If you paid the big bucks, "golden spoke" money, you get a chance to talk to the organizers directly as a "representative of the community" obstensively to help improve the ride. Since I paid the price of admission this is one of the the items i've got on the list ..
My opinion -- I don't think this is Chips doing, in-fact I don't think its really the organizers . I think its a legacy item that started back in the 1990s and has grown into the proportions it has today without someone really riding herd on it. In other similar rides in the briefing they make it a point to tell the independent support vehicles to yield to passing cyclists.
If you don't have one, this is perhaps a reason to have a camera. I bought brand new memory chips for my cameras to be able to capture this in 1080P glory if it happens again. I suspect some people would be embarrassed after what you reported last year if the video of it was made public
Quote from reever on Aug 24th, 2016, 7:24pm:Hey Mr. Wizard,
I don't know what meeting that is on Friday and who it is with, but give them a piece of our collective minds about this problem of "unofficial marshaling". Last year I really felt like I was in danger. I didn't think I would say anything about it because by the end of the incident I was uttering some pretty dark language and gestures at my attackers. I thought I'd just let Chip glory in a really great event and not bring him down. Now is the time to bring up concerns though.