Could Sean, Barry and Shane be replaced by technology?

[Morgan]

Never!


http://www.cyclingnews.com/mtb/2008/apr08/seaotter08/tech.php?id=/photos/2008/tech/features/seaotter_tech708/ESI_hand-off

[ollietrex]

Can you imagine a Feed area with 30-40 of these standing up... It would be impossible to work out which one was your as you fly by.

[Sean]

Funny you should mention that, as I was standing in the hail in Djouce, my engineering brain was working overtime to think of a way of doing it. Thought it might be possible to hang them on strings from a frame, but as Ollie said, it'd be pretty cluttered, and a metal frame can't give you encouragement or time splits :-)

[Barrydanzig]

yeah just think of the abuse you'd miss out on if you had one of them yokes, the abuse is the only thing that keeps me going.

[paddyobrien]

Bah, what sort of an engineer are you? What you need is a metal frame that holds multiple bottles on top of each other and as you grab one from the bottom the next one falls down into its place, like a coke machine or something.


The deluxxe version could have signs on it saying 'Push harder you big jessie' or some other motivational gem!

[Richie]

I dunno Paddy, there's a risk that as you zoom by you'll miss it, plus if its like most coke machines it'll get jammed somewhere.

How about having it spring loaded and with some kinda motion sensor so as you came by the bottle is shot out in your general direction and you simple grab it in mid air...

[paddyobrien]

If you're gonna do that richie you'd need a high speed video camera attached to capture the ensuing hilarity!

[ryan]

What I would worry about would be someone nabbing your bottle!


Just like when you leave milk in the fridge in a hostel... After getting annoyed by people stealing it each day when I was in NZ I put a huge big sign on it saying "Contains Medicine", think I mentioned some weird condition... I had milk every day for my coffee after that :)

[Richie]

Well, it can get a tad boring for spectators once the race has started... to liven things up you could have a technical area / tagakshi's castle style obstacle course... spring loaded water bottle dispensers, fellas in panda bear suits running about, large barrels rolling at ya etc, etc...

[paddyobrien]

I liek where you're going with this richie! We can experiment at the club league. Lads, get those fancy dress costumes ready again

[Sean]

"Just like when you leave milk in the fridge in a hostel... After getting annoyed by people stealing it each day when I was in NZ I put a huge big sign on it saying "Contains Medicine", think I mentioned some weird condition... I had milk every day for my coffee after that :) "


I found a better solution than that once upon a time. In the hostel I was staying in, there was a guy living there more or less premanently. First time I saw him in reception, I ran for cover - he was about 6'8" and looked a "little rough," to put it kindly. As luck would have it, we were in the same room and turned out he was a pretty nice guy who had fallen on hard times and had the scars to show it, but none of the other guests knew that, given his intimidating demeanour. Solution to food going missing = hide it behind his tray, which no one dared touch...none of my food went missing after that :-)


So yes, the solution would be to have an intimidating looking person standing watch over your bottles...which kind of defeats the purpose anyway....

[Conor]

Paddy, if you think I'm wearing that wig and fake boob thingy I wore at Christmass, your sadly mistaken!

[Dave]

Maybe if its geographically convienient the course could go under a waterfall giving each competitor a fair chance at drinking as much water as they can for the 1-5 seconds they could stay cycling for before falling of their bike under the preassure of the water?

[paddyobrien]

Conor, i will state for the record that i was not thinking of that. In fact i'd blocked that image from my mind until you mentioned it there!

[Liam]

WHAT! No fake boobs and dress!? But that was the reason I joined last year!

I thought I had a chance with the ugly bird in the club! :-)


I'm sure those boobs will attract a lot more members this year!!