rhm

I'd like to understand information controles better. I have too many questions to list them all, but here are a few to start with:

Question for those of you who have created permanents, and used information controles: how did you do it? I assume the technique is to go to the place that needs a controle, and make a long list of questions that can only be answered by someone who is actually there; that Google and Google Street View won't be enough?

Question for those of you who have ridden permanents that use information controles: How much do they change, if you do the same permanent over and over, does the owner change the questions much?

What are some of the best information controles you've encountered?

Have you ever encountered an information controle that simply could not be answered?

Have you ever got the answer wrong, and therefore DNF?

skiffrun

You're over-thinking / over-complicating things.

Yes, the guidelines urge mixing up the questions form time to time, or even asking different riders different questions on the same ride. I understand that my friend Bill (in NJ / PA) does the latter; maybe Eric can comment knowingly.

I did worry about multiple questions when I made my first route with Info Controls (RUSA perm #1404). I have three or four listed in the archives for the control in Bahama and two or three in the archives for Grissom. Do I mix them up? Come to Raleigh and ride multiple times and find out.

Don't make it so hard to answer that people might legitimately not understand the correct answer. The object of a perm route and its possible info controls should NOT be to DNF people. If the rider(s) do the right thing, ride a reasonable pace, do not have incredibly bad luck, the rider(s) should come away with a smile on their face (or inside, anyway); riders should never feel as if they were tricked or worse.

Have fun with it -- I could tell a story about the Info Control on route # 878, but that's for another day, or rather, a ride.

As a side note, one of the answers to an Info Control on route #1444 recently changed even though the usual ("usual") question has not.

jhaddad8

One popular info control question I have seen on PA brevets is what is the price of regular gas at XXX gas station. I've also seen what color is the mail box at XX address. On my rides I ask, how many handicapped parking spots are in the lot, who was the employee of the month, what's the posted speed limit and what church is advertised on the sign.
I've never changed any of my info control questions, but I'm also the only person who's ridden my perms, so there usefulness is already a little dubious. I still do write the answers on my brevet cards.

ThermionicScott 

There is an info control on the local 200k that consists of the color of a tie-wrap attached to the stop sign at a particular intersection. Pretty straightforward, but I don't know how it would be handled if a colorblind rider were to happen upon it alone. Maybe take a picture of it with their cellphone as evidence that they were there...

StephenH

We actually have the colorblind problem. Solution there is to ask "How many zip ties are around the stop sign". And get zip ties long enough to go around the post, rather than stringing two together.


rhm, on some of the other issues- on local rides, most of the riders on perms are people who we know and reasonably trust. In a lot of cases, the control owner is along on the ride. So the changing-up of the control questions doesn't actually happen that often. If there were a lot of strangers doing these routes, or people in whom we had less confidence, we'd do things a little different.


I try to get information controls that can't be answered by Google Streetview. I've used zip ties at several points.
I avoid gas prices, those can change twice a day.
The point of an information control is to make some reasonable assurance that the person has been that way. It's not intended as a scavenger hunt. If you're actually there, it shouldn't be at all hard to find or answer the question.
I'm not aware of any cases of getting the answer wrong. If that's a concern, photograph the thing in question for backup.
I'm not aware of an answer not being available. I know one local route, they removed a marker that was referenced, and it's possible somebody got up there and the marker was gone. It's highly likely that the somebody had ridden that route over and over and so it was no problem, though. One local information control asked for the number on a mailbox, and the mailbox no longer has the number. So yes, things change.


Usually, for an information control, you have some leeway about where it's located- can be within a range of several miles. For example, if you go out Road X and turn on Road Y, the information control can be at the corner or a mile or two up either road. Corner is easier to find. But if there's some notable landmark elsewhere, you can use it. So I've got one information control at a cemetery and one at a bridge just because those were easy places to use.


Here locally, we generally have perms in a single Excel file with cue sheet, card, and waiver all shown. If I ride Long Ride XYZ, I get that Excel file, print my stuff, send the waiver to the owner, and off I go. If I ride it a month later, I'll generally use that SAME file. So whatever information control was in there the first time won't change.

unterhausen

I prepared a batch of questions for one info control. Decided to switch them up and ask about a sign. We had ridden the ride 2 weeks earlier, the second time the sign wasn't there. Fortunately I was there as a witness to make it easy, but I definitely would have taken "no sign" as a correct answer. I have only had one person ride one of my perms that I didn't know at all. I have a route that I haven't gotten approved yet because I need to go make up some info control questions, I do take it seriously.

Machka 

I have put information controls into a few of the rides I've organised.

I certainly did not produce a long list of questions. That would be a pain for everyone concerned! I asked one question at each control, and kept it pretty simple.

As I recall, one question was about a sign at an intersection that showed a weight limit for that particular road. I asked what the weight limit was.

Another time, I asked what colour the roof of a particular barn was ... the entire roof was painted as a Canadian flag, so ... red and white. I would have also been fine with "Canadian flag" as an answer. Or even, "Flag". I wasn't fussed.


I rode an event with an information control and when we got there, it asked what was on the sign at a particular intersection. As it happened, there were about 15 signs at that intersection, so we picked one and wrote what it said. I asked about it when the ride was complete, and whoever had created the route was thinking about the name of a shop on that corner, but since there so many signs and everyone wrote down something different, it was not a problem. They were just looking for some sort of evidence that we'd been there.

skiffrun

No one is asking multiple questions at a single control on a single card. They are, however, preparing to ask the same rider different questions on different days/rides at the same control. They may also be preparing to ask different riders on the same ride different questions at a single control.

rhm

Correct, what I have in mind is to have a list of questions from which I can select one when I make a brevet card for someone. The roads I have in mind are 30 - 40 miles from my home, and I have no way of going there on short notice to count the portajohns or whatever. I'm pretty new to RUSA and its rules; my usual way of riding is to get on my bike and to look for roads I've never ridden before. For most of my riding, there are no rules; so RUSA's rules are unfamiliar to me. If I'm going to play this game, I want to play by the rules the way the long-time members understand them.

Thanks for all the responses!

unterhausen

It's a pain if the info control requires an 80 mile trip to inspect. I hate driving, and that's a long ride. I avoid them if I can; I think it makes for a better ride

thebulls

Not sure I understand your comment. When the route is being designed and submitted for approval, you have to have ridden it or at least driven it, at which time you can make a note of some info control questions. As long as those don't depend on things that are likely to change, you don't need to go back again.

If you're just referring to info questions like the price of a gallon of gas ... yeah, it makes no sense to have questions that are harder for the route owner to answer than the rider!

Nick

Machka 

I did try to check my routes once a year, at some point within about a month before the event, to ensure that everything was still OK. So I also checked any information controls I had at that time.

It's good to route check regularly ... you just never know when they're suddenly going to dig a massive hole in your road and remove about 100 metres of it so no one can get through. Yep ... happened to one of my routes. That called for a bit of mad scrambling to reroute things!!

But if you'd seen me when I discovered it, standing there at the edge of the hole mid-ride one day with my jaw on the ground and thinking, "I knew they were doing construction here, but who removes the entire road!" ... you would have probably laughed at the look of shock on my face!

unterhausen

yes, my comment doesn't completely make sense. I like to have my cue sheets mostly finished before I scout so that I can check the cue sheet at the same time. I find that it's not always an easy thing to get a good info control right where you want it, and if it's at the far end of a long ride, that makes it a real pain. My definition of a good info control is one that is simple to find, good location to stop, and not likely to get you in trouble with the locals.

I think I got the idea of using telephone pole numbers from you. I was designing a route that needed an info control and went to find the telephone pole numbers near a park sign. Took pictures of the pole number plates, and then, later, when I put my glasses on, I found out the pictures were out of focus. Oops, another trip back there. That one wasn't too much of a problem because it's a nice ride from my house. I was thinking about using the zip tie info control for that one, but I couldn't find any place to hook them to.

skiffrun

Unfortunately, Nick, if you read enough blogs from around the country, you'll come to the conclusion that some / many are submitting routes that they've never ridden. I recall one blogger who wrote, after his first ride on a perm-pop he had just gotten approved, "well, that road won't work." I was flabbergasted.

There once was an extremely popular perm, at one time one of the five most ridden perms in the country (at the time, three of the most popular perms or perm-pops were near each other) had a c-store control at a certain location; the store was always closed on Sundays, sometimes also on Saturdays; when the store was closed, there was an alternate info control question asking the price of regular gasoline. The price never changed as the gas pumps / tanks had been unused for years. However, if one looked about carefully, there were actually three different prices noted for regular: a different price on each side of the pump, and a third price on the overhead sign.

BTW, that was not a route I owned, but I'm rather confident that you have met the person who was / is the owner.

unterhausen

I have no doubt this is true, and it's unfortunate. Crista asked me if I had ridden my first perm, but never did again. I only bother to submit routes that I am fully confident in. I would feel really foolish having to make major changes after approval because a road wasn't suitable. Too much work down the drain. I have changed at least one route because people complained that it was too hard at the end (after the bar control) (don't drink 2 of the IPA's, it's still 30 miles to the finish). However the roads were not the issue, just the hills. I have some routes where someone else scouted a couple of roads for me, and I didn't ride them or scout them until after the route was approved. However, I trust this person to think exactly like I do about roads. Actually, he gave me an info control for the route I was talking about above, and got a little annoyed with me that I didn't trust him. I've ridden the roads a number of times, but never with the view of finding an info control question.

I have one route I have never ridden. I feel a little guilty about that, but it's ridiculously hard. Maybe next year. It's a good route though. I drove the parts that I have never ridden. That's a good thing, because a lot of the roads are different than the maps, and the cue sheet from ridewithgps would have gotten anyone pretty lost. I made a number of wrong turns

Machka 

I agree. This is a problem which crops up now and then because of wonderful programs like Ride with GPS, and the old Streets and Trips, etc. Yes, they're great ... they make route-making so quick and easy. I've created many routes that way myself. But they aren't necessarily accurate ... or true to how it is in real life.

StephenH

Earlier in the year, I was working on perm versions of the Texas Rando Stampede, and some of those perms are roads I haven't ridden. But I did have input from other people.
Some of my routes incorporated largely roads that were used on other routes, so the perm itself wasn't ridden prior to the event, but the roads weren't completely unfamiliar, either.
We did the Randotour from Texas to Canada a while back, and some of those perms were surely created without seeing the roads. But they were primarily rural routes, too, so not too bad.