Feb. 12, 2022
Indiana Randonneurs
Electronic Proof of Passage (EPP)
One of the fundamental features of randonneuring is that you must offer evidence that you have completed the route that you have undertaken; this is called “Proof of Passage.” Like many clubs, Indiana Randonneurs switched paper brevet cards to electronic proof of passage during the pandemic, and this will remain our preferred method for proving passage going forward. We have also discontinued the practice of providing paper copies of our cue sheet; beginning in 2022, all of the cues will be embedded in the Ride with GPS (RWGPS) link that we provide for each ride.
There are several ways to provide electronic proof of passage. The easiest way is to record a track within a commonly used service, such as Strava or RWGPS. In fact, Indiana Randonneurs provides its members with a club membership in RWPS, making it especially convenient to use that service. You should be able to record your ride with either a GPS unit or with a smartphone (for example, the RidewithGPS smartphone app will allow you to navigate a route and record at the same time in “offline” mode to conserve battery.)
The on-line registration service we use, Ridestats, allows you to submit your Strava or RWGPS track after the ride. Sometimes, however, we have encountered difficulty in getting the automatic reporting function to work. In that case, you may be asked to send a link by email to the RBA (currently Bill Watts wwatts@butler.edu) or the ride organizer showing your GPS track. We will also accept tracks from Spot and other services, so long as they are publicly available and do not require an additional fee for us to access them.
If you do not have a GPS unit or a smartphone, you may also provide proof of passage with photographs taken at each control and at the end of the ride. In this case, send your photos by email to the RBA, and include in your message your finishing time.
Indiana Randonneurs is a small club, and we trust one another. In many cases, the RBA or ride organizer will be on the route and can vouch for your completion of the ride. You should still be prepared, though, to provide evidence for your completion of the ride. If you are especially concerned to have your ride certified—if, for example, you need the ride to qualify for PBP or another event—you may want to plan for redundant methods of recording the ride. For example, you might record your ride on both your GPS and your smartphone, in case one of them fails. Alternatively, you might want to record the ride on your GPS unit, and also take pictures at each control and at the end.
Note, also, that we will accept non-continuous GPS tracks as proof of passage. If, for example, your GPS unit fails, you might record the rest of your ride on a smartphone and provide both tracks as proof of passage.
If you do not have a smartphone or a GPS unit, or if you would find it difficult to provide EPP, please correspond with the RBA at least 24 hours before the start of the ride. We want people to complete our rides and to get credit for them, and we will work with you to find an alternative method of proving passage.