What Race Organizers Ask from Runners Before the Race

Since I started Takbo.ph, I have meet and talked with several race organizers and race sponsors.  This gave me a lot of insights on what is happening behind the scenes.  From our conversations, I learned that we as runners have a part in making the race successful, more pleasant and easier to manage.  And even prior to the race, these simple actions from us will help them a lot.

1.  Fill Up the Forms Properly – These are important.  Your race and personal information in the forms should be accurate and well written.  This is not just as a waiver but it is also basis for the race day itself.  One race sponsor told me that they had delayed the release of the race results in their race last 2008 in Clark because of the discrepancy in the age.  They need some basis that the birthdays written down was true and accurate for them to win in their age categories.  So when a friend asks you to register for him, it is not funny to place his age as 60 when he is a strong 25 y.o. runner.  Naming him Brad Pitt is funny to me but not to the organizers.

2.  Register Early –  All race organizers will agree that we love to register at the last minute.  One week before the race and not even 50% of the target participants are met.  Ask Patrick Concepcion with the Condura 2008.  All of a sudden, the race registration doubles within a few days before the race.  Maybe you would say that the organizers should be happy.  Well, they are but it also means that the staff will be very overloaded prior to the race.  Instead of concentrating on the event, the staff will add more hours encoding your information and preparing the race packets.  This results to increase in human error in the results like wrong name or gender and a lot of other inconvenience to the organizers and participants.

3.  Follow the dates – I also hate deadlines.  When organizers are strict to say that there is no registration on race day or no claiming of race packets on race day, I want to rant about it with a blog.  I want things to be convenient for me and doing them all on the race day itself is my favorite mistake.  But same as #2, it adds up unforecasted manpower.  And how many people do this on race day?  A good number of us.  This adds up to the delay in the race and also becomes inconvenient on my part when they ran out of singlets or race packets.  Instead of putting the staff as additional marshals to ensure a safe race or additional water stations, the staff are placed in another booth for the runners who refuse to follow the dates.

Here’s another thing I learned.

I don’t like drinking that sports drink that has bubbles on it, nor I don’t like the idea of giving out carbonated drinks at the finish line.  Well, sometimes organizers don’t choose the sponsors.  It’s the sponsors choosing them.  Some products can easily lobby themselves into the race planning for their product to be exposed to the runners.  That is how these products love us so much that they will find their way to our hearts at all cost.  But sad to say, I just don’t love the product.  As a result, some runners complain.  It’s like having a suitor you don’t like at all but still keeps on bugging you.  But race organizers don’t have much choice espcially when the direction is coming from higher places.

Our race organizers are very kind actually when you compare them to races abroad.  Like the Singapore Marathon, they follow the deadline strictly.  If you don’t get the race packet on race day, sorry, it goes to charity probably.  If you make a mistake on the registration, you pay to make some changes.

So my fellow runners, while we demand the best from the organizers, let’s also have DISCIPLINE even prior to the race day.  The simple act of filling up the forms properly, registering early and following the dates, can really help our races be at par with international standards.

It’s not just the race that needs to be WORLD-CLASS.  Participant must act as WORLD-CLASS too.