The Rapha Festive 500 is back for an eighth year, challenging cyclists to ride 500 kilometres during the eight days between Christmas and New Year.
Online registration for this year’s edition will open on Wednesday 6 December and the same day also sees the launch of a Rapha collection dedicated to it, comprising a cap, musette, neck warmer, socks and T-shirt.
People logging 500 kilometres on Strava will be entitled to receive a commemorative woven patch celebrating their achievement, and as in previous years, a variety of prizes will also be offered.
The concept of the Rapha Festive 500 started in 2009 when the brand’s lead designer, Graeme Raeburn, challenged himself to ride 1,000 kilometres between Christmas and New Year.
When the event was opened to the public the following year, the distance was halved to 500 kilometres, with 84 riders taking part; by last year, that had risen to 82,000.
People taking part in the challenge are asked “to document their journey and submit their stories to Rapha.”
The brand says that “entries can take any format, and we are looking for the most original, emotional or thought provoking.
Some 800 cyclists entered last year’s Rapha Festive 500 competition, with Ruth Cousins from Wales winning a trip to Steamboat Springs in Colorado, USA to pick up her first prize of a custom-built Moots bike.
Cousins, a police officer, had submitted seven hand-painted cards addressed to her late father in which she wrote of her rides in Wales in winter as well as her job and caring for her family.
Maybe it will get tested, and we'll know for sure.
I thought civilians processed all the work around the submissions,filtered the obviously no action ones, sent the letters out etc, but the choice...
the contrast with how this close pass was dealt with by the magistrates, and the story from the live blog about how 5 close passes were dealt with...
This morning's commute was -10 °F / -23 °C. I doubt the relative humidity is really that low. The dew point might be -30 °C, but that's still 30%...
IC confirmation bias at it's finest, and not the facts of the matter IMHO.
Not always as the ML models can be provided already trained for reuse, thus avoiding the training process where that 'I' is required because it's...
*Gullible.
I thought bikes for general use had a shorter reach and a higher stack, compared to pro-race machines which have a longer reach over a lower stack....
Exactly. I wonder why so many are OK with UAE and Bahrain competing when clearly they should not be there.
Thanks Andy. What about a forum ?