Just in case you had heard about our troubles getting a commissaire, someone has stepped up (George who was there last week, thanks George!) and so we are going racing as planned.
This week sees the women’s race expand to a Regional A Circuit 2/3/4, same as the open 2/3/4 which means 15 points for a win!
The open 2/3/4 is looking good at 11 entries but the women’s and open 4 are still short of the ten entries to be eligible for the full points, otherwise it’s 3, 2 and 1 for the top three only (as per BC regulations). Time to rope in some friends!
You can enter here, but we also have a very empty volunteer sheet so far, so please click here to sign up either yourself or a friend/family member you can bring along. No volunteers means no races!
Week #2 Results
With life getting in the way I’m afraid I only just uploaded the results from week #2 so hopefully BC will make those official tomorrow. Apologies.
Race at Preston Park every week!!
In case you didn’t know, SCRL run an 18 week track league through the summer every Wednesday evening from mid April until mid August. As luck would have it, track accreditation is scheduled to run right after the racing this week! So if you are racing anyway and local enough to pop down of a Wednesday evening why not try it out? We have a few bikes for hire, for those of you that do not have a fixed gear bike, and these are “one and done” sessions lasting about three hours, so why not give it a try? You’re already at the track, what have you got to lose? Sign up for accreditation here or read more about the process and our track league here.
We will also need some people to marshal that for a couple of hours. Please sign up for that here.
The entries are starting to build up, but where are all the women racers? If it looks like there will be no entries at all we may cancel that race and replace it with something else to make use of the track time.
Volunteers are good for race #1 but races #2 and #3 are still missing volunteers, so please sign up here to make sure the day goes ahead.
If you don’t already, you might be interested in racing our track league through the summer every Wednesday evening. If you have UKVA accreditation, it would be great to see you at our weekly league this year. If you are not UKVA accredited, read on …
Track Accreditation
We have arranged two track accreditation sessions to run on Sundays March 5th and 12th, right after the races finish. These will cover both parts 1 and 2 of the accreditation at once so that there is no need to arrange a second session (note that this is NOT UKVA accreditation, read more about that here).
Accreditation is for senior riders. Youth members of PPYCC and VCJ will be accredited at their regular Saturday morning sessions. If you are (or are a parent of) a youth rider not a member of these clubs, please contact us for suitable options.
We will also require volunteers to marshal the track, just the same as racing. Please sign up here or get a friend to. No experience is necessary.
These sessions will also be open to already accredited racers (seniors and youth A/B only) to get some track time and to help out. There is no charge for these riders, just turn up.
Well that’s the first one done and dusted, we are away! Thanks once again to ALL the volunteers who helped out to do their bit and keep the racing alive.
Provisional results are available against the event on the BC website here.
The sun shone on us for a great mornings racing but I’m afraid I managed to not get any pictures, but here’s a still from the finish line video of TAAP Endura rider Jamie Pullen throwing it across the line just in front of PP One Resourcing RT’s Paul Barnard from the 2/3 race.
If you have any pictures of this or the other races to share do please put them on our Facebook open group SCRL Racers Forum.
We are still a bit light on marshal volunteers for week #2, so please put your name down at this link. Which leads us on to some more serious news on the volunteer front.
Become a British Cycling official & volunteer
As well as the local volunteers we always need, we also need British Cycling officials to run BC sanctioned races.
With the usual levels of retirements and relocation over the past few years but with the addition of COVID preventing racing and thus, being able to train new officials, the South East is now VERY short on the volunteers required to act in an official capacity (i.e. commissaires). Whilst being a circuit race on an extremely small circuit reduces our need somewhat (we essentially only need commissaires) some of our winter series races are in doubt due to the lack of qualified officials.
Other events, such as road races, face a similar issue across the board in race officials, AMS volunteers (which are becoming more of a requirement to get police clearance for road races), convoy drivers, motorcycle marshals etc.
So it has never been more important for the racing community to come together to do their bit if we want to keep road and circuit racing alive.
Please have a read of the British Cycling “workforce” page here and consider any roles you might be able to fill.
The list of courses currently open and their locations are here.
If you have a number of people willing to take on a particular role, perhaps from your club, you might be able to get BC to arrange extra courses to run. Each section in the list of courses above has links for the appropriate people at British Cycling to contact.
There is a healthy entry list for the open 2/3 races and the marshalling for the first race has been filled by the 2/3 riders. Kudos to you for stepping up!
Unfortunately the open 4th cat and the womens 3/4 cat are not looking so good right now. As a result the marshalling is looking thin on the ground for the other two races.
We need cover for all races or none of them will proceed (I hardly think anyone expects riders to turn up and marshal a race if they aren’t getting a race).
If you or someone else can cover a marshalling duty please help the league out and sign up. Or if you are an entrant try to persuade a friend to come along and cover for your race. The times for the races can be found on the calendar page.
To sign up to help as a marshal at the first race click here.
Just a quick note to say that winter circuits entry is now open on RiderHQ. Click here to enter.
The calendar of events for the winter series is here.
The event cannot run unless we have marshal cover. You can sign up for all events here, or just go straight to signing up for the first one here.
Its easy to both race and marshal:
Race #3 riders can cover race #1 then warm up during race #2
Race #1 riders can cover race #2
Race #2 riders can cover race #3
There’s usually a free hot drink from coops coffee van in it for you, as well as the warm and fuzzy feeling that you are helping keep the local racing going!
Now that we have the requisite key volunteer roles filled the series is being registered with British Cycling and entry systems are being set up. There will be another post once they go live.
We will still need marshalling volunteers (5 per race) and the sign up page for that will open very soon. If every entrant just did one slot nobody would probably have to do more than one. We suggest the following:
Race 3 riders marshal race 1, warm up during race 2.
Race 1 riders marshal race 2
Race 2 riders marshal race 3
You can view the dates and race formats for the series on the calendar page.
This year we are going to try out an open entry 3/4 race in week 4 so third cat racers can opt to do that, for regular C+ points (10 for a win) or try their hand in the 2/3 Regional A Circuit race (15 points for a win).
If it is a success and the two races still balance out we might add more next year.
At time of writing we have had no takers for the committee/non-committee roles announced vacant which will either immediately or soon require filling on the committee.
There was a very poor turn out for the AGM, and the committee had two very real and urgent concerns that threaten the future of racing at the track to discuss but with lack of attendees nothing could be resolved.
Firstly they heard our Treasurer report that once again the track league made a loss, around £440 this time.
Secondly came the all too familiar request for help to run the league, both on the day of racing and also with the day to day tasks that need to be done so that racing happens.
It was a struggle throughout 2022 to get enough volunteers and for the first time ever we had to cancel one night because of this. On top of this we are losing several key members of the committee and the SCRL family this year, some permanently.
Dave is intending to move away from Sussex in 2023 and whilst staying on as treasurer for this year he won’t be taking on any event day duties which means we need help with sign on, judging and the general maintenance of facilities (race numbers etc).
Ben is also moving away (it’s a family thing) so whilst he will continue for now as Chief Judge and also Recorder (making sure results are published and tallied up over the season) he may not be able to see the season out and definitely won’t be here in 2024.
Toby won’t be continuing as “in-person” promoter this year (but can run the back office part for this year only), he tried to step down before last season but had his arm twisted. He is prepared to be at a couple of events for the purposes of training new volunteers but that will be all.
Unfortunately none of the few that attended the AGM felt able to take on any of these roles so 2023 isn’t looking promising.
With that in mind, the committee have decided that none of the racing calendar will be submitted to British Cycling until we at least have commitment to the main roles required for each event in advance.
For now, we have made available signup sheets for our intended Winter Series (see below). All roles need to be filled by lunchtime Friday 20th January or the winter series will not go ahead at all.
There are further issues to discuss regarding the financial feasibility of track league as compared to being subsidised by the circuits but we will see how the winter series goes first. If we can’t run a winter series to subsidise track league the costs for that will go up, probably by at least 50%.
There is another reminder further down the page here about the roles which need filling.
Winter Series
There is a volunteer signup page available for each race (links below) where primary volunteers (non-marshals) can put their name down.
The marshal positions will also require filling prior to the event but these will be on a separate signup sheet closer to the time.
Remember you won’t be left on your own from the off, you will always be shown what to do, and there is nothing you can do that would cause any serious problems or get you into any kind of trouble if you “do it wrong”.
Committee positions are elected representatives. Please contact the committee if you wish to fulfil one of these positions.
Promoter (Register races with BC, set event schedules etc. Back office role covered this year only but will not be attending events)
Treasurer (Manage finances including with British Cycling. Back office duties are covered this year only but needs someone to learn the ropes this year to take over)
Non-Committee Back Office Positions
Facilities manager (Help manage equipment at the track, ensure electronic devices are charged, order new equipment).
Volunteer organiser (Manage the volunteer requirements through the year).
To volunteer for these positions, please contact us.
Event Positions
These are non-committee positions but work best when there is a pool of experienced volunteers who can help train new volunteers.
*Organiser (General running of the event on the day)
Sign-On (manage rider sign on, take payments, handout/retrieve numbers)
Judges and Chief Judges (Judging duties for track and circuits)
*Organisers have to have attended organiser online training with British Cycling and have had the organiser dashboard enabled on their account. If you are interested in this training please contact the promoter.
Winter series #5 is now open for entries. As always we can’t run anything without volunteers to marshal, so please put your name down or get a friend to volunteer.
Track Accreditation
Our track accreditation sessions are now open for entry. Please just enter your first one for now. Then you can enter any additional sessions as and when you know you can get to them.
Read about our accreditation process and why we have it here.
League Registration
For those riders already accredited registration is now open. Please take note of the instructions in regards to sending in your licence details.
SCRL now have their own set of racing rollers!
You might have been at the AGM a couple of years back when we borrowed the BECC rollers to spice up proceedings a bit.
Well a BECC member found their spare set in his garage and offered them up for sale. After (not all that) lengthy negotiations they were obtained for a very reasonable price indeed!
So now we have them, lets make some use of them. Any ideas for how we can use them to raise funds in addition to just having some fun with them would be welcome.
So far thoughts are:
Perhaps have a winter league where we can have a “social” evening once a month through the off season, probably at the Knoyle Road hall.
Maybe if we can have short notice use of the pavillion a “rained off day” event.
Hire out for use by other clubs, organisations and events.
Provide for use at local summer fairs etc. as an advertising/awareness raising tool.
Once again we find ourselves asking people to step up to fill the volunteer roles we require to allow racing to go ahead. If you have raced all the races so far but not volunteered it’s time to put your hand up✋
Again may we suggest the following:
Bring someone with you who can marshal during your race OR
Volunteer for the race after yours (or in the case of the last race, come down early for the first one)
Thanks for all those who have put their hand up to volunteer this Sunday so far.
It does seem to largely be the same names each week though.
We are still especially short of positions to cover the first (cat 4) race. If you are racing PLEASE see if you can persuade someone to come with you to cover a marshalling spot and get them to put their name down on our request form here: Current Volunteer Status – Sussex Cycle Racing League (scrl.co.uk).
The other positions are at a bare minimum too, which means if someone is a no-show then racing won’t go ahead, so please put your name down for those as well if possible.
This is an all or nothing situation. We won’t put on one or two races which we have cover for, the whole event needs cover or it doesn’t happen.
Just a reminder: this isn’t a commercial enterprise, it’s volunteer driven to keep the track in use and provide some local racing. If you like racing at it, you need to put back in to keep it going. If everyone does their bit, you probably only need to do one or two slots a season at most.
