# ECE To/From Audax



## Heltor Chasca (27 Apr 2018)

I have a question about ECEs (Extended Calendar Events) for you experienced Audax riders.

If I was to ride to/from an event, do I have to do the entire ride total at Audax speeds? ECE sections plus the calendar event) In other words: If I rode to the start where I kipped in the village hall the night before an early start for example, would my ECE and ride count? 

I was thinking about doing 50km to the start of Sunday’s 100km ride and 50km home again, but I was worried about the time taken hanging about at the start and at the finish eating cake, would affect my ride. Any ideas?


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## Pro Tour Punditry (27 Apr 2018)

Yes


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## Ming the Merciless (27 Apr 2018)

Treat the whole thing like a 200. So consider time at the start and time at the end as opportunities to eat, drink, and fill your water bottles. I usually aim to get to the start of events about 20-30 mins before start. Then spend 30-40 mins after end of event eating, drinking and chatting, before riding the ECE home.


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## Heltor Chasca (28 Apr 2018)

YukonBoy said:


> Treat the whole thing like a 200. So consider time at the start and time at the end as opportunities to eat, drink, and fill your water bottles. I usually aim to get to the start of events about 20-30 mins before start. Then spend 30-40 mins after end of event eating, drinking and chatting, before riding the ECE home.



Much appreciated. Thank you. So doing an ECE by riding to the village hall, going out to a pub for a meal, then having a full night’s sleep in the hall isn’t going to work?


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## Ming the Merciless (28 Apr 2018)

Heltor Chasca said:


> Much appreciated. Thank you. So doing an ECE by riding to the village hall, going out to a pub for a meal, then having a full night’s sleep in the hall isn’t going to work?



No, because the clock starts when you set off on your ECE and either stops at the end of the calendar event (if the ECE is wholly before it) or at the end of the ECE if a portion is after the event.

So clock starts at earliest point, either ECE start or calendar start. Then end at latest point either end of calendar event or ECE. Any time in between the clock is ticking. The ECE including calendar event must be completed within audax time limits.

You could ride to the village hall, pub, sleep. Get up a bit early do a 20km loop to start your ECE, ride the event, then do a 80km loop home or some such variation. That way the clock is not ticking at pub and sleeping night before.


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## Heltor Chasca (28 Apr 2018)

Understood. Thank you @YukonBoy

I am also trying to fidget a calendar event which is advertised as Avon Cycleway 130 (actually 138km) Am I right in thinking that if I ECE (add) approximately 35km to either end, I could claim it as a 200?


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## Ming the Merciless (28 Apr 2018)

Heltor Chasca said:


> Understood. Thank you @YukonBoy
> 
> I am also trying to fidget a calendar event which is advertised as Avon Cycleway 130 (actually 138km) Am I right in thinking that if I ECE (add) approximately 35km to either end, I could claim it as a 200?



If your ECE is advisory then you can only use the nominal 130 of the calendar event. If you submit a mandatory ECE then you can use the full 138 to count towards the 200 distance. If planning to only ride 35 each way I would submit a mandatory ECE to be safe (combined definitely over 200). When I upload my mandatory ECE track I include the full track ECE there, calendar event, ECE back.


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## Heltor Chasca (28 Apr 2018)

Thanks again @YukonBoy I have submitted a mandatory 72km, added to the 138km, that should safely push me into the safe zone by 10km.


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## Aravis (6 Mar 2019)

YukonBoy said:


> If your ECE is advisory then you can only use the nominal 130 of the calendar event. *If you submit a mandatory ECE then you can use the full 138 to count towards the 200 distance*. If planning to only ride 35 each way I would submit a mandatory ECE to be safe (combined definitely over 200). When I upload my mandatory ECE track I include the full track ECE there, calendar event, ECE back.


I may want to do one of these the weekend after next so I dug this thread out. I've also read through the FAQs and threads on other forums. I have a feeling that the FAQs, even on the shiny new Audax site, have not entirely kept pace with developments.

For a while I thought I had it, but again I'm confused. I thought the idea was that you do the calendar event exactly as you would without the ECE element, using a manual card and whatever else you're required to collect on the way. You then get credit for the nominal distance of the calendar event, and build your ECE legs to make up the total distance to what you want. I find that entirely logical.

I've seen a statement from Martin Malins (November 2017) on "another forum" indicating that _mandatory route ECE's incorporating a mandatory calendar leg (if selected by the ECE entrant) are now official_. That seems to concur with the bit in bold above, but I'm not seeing any means on the ECE entry form whereby you can indicate that you wish to do this.

But assuming you can, are you then still required to complete a manual brevet card? I've seen comments that suggest you aren't, but that seems at odds with the idea that the ECE co-ordinator doesn't need to get involved with verification of the calendar element - he just needs to know it's been done and verified.

And if you are going for full GPS validation throughout, does your version of the calendar event route have to match precisely the organiser's recommended version, or can you modify it subject to passing sufficiently close to the specified controls? I suppose there could be an issue with not knowing in advance where any information controls might be, but it's often possible to infer which section they're on. If you get it completely wrong you could always do a there-and-back diversion so that you visit the info control and rejoin your pre-defined route at the point you left it. But perhaps that still doesn't work because completion of the calendar event requirement can't be completely established from the GPS file alone.

But even if you have done your utmost to mirror the recommended route precisely, isn't there an extra bit of work for somebody to check that you've done so? Either the event organiser or the EDE co-ordinator would have to get involved with the other's territory, which I thought was exactly what shouldn't be happening.

I think I'm concluding that verification of the whole calendar + ECE combination by GPS isn't going to work unless you do the convention manual validation of the calendar event as well. The only advantage of doing so it to get credit for a few extra kilometres, meaning that your ECE legs can be a bit shorter. Is this right?


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## Ming the Merciless (6 Mar 2019)

The ECE is verified by GPS and the calendar event as normal. You are overthinking this. It really is quite simple.


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## Aravis (6 Mar 2019)

YukonBoy said:


> The ECE is verified by GPS and the calendar event as normal. You are overthinking this. It really is quite simple.


No doubt I am.

Please bear with me though. In the example quoted, what you seem to be saying is that if I validated my ECE legs as mandatory by GPS, I would've got 138km from the calendar event even if I'd switched off my GPS during that phase. If that's how it works then so be it, but I don't see the logic.

That said, everything I can find on either of the official AUK sites states unequivocally that only the nominal distance counts. For example:

http://www.aukweb.net/diy/ece/

As the difference in my upcoming event would be all of 1km, and I don't expect ever to do this again, I'm happy to assume I'll get the nominal distance.


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## Ming the Merciless (6 Mar 2019)

Aravis said:


> No doubt I am.
> 
> Please bear with me though. In the example quoted, what you seem to be saying is that if I validated my ECE legs as mandatory by GPS, I would've got 138km from the calendar event even if I'd switched off my GPS during that phase. If that's how it works then so be it, but I don't see the logic.
> 
> ...



Nope you need to keep your GPS on to validate the ECE. You submit the whole thing. You cannot validate mandatory if you switch off your GPS!


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## Aravis (6 Mar 2019)

YukonBoy said:


> Nope you need to keep your GPS on to validate the ECE. You submit the whole thing. You cannot validate mandatory if you switch off your GPS!


Of course I wouldn't do that. But I might record the three phases as separate activities, in which case I'd've assumed the ECE guy would only want the ECE bits, and separating them at time of recording is helpful, surely? I thought he only needs to know that the calendar event was completed, and a GPS track doesn't prove that.

You've certainly persuaded me that I need to check with the co-ordinator that what I intend to do is acceptable. Wish me luck.


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## Ming the Merciless (6 Mar 2019)

Aravis said:


> Of course I wouldn't do that. But I might record the three phases as separate activities, in which case I'd've assumed the ECE guy would only want the ECE bits, and separating them at time of recording is helpful, surely? I thought he only needs to know that the calendar event was completed, and a GPS track doesn't prove that.
> 
> You've certainly persuaded me that I need to check with the co-ordinator that what I intend to do is acceptable. Wish me luck.



That's the problem you have been making a load of assumptions and not listening to what we have been telling you from the start, based on actual experience.


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## Aravis (6 Mar 2019)

YukonBoy said:


> That's the problem you have been making a load of assumptions and not listening to what we have been telling you from the start, based on actual experience.


I think this is unfair. I've been trying to make sense of apparently contradictory information, and of course that involves making tentative working assumptions.

Having dug a little deeper, it does seem that AUK made a rule change in 2017 (described as a "concession" in one contribution) enabling the actual calendar distance to be used instead of the nominal provided the calendar event is treated as mandatory by GPS throughout. They don't seem to mention this in either of their websites, which are adamant that it's nominal only - everywhere I've looked anyway. No ifs and buts. That's the root of the "problem" that led to this discussion; everything else followed from that.


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## Ajax Bay (6 Mar 2019)

Cross posted with the above.
The ECE guy has said (elsewhere - 30 Oct 2017) "Nominal distance used to apply to all calendar events but with the advent of mandatory route perms by gps it's no longer necessary to apply this. You don't have to submit the track of the calendar event beforehand but you do have to commit to riding the full not nominal calendar distance and then a mandatory ECE and submit a total track such that they both add up. [to more than n x 100]"
So @YukonBoy is telling you what, in practice, is acceptable, and I suspect that the ECE guy (volunteer) prefers having to deal with just one gps track rather than 2, and it manages the issue of calendar event advertised distance not being, necessarily, the shortest reasonable cycle route between the controls (advisory route) or even over n x 100! - no names, no packdrill; but I'm doing one of those in May.


YukonBoy said:


> you have been making a load of assumptions and not listening to what we have been telling you from the start, based on actual experience.


Well you can't beat 'actual experience'.
I'd nevertheless observe that the authoritative pages, extracts of which I've pasted below, have not yet had that 'in practice' amendment applied to them.
"Only the nominal distance of the Calendar event counts" it says.
"*Extended Calendar Events (ECE)* give riders the opportunity to ride out to and/or back from a Calendar event and add the extra distance to that of the calendar event. The extended portion of these rides is managed like a DIY and can use any of the above three methods. More about ECE here."
[In the subject case this one: Option 3: Validation by GPS – mandatory route]
"The regulations and process for planning ECE routes are similar to DIY Perms except the distance must scale the Calendar event up to a recognised BR distance of 200km and multiples of 100km thereafter. . . only the nominal distance of the Calendar event counts . . . towards your ECE total.
"[L]ike DIY Perms ECEs can be validated . . . as a 'mandatory route' where you submit a planned route as a GPS file in advance of the ride, and a tracklog after the ride to show the planned route was followed throughout. The Calendar event and the linked ECE are recorded separately . . . "
@Aravis - I think this topic is not really CycleChat stuff - perhaps you could read the discussion on another forum.


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## Aravis (6 Mar 2019)

Ajax Bay said:


> @Aravis - I think this topic is not really CycleChat stuff - perhaps you could read the discussion on another forum.


Yep, fair comment. By posting in this thread I was really looking to test my thinking before approaching the organiser directly. It's certainly helped, though not quite as I might've thought!


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## Ian H (6 Mar 2019)

One point to bear in mind is that a BP event may well have a relaxed minimum speed, whereas a BR event cannot be under 14.3km/hr. So, if you're ECEing you will need to stick to above 14.3 average to claim your points.


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## Ming the Merciless (6 Mar 2019)

In the official ECE FAQ and yes Martin has confirmed the total distance of your track log will count for min distance if you do as mandatory ECE.

*Can I ride an ECE under the new AUK mandatory route regulations?*
Yes; just enter the Strava / Ride with GPS / Garmin connect etc. route url in the google maps box on the entry form I don't need to confirm it's ok. As the calendar leg is not mandatory I will not check this as long as the distance for the whole extended ride meets the minimum distance.


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## Aravis (6 Mar 2019)

Dogtrousers said:


> Audax sure does manage to generate a lot of complexity, not to mention TLAs, out of the simple activity of riding a bike.


I had to find out what TLA stands for. I think I may have disappeared down a vortex.


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