The ride was posted pre 15th but there was confusion about who the ride leader was. Doug and Shelly Jensen posted the ride but put Lucy Ormond a the ride leader since she is the Cactus Hugger organizer. Lucy was contacted for clarification on information on the posting and she stated that she didn't want to be responsible for signing up club members. The ride was removed at that point but after some ensuing emails, it was put back on. Sorry for the confusion. Greg McMurdie wrote:

I thought I would put a question and a comment to the board about club mileage. I've cc'd the mailing list only to provide a public forum in case others have suggestions or comments they would like to make about the content of this email. And as a friend of mine at work would often say, "I have no personal attachment here - feel free to criticize."

If I remember correctly, I noticed that last Saturday's Cactus Hugger 100 was not listed in the ride schedule (I don't have my copy anymore and couldn't find April's newsletter on the web site) and wasn't on the website until a week or so before it took place. I assume it was not in the newsletter since it wasn't submitted before March 15th. My question is - Do we have an official policy for situations such as these? I don't think it's really any big deal, but I posted a question about this same situation last fall and never got a definitive response; e.g. rides scheduled after the 15th of the month (although my specific question was about rides scheduled from October through March). When will exceptions be made and if so, what is the criteria for making exceptions?

I also want to make a suggestion about club miles, if only to put it out as a straw man. On a ride over the winter with a couple of "polar bears", we talked about what the club could do to encourage people to ride more. A suggestion was made that we should look at all the different levels of mileage people ride in the club and provide incentives or rewards (just as we do now w/ jerseys, etc.) for those who improve upon their previous year's total. For example, let's say a person rode 240 miles last year with the club. This year, they ride 480 - a 100% improvement from the previous year. Then let's say that there are 500 mile thresholds for giving out rewards - 500, 1,000, 1,500 and so on. Since this person rode 480 miles by the end of the year, they would be eligible for some type of reward for riders who rode less than 500 miles. The person who had the highest percentage increase would receive some type of benefit.

One pro to doing something like this is that it would encourage active participation among all levels of the club, not just the top few who log a lot of miles with the club. Another pro is that it encourages personal fitness and allows people to set and achieve personal mileage goals. Perhaps the greatest drawback is administrative - e.g. at the end of the year, calculating everyone's total. However, since not everyone is interested in club mileage, we could ask that only those interested submit their mileage achievements for a quick review before the year end banquet.

Thanks in advance for any comments by the board. I appreciate all the work all of you do to help run the club. And it already looks like the club is going to break another club mileage record this year with over 26,500 miles recorded and we're not even into spring form.

Greg McMurdie

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