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[RC] NC Ride East-West - k s swigartMKS said: A couple of years ago I was looking at the membership numbers by region thinking that might have something to do with it. I found this wasn't necessarily the case. The NE and SE are pretty strong regions. To me that says it's might be more of a cultural issue within AERC. It probably is. From my experience and from talking to people who have ridden in both the east and the west, one of the cultural differences is that there are more people in the east who are interested in the race (i.e. the competition against other riders rather than the competition against the trail). And it is only in a race where it matters one whit who else has shown up. I know very few riders who care very much at all about going to compete against the "best of the best" the purpose for driving a long distance is not to compete against other riders, it is to compete against a tough trail (or to see a pretty trail). So yes, I (and a lot of other riders I know in the west who might make a long drive)might make the long drive to Virginia to pit myself against the Old Dominion. And I might make the not quite as long drive to Wyoming to pit myself against the Big Horn. But I don't give a shit about competing against Stagg Newman (or any other fill in the blank name). I cannot, of course, speak for everybody in the west, but since it was the culture of "the competition is the trail" that is prevalent in the part of the AERC that _I_ see (being in the west) that attracted me to the sport in the first place, I know that that is the overriding culture out here. Steph told me that when she went to the SE to compete with Kruschev (many long years ago :)), that it was quite different. What she said was, "Oh yes, down there it is a RACE." And if you look at the finishing times of most of the rides, this seems more prevalent. There are few rides in the SE where people take the whole 12 hours to finish a 50. kat Orange County, Calif. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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