UCI Gran fondo Sligo

I live just off the route, and run a veterinary practice on the route, and communication by the organisers was nonexistent.

Only for the fact I follow this forum as a leisure cyclist, I wouldn’t have realised that the road in front of the practice was due to be closed today as there was no publicity about road closures at all until a couple of days ago. I enquired from the County Council what arrangements were in place so that our in patients could be looked after and what would happen if we needed to treat emergencies. In fairness the Council responded within 30 minutes cc’ing in the GF organisers asking them to liaise directly with us. Nothing. Radio silence.

Ultimately we relied on the common sense of the Gardai at the junction to access the building, which worked out ok, but the lack of communication from the organisers was ridiculous.

I’ve heard the same thing again and again over the last two days. Residents and business owners left completely out of the loop. Part of the reason for the route change was a large horse show with hundreds of entries which was completely ignored only that one of its organisers was made aware that it was on the route that the road was due to be closed and pointed out that it was impossible to rearrange with a few days notice.

I’m glad it went well for the participants, but the sense I get from locals is there’s no great hurry to see a similar event back unless communication from the organisation is orders of magnitude better.

No - it is up to the applicant rather than the council.

"The applicant is advised to notify all residences, businesses, local clergy etc located
in the affected areas. This notice should include the purpose of the Temporary Road
Closure, dates of the closure, contact details of the applicant’s liaison person, the
procedure to be followed by householders in the event of an emergency and a map
detailing the section of road to be closed along with the diversion route."

In @dakar 's case, there is supposed to be a full traffic management plan agreed with the emergency services from very early in in the proceedings but again the organiser is in charge of the comms on this.

True. But that adage doesn't work well when you're looking to come back again. Amateur sporting events like this really rely on public buy-in and support. Cycling probably finds it harder than most these days due to it being lobbed into the middle of the ridiculous "culture wars" populist debate.

Also need to be mindful that after they've packed up and gone home, local clubs may also be looking for public/ council/ Garda support to put on sportives in the area. The last thing they need is more fuel added to the "bloody cyclists" fire.

Sounds a bit like

https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/etape-hibernia-organiser-withdraws-from-event-44579

which was probably the last event of this type in the country. I did both editions in 2010 and 2011. Article above has some of the story. There was resistance to the closed roads and the solution in 2011 was to start cyclists really early (well before 7 if I remember correctly) which makes it less attractive and won't bump your numbers

Clear communication from the event organisers on what the actual road closures are\were, being told the road is being closed for most of the day to then be open a few hours later, or main streets on villages(ballisodare) being said to be closed cutting access off to most of west Sligo, only when you actually called one of the mobile numbers were you told a stop-go system would be in place. People on the route only getting leaflets up to the Thursday before the event that they would be affected is a bit short notice, no?. Surely simple things like telling people stop-go systems would be in place on certain parts or that the roads would re-open earlier would be a basic thing? The first page and half of this thread was about how poor the communication was.

so locals were notified on Thursday? How much notice do you need? If they were notified three weeks in advance they’d be on here moaning that they were notified to far in advance and should have been “reminded” closer to the actual date!

Like I said…some people just like a good moan and are never happy.

You're kidding! The Sligo community games Finals were on in ATU yesterday so we warned all parents from West Sligo that Ballisodare would be impassable and they all went a very long way round. I went to Lough Key for an event yesterday and found an alternative route via Tubercurry because the information was that any through road in Ballisodare would be closed all day. Could have saved diesel money going the normal way!

Making the local radio now

https://www.oceanfm.ie/2024/07/04/lessons-must-be-learned-from-gran-fondo-event-in-sligo/

Have you done anything but complain in this thread? Did you actually do the event or just complain about it here :V

The radio interview above mentioned they've secured rights to host the event for three years and lessons should be taken into next years event. Even the points raised were absolutely fair enough imo, he even mentioned the route change wasn't great for cyclists and the fact there wasn't hot food at the end.

Overall the event was good. I've never raced a fondo before and I quite enjoyed it.

Chaos at the start but I made a huge effort to get as far to the front as possible, it was fast from the gun. Settled into a group and there was some good racing and not too many sketchy riders. Managed to hang on to a group until about 100k, on second lap I pulled off to refill bottles and piss. I was more than happy I was able to hang on to a fast group until that point and didn't fancy jostling in the bunch for a downhill finish. Lessons learned for myself in terms of nutrition, bring more than just mix.

I hope they do a discount for returners next year, felt **** that I had to fork over full price for a ticket while lots had discounted ones buying the week before.