Not a Race Director, but I play one on TV.

Just kidding. I thought I'd share a short convo I had with a friend who is an RD and he said a big challenge is to plan for the future in a way that isn't tone deaf to the present. I hadn't thought of that, but when you plan for a race series there's always a chance that you'll announce it on the same day that your area hits a new record high in numbers or there's an outbreak at a long term care facility with tragic consequences.

I hadn't considered that before, and I appreciate the RD threads on here because there's a lot of moving parts and it's interesting to hear about them all. I'm very curious about this thread!

I'm not a RD but do run a business that is sport specific (youth leagues, practices, etc) and completely indoors. I would try to sit down with your local gov. and ask them how they see you being able to move forward. Come up with a plan with them that will allow you the permits you need (if that is something you need) and then make a decision after that. It doesn't really do any good to get a opinion from an RD living in Florida if you are trying to put on a race in California since obviously the restrictions, etc. are waaaay different.

While my business is certainly taking a hit we have been able to survive (despite the actions of our local gov.). Out of about 170 teams (out of a normal 230) that registered back in Nov., I've only had 2 teams drop out of the league since we started up. I say this because numbers have risen substantially since Nov. yet people still are willing to come indoors and play. My assumption is that all the teams/players/parents that weren't comfortable with the situation just didn't sign up, the 2 teams that dropped out of the league were on the fence from the beginning and the rise tipped them over the edge, and the rest were coming in to play no matter the situation (as long as we set things up appropriately on our end). I say this because I think if you set things up properly there will be people that want to race. Your registration numbers will probably be down (unless there are normally a lot of races but now your the only one) but there are plenty that want to race or do normal activities as long as there is effort shown to mitigate risk.

Obviously go by whatever your state/county is telling you but some of the things we have implemented. Everyone that enters our facility wears a mask at all times (even the kids while they are playing). We just set up that everyone must "check-in" at the facility with their names, phone#'s for contact tracing and time of arrival (this means we are collecting probably around 1000's names a weekend). All of our start and end times are staggered which relieves a huge bottle neck when one game ends and the next one begins. Limited spectators to 1 per player (includes siblings, parents, etc.). Encourage everyone to show up like 5 minutes before the game start so no one sits around in our lobby waiting for games to start, etc.

That’s a lot of what I was getting at in my posts about race cancellations last year. Not so much that I didn’t think racing could be done safe but much of it came down to political optics and finances. There were some races that were going to see very low turnout of racers and volunteers and there was an easy excuse to cancel as opposed to losing money. Having a race, which is about as non-essential as things can be in a pandemic, can be incredibly tone deaf depending on the timing, the locale, the messaging, etc. The three IM branded races that went off did so only because of timing luck. No other reason. Look at AZ 70.3 vs IMAZ. Same location five weeks apart. The 70.3 timing was at the low point in the fall. By the date of IMAZ the COVID numbers were 6x higher... only five weeks later. Carrying on with the race was maybe safe but the RD looks like a flaming asshole for doing so, IMO.

It’s not that I think the races are inherently super risky. I’m not super concerned about outdoor activities and COVID spread. I am concerned about many of the logistics and it sounds like much was mitigated as far as some risky race logistics like check in, meetings, volunteers, start/finish, and such. Where things go off the rails for me, and likely others, is travel risk. I just don’t want to be staying in hotels, or eating out, and there’s almost nothing in the world that could get me on an airplane right now.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

When and where is your race? Ours is 7/25 in NC. Currently we are optimistic, but not sinking expenses quite yet. I am certainly a bit nervous. Can we really have the festive atmosphere that makes us special?

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David
* Ironman for Life! (Blog) * IM Everyday Hero Video * Daggett Shuler Law *
Disclaimer: I have personal and professional relationships with many athletes, vendors, and organizations in the triathlon world.

I know my RD friends are in discussions with local permitting agencies/authorities on the feasibility of future events up to and including June. There is a lot of uncertainty around if these can be held safely by both the local permitting authority/ medical staff and even RDs.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

We are moving forward as usual with plans for our small annual sprint triathlon in July. We held this same race last July amid the pandemic with some alterations.

The question of ethics and optics is highly location dependent. This race is in a small community in the upper Midwest. It typically has 75-125 participants coming from within a 200 mile radius. The people here are probably more accepting of public events and generally won't let the pandemic completely control their lives. Kids and adults played outdoor sports as usual all last summer. High school football season came and went with no major changes from previous years. Last night, I watched a high school basketball game inside a school gym with a couple thousand other people. They simply blocked out every other row of seating and reminded people to keep their masks on and stay apart.

I only mention all of this to give an idea of what our local public's opinion of a triathlon might be. About 95% of our locals would not even know what a triathlon is. But, if they did know, I'm quite certain they would have no problems with an outdoor sporting contest between consenting adults.

I'm a race director for a small race in Canada, about 200 athletes for the standard/sprint distance race but we also run a kids event that traditionally gets over 600 children between the ages of 5 and 15. That event is held on a separate day and venue than the standard race.

Right now we think we can go ahead with the standard race, with certain measures in place of course. Our committee is purely volunteer based and we are not for profit so having the race or not is not really a big deal from a financial perspective, but with very little local racing options in general our races are usually the highlight of the summer and people look forward to doing them, especially the kids of steel event.

One issue we have is that many of the organizations that volunteer to assist us one race day to provide first aid service, search and rescue on the water, etc. are reluctant to help and are keeping their services available for emergency use only, hopefully that changes prior to August.

We are somewhat isolated where we live and currently have less than 10 active cases of Covid-19 but even though the numbers are low we still have restrictions on gathering size, travel and self isolation, social distancing, requirements to wear masks in public etc.

I can see us being able to have the adult race but the kids of steel is somewhat questionable.

I know my RD friends are in discussions with local permitting agencies/authorities on the feasibility of future events up to and including June. There is a lot of uncertainty around if these can be held safely by both the local permitting authority/ medical staff and even RDs.


I agree with Brian, here.

I'm not an RD but all my clients are RD's - in some cases organizing some of the biggest running, cycling and triathlon races/events in Canada and a few in the U.S. Through some advocacy work that I'm doing for the business, I am in regular contact with many RD's all across North America each week!

Like a lot of things with Covid-19 - what we see is going to be very regionally specific. And ultimately local municipalities, who issue the permits are going to have the final say! An RD can plan as much as they like, for as many different scenarios as they like, or need to, but securing that permit is the final hurdle!!

For the Canadians on here, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I would be VERY surprised if we see any "normal" triathlons this year. We may see some smaller, Time Trail format kind of events with heavy protocols and social distancing in place. All running, cycling and other endurance sports races/events in the country through to about June 1, have already cancelled, postponed(if they can) or gone virtual! Makes sense - right now the gathering limits for people right now in most parts of the country outdoors is 5 or zero!! A LOT has to happen between now and June, for say even a couple hundred people together together.

Ounce deeper into the Fall, (unfortunately well past Triathlon Season here in Canada), I can see the possibility of some larger, getting-close-to-normal, running ad cycling races/events. I think the Live Music Concert Business, another business that has been absolutely hammered by all of this, is targeting the Fall of this year, for a start of some Concert Events. For us in the Endurance Sports Race/Events Business - they are a good business, to follow, because there are many similarities in terms of gathering and congregation.

Prediction - We'll not fully get back to normal in the Endurance Sports Race/Event Business, until 2022! (Trust me - because my livelihood depends on this business, I would love to be proven completely wrong about this. Unfortunately, I've had to make plans for Worst Case)

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

We do relatively small events in northern Illinois. We do bike races and multi sport events. We won't be doing anything the first six months of 2021. We likely won't do a triathlon at all.

It was written better in a post above this, but the optics of planning and advertising an event anytime soon might be a poor choice long term for us. A couple sponsors didn't seem too wild about participating this year either. The park district we get permits through isn't approving anything with more than 25 people at the moment either.

I would not be surprised if the entire year is a wash for large events. It's certainly not that important in the grand scheme of things.

I said this before in the the LR. But 2021 could still be a shitshow and I’m putting that nicely. I know everyone is trying to be positive. But we have multiple new strains, we have enough people at least in the US that don’t want the vaccine that the odds of a mutation taking place that decreases the vaccine effectiveness is not zero.

Now coming out of california they are suspending a batch of the Moderna vaccine because of reactions people are having.

I really hope by the fall we’ll have some races and this will start improving, but I’m really not holding my breath. Hopefully I’m wrong.

We put on three races in West Michigan and the biggest challenge we've encountered is trying to plan for so many different scenarios at once. At this point it's almost like starting from scratch and planning 4 races for every 1 race we put on.

Our first race is in June, usually brings in around 1800 people, and features the biggest changes given how early in the year it is. The first is that we moved transition from a long and narrow stretch of road to a large field that should be somewhere in the 50k sq ft range. Quick back of the napkin math says I can fit upwards of 400 racks in there. We have capped each day at 500 athletes and have enough racks to put 2 or 3 people per rack with plenty of room between racks for spacing. It will also allow for better, one way traffic flow. We also split the event into two days instead of one to help space people out more. We are offering our sprint and a new super sprint distance on Saturday and an Olympic and Half on Sunday. These changes are in addition to the USAT/Ironman/Fred Somner/Common Sense playbook that everyone will be following (limiting touch points, prepackaged food, hand sanitizer everywhere, masks, etc). Our Olympic distance event sold out in under 10' and the other distances will most likely sell out this week so people are definitely ready to race.

Our other races are later in the year, August and September, and will most likely feature the same covid modifications that everyone is following at this point. We have capped registration at 600 athletes for those races. Our August race (MiTi) sold out quickly and is down to a few full-distance spots left (full distance is way up compared to our best year). MiTi normally has around 1k athletes and I'm hopeful we will be able to open up registration to more people as we get closer to race day, but for now we are confident we can put on a safe event with 600 people, assuming of course that we don't have some crazy relapse.

Received an email with this in it for a race I was signed up for.

Thanks Cuomo.

We are disappointed to pass along the following information.

We have received emails from New York State Parks and Recreation and confirmed with phone calls to the management of XXX State Park in NY that the State has already made the decision to deny any permits for events within their parks in 2021 due to the corona virus.

I'm registered for Musselman in July which uses a State park. I'm assuming that's toast now???

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

That is how I read the email from the race, but I couldn't say for sure.

I looked up 2 other races I'm hoping to do and one is open (and in a state park) and the other is not in a state park and "opening soon".

Everyone who isn't on ST. These threads pop up all the time now and they are all gloom and doom. If you read these things it seems like people are better off setting themselves on fire than hoping race in 2021.

Pragmatism and realism are not the same as gloom and doom. You can agree with that, right?

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

No kidding. I could just blow smoke up everyone’s ass. But if you’re in the US, and aren’t in one of the states that just doesn’t give a shit, it can still be a mess. Sorry to burst everyone’s special little bubble they live in if they think everything will peachy, but we aren’t out of this yet.