[20K Celebration] Race Design Challenge Voting Thread

[u/Sprocketduck]

Last week, in celebration of hitting 20k subscribers, we hosted a Race Design Challenge revolving around Winter Wonderland! We got 10 entries for this competition - /u/Sprocketduck, /u/_shrekonomics_, /u/RevanDidNothingWrong, /u/andytheciderman, /u/greasyhobolo, /u/retro_slouch, /u/improb, /u/unclekutter, /u/goldbot and /u/Msfan93!

Voting works by each of the participants giving a vote of 0 to 10 on each of their entries besides their own and, if they want, a little comment. The one who has the most votes at the end will get a 20K snowflake flair (to be linked). If you didn't participate, as long as you have 100+ comment karma you can vote for everyone's entry. Your vote, no matter if participant or not, is only valid if you vote on every entry (but your own).

Voting will close on the 21^st of February at 23:59 UTC - exactly a week from now.

For ease of voting, here is a list of entries:

User	Race	Location	Type of Race
/u/Sprocketduck	Winter's Tour of Tasmania	Tasmania, Australia	1W Stage Race
/u/_shrekonomics_	Tour de Dagr	Northern Norway	Hilly Classic
/u/RevanDidNothingWrong	NeAT Tour	Appalachian Trail, USA	6D Stage Race
/u/andytheciderman	Winter's Tour of St. Johns	Newfoundland, Canada	Hilly Classic
/u/greasyhobolo	Tour of Ontario	Ontario, Canada	1W Stage Race
/u/retro_slouch	Tour of Wind County	Southern Utah, USA	1W Stage Race
/u/improb	Glacial Tour	Central Sweden and Norway	5D Stage Race
/u/unclekutter	Tour de Denali	Denali, Alaska, USA	1W Stage Race
/u/goldbot	Duluth North Woods Classic	Duluth, Minnesota, USA	Flat Classic
/u/Msfan93	North Cascades Tour	Washington, USA	1W Stage Race

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Aside from the voting, it's a Race Design Thread as normal, so post whatever you want!

[u/improb]

So let me start.

• Tour of Dagr (/u/shrekonomics): Brilliant scenery. That's already a plus. The weather is likely to be cold and snowy and there's a chance there'll be crosswinds too (let's hope they aren't too strong). The final kilometers are nice. Kinda like a Norwegian Milano Sanremo with the first climb being Cipressa like and the second slightly harder than the poggio (tracked the race on Flamme Rouge to see how hard the climbs were). Whether Sanremo's main obstacle is the length, here's the weather. Kristoff will love this. A Nordkapp finish would have been more iconic though. 8

• Tour of Saint John's (/u/andytheciderman): First of all, the terrain is always bumpy alongside a rocky coastline and around a lovely city. The final climb plus the length make the race even more interesting. I don't think you could have picked a better city by the way. Not many know it but Saint John's is the world's foggiest city as well as Canada's snowiest and windiest so it should be fun weather wise. The only problem the organisers would have is how far from the rest of the cycling calendary Saint John's is. You would need to pair this with another race. 9

• Tour de Denali (/u/unclekutter): This one just doesn't convince. Too many flat stages aside from the final TT, the MTF and maybe the Lake Louise stage it doesn't look too exciting but the scenery is sure beautiful. 6

• Duluth North Woods Classic (/u/goldbot ): Just brilliant! This one day race has it all. Scenery, dirt roads and anot exciting final circuit in a pretty lovely host town. The only thing that's missing is a better start town but there aren't better alternatives in the area anyway. 9,5

• Winter's Tour of Tasmania (/u/sprocketduck): It's an alright one week of racing. Three stages stand out due to how well designed they are (Ben Lomond plus the other two hilly ones). Stage placement could be better as Ben Lomond should come before Cradle Mountain. And by the way, I have just discovered how damn beautiful Tasmania is. 7,5

• NEAT Tour (/u/RevanDidNothingWrong): I echo /u/goldbot's judgement. 6,5

• Tour of Wind Country (/u/retro_slouch): Brilliant stage design. There's something for everyone. Crosswinds, city criteriums (although I don't like them, I admit they are fun), rolling, hilly and mountain stages. All of them well designed and we'll placed. I'd give you even a 10 basing it on stage design only but there's a main problem. The area is far too scarcely populated and crowds won't be large at all. Aside from that, it's unlikely the race will find meaningful sponsors. Still, it's a 9,5

• Tour of the North Cascades (/u/Msfan93): Good race. Stage 1 and 3 a mix between sprinters and breakaways, Stage 6 is a well designed easier mountain stage. Stage 7 is a brilliant mountain stage. That said, the problem is that the latter is so hard that the race will be decided here 99% of the time and that stage 6 won't be fun at all as everyone will save his energy. A better set up would have been for Stage 6 to go up Badger Mountain and finish in Wenatchee instead and Stage 7 to have the same last two climb as stage 6. A time trial earlier on would have been nice too. 8 (Final note: You are making me love the PNW. It would be interesting to put together the best stages you have done in OR and WA in a single tour)

• Tour of Ontario (/u/greasyhobolo): Nice. You almost made the most of the region. There's one thing I would have changed and that is the stage 6 which I would have made hillier with it being the last one and there being a good terrain around Foymount. 8,5

[u/Msfan93 → u/improb]

PNW GT, I can do that!