So what's happening here?
 

Hi,
I have primarily been lurking when I have a chance to look at Bike Forums in general for the past few years. This sub forum came out of 'Fifty Plus (50+)' sub forum as a place where the racing members of that sub forum could have more focused conversations about racing as I recall.

What happened?

For me, I got busy with building a house and my top priority was finishing the house, riding (so I wouldn't get completely fat), and Facebook (for online socializing). I looked at this sub forum and 'The 33' sub forum on occasion. I noticed that participation on this sub forum was fading and apparently hit a critical (low) mass a few weeks ago and now it looks like it is no longer self-sustaining.
I have physically met and become friends with a few people because of Bike Forums and through this specific sub forum. As my life is sort of settling down, it would be nice if Bike Forums again became a source of establishing new friendships and sharing and exchanging information.

Should Bike Forums management migrate 'Masters Racing (All Disciplines)' threads back into the 'Fifty Plus' sub forum?

I don't have strong feelings either way but with the newest post in here being almost a month old, it seems like something has to change.

Thoughts?

Hell no.
I'm long retired from competition, still keep on cycling in an Old School vibe 51 years after taking up the sport and have Zero interest in diluting whatever conversation we can have with an elder-ish gen-pop that has no common experience in racing bicycles.

Topics of Interest:
A) Preparing for Worlds Track Competition
or
2) What Hybrid bike is "Best" for my MUP

Cheese and Chalk.
Let the sub-forum Masters Racing (All Disciplines) be Silent, if that is how it goes.

-Bandera

It seems participation in BF is down in general. I switched to the 33 where there was a critical mass of racers otherwise it seemed like I was posting by myself many times. I have zero interest in posting in the 50+ sub forum about masters racing.

Exactly, I agree with this 100%. This forum got weird for me because it eventually felt like I personally was posting 70% of the content. It wasn't much of a conversation.

I likewise am more interested in racing and training for racing (or really riding as an athletic endeavor which I'm constantly trying to get better at, racing is the primary driver for that for me right now). I am not particularly interested in talking about cycling from the more general perspective of being over 50 or being a woman. Mostly, if people don't care about or respect racing, or if they think training towards an endurance goal is the same thing as training towards a performance goal, then I don't have tons of specific bike-related conversation to engage in with them. Ie not much interest in general cycling forums.

Personally I think the ship has sailed on the Master's Racing Forum. The conversation died awhile ago and without a good mix of experienced master's racers posting here and new racers coming in with questions, I can't see it being revived. I think the real life world of Master's racing is in decline too, so I don't see the influx of new voices happening. This is not really what I want to say because I think this used to be a great sub-forum, it meant a lot to me. But that is life, I suppose. Things change.

even the 33 is not what it used to be

there are some veterans left, but really not that many new members joining. in a way, it mirrors what's happening to USAC-sanctioned racing at large.

my friend and I used to joke about the sparring that goes on in the 33, saying how it's reminiscent of a choreographed fight scene from a musical. there are so few participants that even shouting matches are a lot fewer now

Bulletin boards as social media device have long passed their prime. Folks who look for this sort of interchange are generally using facebook groups, but people's screen time has simply been replaced in other ways for the most part. Why talk about strava on BF when you can watch Gaimon's youtube videos, and then interact with your friends on Zwift?

The endless subforums didn't help BF. Rather than having the critical mass folks talk of, the sense that there's one person posting in a forum that heathpack mentions is pretty universal. From my eye it seems BF's biggest traffic is in the non cycling threads of politics, trollheim, and foo. There was a push to combine forums, but things are so scattered it's daunting to decide what's going to get lumped and who you're going to piss off in the process.

Along with heathpack, Chappy carries this place and he's not even a master!

I gave up my blue star at the end of the year. I couldn't muster the enthusiasm to continue to feel obligate to come and sort out spam and mediate arguments.

As Psimet2001 has noted in The 33 and as some of you have noted here, bicycle road racing, including criteriums, seems to be in decline in the US and this sub forum appears to mirror that decline. I don't think we need to have another conversation on how to save the sport here, but I guess there is a correlation between racing and conversations about racing in an online forum. I periodically lurk over in slowtwitch because they have some good information about bicycle equipment. That competition forum seems to be healthier than the racing forums here.
I guess it is what it is or some other cliche about things whose time has come and gone.

to be fair, there are quite a few more people who post more than I;

both @sarals and @Racer Ex post a fair bit, as does @Hermes, @Revchuk, and @Bandera

bikeforums could certainly survive, but it seems that @gsteinb is certainly right that the balkanization isn't helping. slowtwitch, after all, sees a healthy level of traffic, as does paceline (formerly serotta). neither places shunt racers into a sub-forum though...

btw, i can technically race as a master, starting this year. i'm getting old :)

No, no, no! Let's keep this alive. As @echappist mentioned, I AM one who does post here in the hopes of keeping the forum going. But I now post infrequently. That's because I felt like I was talking to vapor, hollering into a canyon.
@Heathpack and @gsteinb both make solid points. I'd like to add that even though I am now an "experienced" masters racer, I still enjoy a discussion around racing as a master. You can't do that on Strava. You can, to a degree, on Facebook. It's not the same thing, though.

I also agree that's there is a decline in interest in cycling. That's mirrored in racing, for sure. Although, we have had a bit of a resurgence at Hellyer this season, if the size of the beginner sessions and the additions to the racing calendar are a true indication. A glimmer of hope?

Can we get this going again? Pipe dream?

How has your end of season recovery period and (hopefully) graduated build into a new season on the track been going?
What racing goals are set for '19?

I've been considering a descent into madness, debauchery and a stew of excess but I just don't have the time to dedicate to it so I guess I'll just ride the bike instead, again.
Maybe next year...

-Bandera

@Bandera, riding the bike is a proven diversion, cure, and alternative to nefarious thoughts of inappropriate actions.

:)

My off season was going well until I broke the fifth metatarsal in my right foot seven weeks ago. That knocked me off of the bike - well, everything, really - for a month. My podiatrist had wonderful news when I saw him after that month long respite - "surgery, it isn't healing". The surgery is scheduled for February 13. Coach has me rebuilding with the notion of gaining as much strength and fitness as possible before the surgery (big race, "Little Toe Nats"). I don't know what the penalty will be after the surgery, but it will likely be six to eight weeks of recovery.

Always something!

Goals for 2019? Track Nats (at Velo Sports Center in Carson this year), with an eye on the top step of the podium. There will be a "west coast women's series" at Hellyer in June or July, and I'd like to participate in that. State track championships are always on the calendar, as well. Worlds, I don't know. It depends on whether or not the UCI instates a five year age grade for women over 55 for this years event. For road, well. Maybe a flat crit or two, but that's about it. Track is crack, and that's where I belong.

Thanks for asking!

I don't have the time to come here often. I do stalk @Heathpack and @sarals on Strava. :-)

I'm doing that structured non-training plan for now whilst I try to put enough money away so I can walk from working. I did manage to pick up a new Hot Wheels a few weeks back. Now if there weren't any snow on the ground I could take that out.


https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...45782e0cd4.jpg


I got to meet RacerX and Sara at the track stuff up in Trexeltown. That's some interesting cycling.

How'd the surgery go Sara?

Wow, that is SOME car, Ibo! Beautiful. Is it a manual or automatic? V8 or V6?

The surgery is scheduled for this Wednesday AM. I'll put a post here (and email you and @Heathpack) when I can to let you all know how things went, and how much metal I'll have in my foot. It won't be as much as @Racer Ex had, his injury was pretty serious.

@IBOHUNT, it was such a delight meeting you at T-Town. I'm so glad you came to the track! Yeah, the racing is different on a velodrome, but to me - it's home! Ex was saw that early on in me, but my brain can be an immovable object, and it took me a while to come around. I'm glad I finally did. I hope to see you again!!

Sara - It's a LT1 (6.2L) V8 with an 8-speed automagic. I was looking at the ZL1's which adds ~200 hp but that's just tickets waiting to get written. This will probably the last vehicle I buy and it will sit more than it should probably. Bought the wife a Daytona Charger back in 2006 and it's got ~20,000 miles on it.

I'm Still a fan of the motor I built for the 85 truck; even at a docile 9.5:1 compression ratio it dyno'd 350hp at the wheel. I need to put a 4-link in it. Not a chance in getting it to hook to the pavement the way it is.

Good luck Wednesday. Keep us informed.

Not sure I'm back, more like a drive by :-)
When I was younger we hunted whatever was in season including rabbit. Rabbit pot pie? Oh yeah, there's some good eats right along with bacon wrapped Dove breast. Now that I am old it's mostly white-tail with an occasional trip to the south for Gator or west for Antelope. The Antelope comes pre-saged and the gator does well marinated in buttermilk and black pepper. :-)

I hadn't seen anything about your foot Sarals. All the best with your surgery!

Nice car IBOHUNT!

As for me, I haven't raced since my wife was diagnosed with cancer mid 2015. Since she passed away August 2016 I have had little motivation to ride other than commuting to work. I've gone out just for a ride less than a dozen times over the last 2 1/2 years! Had a flat tyre a couple of months ago and haven't bothered fixing it so not even commuting...

Instead been doing things that fill my day. Back into rock climbing (I was a professional climber back in the late 80's through to late 90's only retiring due to chronic elbow tendinitis). Also downhill skiing again including a trip to Japan last month. Playing some social tennis with my brother. Work has organised lunch sports so I am playing basketball, indoor soccer or badminton every lunch time too.

I am also spending a lot of time with my cars of which I have 3. My daily is just an 04 Turbo Forester, an 84 911 Carrera coupe and the most recent 92 MR2 Turbo hardtop I am currently setting up for hill climbs and club sprints! I have also been going to car events and races focusing on the historics.
​​​​​​
My BT Stealth is intentionally racked in the living room to try and motivate me. I have gone a few times to watch and help run my clubs track racing on a Saturday afternoon, but as yet haven't had to itch to swing a leg over the top tube and start racing again myself... One day hopefully I can contribute again in the race report thread!

How hard is it to shoot a rabbit? Asking for a friend.

Not easy, but worth the tasty effort.
Natural selection has endowed Le Lapin with effective camouflage, total situational awareness, terrific acceleration, enormous agility and the "hare brain" so famous for odd acrobatic/gymnastic changes of course that befuddle pursuing natural predators.

A .22 rifle vs a shotgun w/ bird-shot is a more sporting, if less productive for the pot, method favored by my kin for rabbit hunting.
A quiet stalk with a single decisive shot is required rather than a futile fusillade in the general direction of an alerted/fleeing Bunny-Wabbit.

Rabbit Stew, a French delicacy

-Bandera

"Harder?"
Do you mean more difficult to approach and stalk to deliver a decisive shot on a small alert animal or larger one in their preferred feeding habitat?
The skill of the hunter in his/her experience of the quarry's behavior, terrain sense, ability to perceive silhouettes against a background, work upwind and calmly and accurately deliver a killing shot are all learned skills that our species has worked on for countless generations. None are easy skills, and most neglected in our "modern" world. All hard work in the oldest sense of the word, with going hungry or not at stake on the accuracy of the shot.

To deliver the killing stroke on any game animal. large or small, should be done with calm considered certainty.
In my culture we don't hunt for sport, we eat what we kill and take "a good clean shot" or none at all. Rabbit,deer: Same, same.
Hard to do, our natural quarry has been at this survival thing for quite some time as well.

-Bandera

I'd echo what @Bandera posted.

I'll add this with the scale of easier to harder.

shotgun - If you are hungry then this is the go-to weapon. My preference, harder to easier, is 410, 20ga (hard to believe that was bought new 50 years ago) then 12ga. Spray away!
.22 - an over-under is a good weapon of choice here. You can get .22 and 20ga combo and it will work for many species including deer (rifled slug).
Recurve bow - this will hone your skills. The ability to sneak up on a wary critter and judge the yardage is a true test. Yardage judging is key to any IBO or ASA shoots

Any good 'kill' shot will take an animal out. Some, even with a double lung shot, will run or put up a good fight. I put an arrow in a gator just south of Myrtle Beach S.C. (Georgetown) and it took me about a half-hour to get it to the boat so we could bang stick it. I've had deer run 70 yards with a double lung kill shot. Put an arrow through an Antelope in S.D a few years back. Those critters are fast and can run for what seems like forever .when they should just fall over. Amazing what adrenaline does.

As Bandera put it... It's the responsibility of the shooter to know the game anatomy, and only take a shot that will kill. Like Bandera, I was brought up, and passed that on to my daughters, that you shoot it you eat it.

I've been invited to Casa de @racerex for Chuckar hunting. Once I retire I may take him up on that but that little stoke thing I had back in July left me with only partial vision in the right (dominant) eye. If you can sneak up on me you can take a blow with that arn skillet to the right side of my head and I'll never see that coming. All good though.

Mountain bike with a gun/bow rack... yeah buddy!

Say you went out hunting rabbit, what would likely happen?

You could go out any day of the week and shoot a few rabbits? You could go out and probably shoot one? Fifty-fifty on even being able to shoot one? You manage to shoot a rabbit one time out of ten you go out?

Assuming you pretty much know what you are doing, have the right equipment, are a good shot, etc. How important is a rabbit dog/dogs to the process?

I'm loving this conversation!