there will be plenty of beer.
Did anyone go to this yesterday?
The beer was great!!
I did not go and I have heard curiously little about the event. Perhaps not much happened? When I opened my email at work this morning I was greeted by the latest email from PBV. They were at the event and they summarized it like this:
“If there was one theme that stood out to us today, Porkers, it was the word “stewardship.” Both Anne and Dieter referred to themselves as stewards, emphasizing the uniqueness and the value of our favorite Iowa tradition. It was clear that they take seriously the responsibility of guiding it, caring for it, and keeping it safe. Interestingly, they didn’t claim sole responsibility for that. We’re paraphrasing here, but Dieter said something like this: “I’m thrilled to be RAGBRAI’s new director, but someday after I’m gone, the success of this great ride will not be dependent on me.” RAGBRAI depends, he said, on the many communities, partners, charters, vendors, churches, non-profits, the Troopers, the Iowans who live along the routes, the RAGBRAI staff, and of course, the riders. ”
They said a little more but nothing that has not been reported in the Register announcement of the new director. Obviously their take was RAGBRAI focused, I have not heard anything about IR’s presentation.
The only thing I heard that was news to me was that TJ is limiting his ride to 5000. Also that next year who is to say they do something other that a cross state ride. That and meeting the new RAGBRAI director.
Joseph Schlau shared this link in another thread.
Here is a link to the facebook page with two videos of today’s talks at
Fat Hill Brewing. Scroll down a bit for the second one.
https://www.facebook.com/northiowatouringclub/
One question that was asked of Dieter was how many Ragbrai’s have you done? Which he replied ,”none”. I think in all fairness TJ should have been asked ,how many Iowa Rides have you done? None !
[quote quote=1313497]“If there was one theme that stood out to us today, Porkers, it was the word “stewardship.” Both Anne and Dieter referred to themselves as stewards, emphasizing the uniqueness and the value of our favorite Iowa tradition. It was clear that they take seriously the responsibility of guiding it, caring for it, and keeping it safe.
[/quote]
It is interesting, the comments they made KenH. The sense of the RAGBRAI tradition and that its more important then the people who are currently caring for this great event. Just what RAGBRAI needs on the heals of all this commotion. I’m sure they will be working hard on maintaining RAGBRAI this first year. After that I hope to hear some new outside the box ideas also. Like:
1) changing 1 or more of the loops to be an extended alternate route rather then crowding the part of the route they have in common.
2) On northern or southern routes, a dip into neighboring states like the TDF does with countries.
3) A shorter route with 1 day being an optional loop ride or rest day. 2 nights in the same town.
4) Ideas for IR and RAGBRAI working together beyond the obvious one of the starting/ending towns being the same.
Any other outside the box ideas? (now that IR has the east to west thing covered)
[quote quote=1313501]One question that was asked of Dieter was how many Ragbrai’s have you done? Which he replied ,”none”. I think in all fairness TJ should have been asked ,how many Iowa Rides have you done? None ![/quote]
Another question for TJ, in light of the fact that your ridership is down to 5,000, (maybe), how much is projected to go to all of those charities you spoke of?
And, while we’re at it, is your salary, and those of your staff going to be cut by 75% too. Remember, on your FAQ section, you promised you were going to post your W2’s because it was not about money. Why should you receive the same salary you had on Ragbrai if your ride is now going to be much smaller. The Iowa’s (small) Ride.
But then again, you said a lot of things that were not true since October 15th.
Having just watched the TJ video from yesterday and I can say that it all sounds good but I still do not like how everything went down. It did nothing for me to change my mind.
I will be riding RAGBRAI and I look forward to the best RAGBRAI ever with Dieter and the new crew.
How many people were in attendance, from the one video it looked like maybe 100 at most?
I would guess less than one hundred. I live a mile away so I couldn’t not go. When they asked for questions from the RAGBRAI peeps it was just crickets. It took a bit for people to speak up. The big issue in most people’s minds was the charity aspect. I’m not sure that we learned anything new on that point but Anne did say they would look into posting what percentage of the rider fees went to charities.