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Entrepreneurs - step up!
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Less Coaches - More RD's.

It's too late for me, too many kids, too much debt, too set in my ways.

But, we need more races.

We need some smart entrepreneurs to get into the Race Production BIZ.

Who, how about some of the tri-coaches out there. You folk are as entrepreneural as they come - you are running your own businesses. You know your communities, terrain, Tri-shops, local triathletes... you are the logical choices. The Triathlon community needs you, step up, serve your community.
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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Dan will help you get started...

http://www.slowtwitch.com/...ceprod.html#cashflow



"your horse is too high" - tigerchik
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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A friend of ours was complaining that there isn't enough running races in winter in our area. My wife said to him "well why don't you organize one then". He did, all set for Feb 29th.
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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did it this year: http://timetrial.org/ttcupres.htm

lots of work, no profits ... but worth it to help advance the sport, there has been a 50% increase in race participation and growing.
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [TimeTrial.org] [ In reply to ]
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If you did this on a larger scale, a full time scale do you think the profit would be there?

The one thing I have notices is that most running races have a charity attached to them and very few tri's have the same. Is that because tri's have a much much lower profit margin than pure running races. The price for a tri is double, triple, etc. of a running race, is the infrastructure to get a race going also double, triple...?
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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The work and people needed is at least triple. I've worked with every thing from sprint to 1/2IM and it takes a lot of work. Unfortunately the same people and usually few in number are the ones that usually do all the work and that gets old. Where I live there a lot of people that want to race but always have an excuse not to help and usually pretty lame ones. A couple with deep pockets will offer money but I have never seen these individules lift a finger to help out even though they stand around the day before and watch the race being set up and also after the race. If every one would commit to helping with at least one race per year eventually (I think) more races would appear and survive because Rd's and race management would recognize they could get people that have the sport at heart and are knowledgable enough to really help. My 0.02 thanks for listening.
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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After racing for 15 years, I thought last year I would look at a different side of the game.

Well I did a lot of research in 2003 into the possibility of producing a new race in my local area (No Cal). Creating the courses, budgets, applications for permits, gathering a small committee, talking with a couple prospective sponsors, and finding a spot in the tri calendar. The single problem that kept coming up was liability. Sure USAT provides insurance, but everybody you deal with (the parks, the city, the county, etc...) wanted seperate insurance. And at the time the SF triclub members with their BS, had me very frustrated at the direction the sport is headed. Who needs that crap?

This not a part time commitment either. I work full time, have the family and completed 2 IM's last year. So, I give up the racing and focus on being an RD, but for what. I could probably work a week of overtime at my 9 to 5 and bring home twice the amount of cash. There is too much at stake for me and I think most people to put there neck out there with little promise of a decent return.

Good luck to all those who dare.

Brent
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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This is an interesting thread and my first time posting here so I apologize in advance if my posts come out in an awkward fashion.

We do need more RD's and it's a tough, thankless job that does not make much money. I hope everyone realizes this and appreciates what RD's do so we all can go out and push ourselves for 45:00-14:00. It's a physically and mentally draining job that has long hours and for the most part you end up hearing all the negative things about the race and not the postive ones. USAT has been great in implemeting a program to help out first time RD's. We should be thankful for this.

I know where OCTriGeek is coming from and I'm not getting down on him about the coaching aspect. I'm a coach so I take this to heart. We are entrepreneurs, definitely. But we have chosen to coach becasue that's what we like or love to do and want to make our living at it. There are many entrepreneurs in our sport, too many to count. We should consider all of these people as candidates to be RD's. Coaching is also becoming a tough and competitive business that requires specific skills and organization. IMO, if a coach has anywhere over 6 athletes then they would be very challenged to put on a race well. As in our training, there is an amount of specificity to our profession and trying to develop a race would most likely yield negative results on either side. Many coaches do serve the community by volunteering and doing clinics and camps for FREE and some coaches even serve the community by coaching for free. other coaches serve the community by contributing free articles on training and racing to magazines and websites. Do you know how many hours of work it take to develop a clinic or write an artice?

So yes, to some, coaches might seem like a logical choice, but there are many different people within our sport who also are logical choices.

Lee Zohlman, Lead Coach/President
BodyZen Multi Sport Coaching
http://www.bodyzen.com
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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Costs spiralling out of control on all fronts from permits, to shirts, to awards, to demand for payment by "volunteer" groups, to required "donations" by community groups and demands for prize money by the upper echelon of the racing community.

Fewer and fewer people willing to help and truely volunteer each year. More and more people are racing less in local races and concentrating on a few larger races and when not racing are spending their weekends training.

Long time workers growing older, having families, changing job requirements or just not wanting to spend every free weekend working endlessly for a mere pittance.

A race director getting older and actually enjoying watching his son grow up and finding it more difficult to convince his wife that all this work is worth the small pay and large effort.

Watching race fees go up to the point where it is driving out new comers to the sport or people who are only willing or able to compete in only one or maybe two races a year. Last year we charged $65 for an Olympic race and this year with all price hikes in order to break even we will need to charge $72, if we want a profit , then .........

These are all reasons that Triathlantic will be cutting its race schedule by more than half in the next few weeks and probably reasons why more joe average race directors find it impossible to get into the sport. After 18 years of producing 25-30 races a year, we will be hard pressed to be able to organize any more than 7 or 8 this year.
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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>>It's too late for me, too many kids, too much debt, too set in my ways.

But, we need more races. <<

Not to pick on you, but don't you think everyone is going to have some excuse?

I agree with whomever said every should get out and volunteer at least once a year at a local race. Or, volunteer within your tri club. Your eyes will be opened to how many bitchy, demanding people are in the sport. Don't get me wrong, there are many fabulous people in the sport (the majority), but being on the other side of the fence is a good experience. A big thanks to all race directors AND volunteers.

Now if any of you want to volunteer for Alcatraz....give me a shout.

clm

clm
Nashville, TN
https://twitter.com/ironclm | http://ironclm.typepad.com
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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If we all volunteer for one race for every race we run - the supply of races would likely go up significantly as I believe this is the limiting factor.

____________________________________________

"which is like watching one of your buddies announce that he's quitting booze and cigarettes, switching to a Vegan diet and training for triathalons ... but he's going to keep snorting heroin." Bill Simmons, ESPN
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [ironclm] [ In reply to ]
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"

Not to pick on you, but don't you think everyone is going to have some excuse?"

Did it sound like I was making an excuse?

Did it sound like I had any interest in being a RD?

I'm an ivory tower corporate slut type with no interest in getting my hands dirty and stocking my garage with pylons. What I want is more RD's to give my money to. Those RD's that have built a strong race list have my utmost respect - I couldn't do it nor do have a desire to do it.

By creating this post I was trying to open up dialog for young, smart, hard working entrepreneurs to think about the opportunities out there. There are many many many more like me out there... people with gobs of discretionary income who just want to race.

You want to volunteer, go volunteer, I don't care.
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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OCtriGeek- In your case volunteering would be a very good thing because your seem to have years of race knowledge to put to use helping some young hard charging individual plan and set up a race.

Nothing says you can't help and race the event also which is what I have done on many occasions. I don't have much in the way of extra income but still enjoy giving my money to an RD to test myself. Helping with a race doesn't have to be all time consuming but it can be if you let it. So volunteer for a race and don't expect any thing in return except perhaps a thankyou or the pride that you helped with a damn good race the others could enjoy.
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Re: Entrepreneurs - step up! [OCTriGeek] [ In reply to ]
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given these sentiments, your earlier exhortation to "step up, serve your community" is coming off as a bit disingenuous
Last edited by: pyker: Jan 13, 04 11:51
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