Write to the table

The table is where the letters arrive. Like the registration table at a race, it is a real desk with real work spread across it, and it is the right way to reach the people who keep this board kept.

Write to letters@californiaroadclub.org. Every letter is read.

What letters are for

Three kinds of letter are always welcome at the table.

A correction against the public record comes first. If a note carries a wrong date, a wrong distance, a misread rule or a name spelled the way nobody spells it, point to the note and to the record that disagrees with it. Corrections are the most useful mail we get, and they are answered before anything else.

A record the board missed comes next. A results sheet, a race flyer, an old district schedule, a photograph of a start line or a registration table at dawn: the paper of amateur racing is scattered, and the board is glad to learn where a piece of it survives. Tell us what it is and where it lives, and we will say whether and how it can be used.

And a question about a note is always in order. If something on the board is unclear, if a source named at the foot of a note does not lead where it should, or if a note raises a question it does not answer, ask it. Some questions become notes of their own.

What letters are not for

The table is a reading desk, not a registration desk. It cannot take a racenote, because the board runs no race. It cannot process a membership, because there is no club here to join. It cannot forward a sponsorship request, because no team sits behind this site. Nothing on the board is sold or traded, so letters offering to buy the address, the content or a place on it will find no transaction to discuss.

If your question belongs to a real event, a real club or a real governing body, write to them instead. They are the ones who can act on it, and most of them answer faster than we do.

Who reads the letters

Letters are filed by Wren Colfax, who holds the stapler, and corrections are checked against the record by Marge Iannone, who minds the pins. A correction that holds gets marked on the page it fixes, with the sources line updated so a reader can see what changed.

How fast the table answers

This is a volunteer table, not an office. Letters are answered in the order they arrive, and a correction worth making is made as soon as the record behind it has been checked, but nobody staffs the desk full time. A letter can take days rather than hours. If yours is about a correction, the fix will usually show on the page before the reply reaches your inbox.