YOU SOLD MY BIB? (Read 481 times)

 Im sorry for being unclear. The plan is they will assume you aren't coming, take your bib and hand it to someone who is waiting on race day to register. So, when you show up at 8:55, you can walk by the starting line and see someone else with your bib on their shirt.And since they have ZERO extra bibs, I can only assume that you will not be allowed to race. As they stated, anyone without a bib cannot be knowingly allowed to race since it would jeopardize their insurance policy. And, I agree. There could be a lot of logistics here. Including: they already announced everyones name and bib #.

 

As Baboon said, I plan to be there early (earlier now), so it should not be an issue for me. But I haven't even HEARD of a race doing this.

Thanks for the clarification. Never heard of this before and it sounds like a bad idea. I doubt there was any mention when you registered online and paid that you had to be there to pick up your bib more than 10 minutes before race time. Sounds like a breach of contract. I'm sure most people will be there plenty ahead of time, but there could always be some stragglers for whatever reason who could end up getting screwed out of the race they signed up for early. Hopefully all the pre-registered runners will have seen this and take note to make sure they get there extra early. If you do lose your bib and show up, do you get a refund?

If anyone does lose the bib they had paid for earlier I'd say that this is a rare situation where banditting the race is totally acceptable and I'd encourage it.

 

BTW- after the downgrade, you @united gave me a seat that someone else had rightly been assigned to. That wasn't cool -@Lagat1500

For those wondering whether I have had my picture taken with Lagat, by Lagat's wife, the answer is "yes."

Hey - Im a newer runner (about 1 yr) and I don't know if this ever happened to you, but it seems highly... odd, to me.

 

I signed up for a HM months ago. Great deal. Local race. They have FB and twitter and their own website. They posted months ago they were increasing the size of the field due to increasing demand every year, but they kept updating the open registrations. (400 to start)...100 left...50 left...7 left.. sold out.

 

Today, they announce since they actually have no extra bibs, they are going to compile the bibs and 10 min before the 9am start, they will start re-selling (double selling) the bibs to people who want to register race day.

 

There are a lot of issues with this particular race why I feel this is a bad idea. (1) they are having "walkers" start the course early at 8:15am. The destination has 2 roads to it, one will be closed with a gate (once you've drive all the way up the road). and the open road is the one with slower racers on it going against traffic (2) there is no day-before packet pickup. (3) this event has never been this big.

 

Everything about this race organization has been 100% great and admirable until this.

 

But in your opinion, should paid, registered runners have their bibs re-sold without their consent?

OK, let's take the thought that they have TOLD you that you have to pick up your bib by 15 minutes before the gun.  You do not pick it up.  You did not follow through with your part of the contract of picking the bib up on time.  What they do with the bib after that time (10 mins before gun time) is up to them.  They can put it in a box, re sell it, throw it away, etc.  It is their bib, not yours.

That being said I think it is going to be a cluster fuck and trying to get any amount of bibs resold in the last few minutes will cause problems for everyone.  As some else stated how many runners are going to show up with the possibility of running (buying a bib) and what if that number is higher than the actual number of no shows?  Are they going to have these runners in waiting off to the side in a line?  How are they going to enter all the information into the race database in time to make sure the race still gets off in time?

Also they are creating this fear, worry, anxiety with runners that have bibs and that is not good either.  I get the point that they are trying to maximize revenues for the fundraiser.  There is probably a better way to do it.

Kelly,

First, I want to be very clear that I have huge respect for the amount of work you put into this event and the great deal it is. I am sorry if you feel that any criticism of one part of the race is an overall criticism of your work.

That being said, your initial post today was responded to mainly because I was upset. I, a pre-registered, paid runner was upset that I now had to worry even more about parking and traffic.

I can not imagine how much pressure you were under to make this decision, but I felt any of the 400 runners would be much more upset with you if they were denied entry. And rightly so.

Others have commented that there is also a potential legal case against selling the same spot to two people.

I do not envy your position in this decision. I am also a member of the HTC. Maybe in the future, HTC can pre-buy registrations if they want to be able to accommodate last minute requests. That is what several travel agents do.

As for the threat of banditing. I again do not envy you. However, your solution was to invite people without registration to come anyway? With several races looking to increase security, this seems a big step in the wrong direction. As for your insurance, you cannot be liable if a person jumped into middle of your race, but now that you have invited unlimited unregistered runners to show up anyway could be seen as an action you took which facilitates the ability of unregistered runners on the course as well as their risk to registered runners.

I am sorry if you did not appreciate my forum for discussion. I am not likely to be personally affected by your decision. I appreciate your taking the time to clarify your position and decision. I would have liked to have been on your side earlier when you were getting pressured.

I hope that the event is a huge success and that my concerns are unwarranted.

Also - do a lot of races have walkers go out first?  It seems like that's a great way to have racers weave through a bunch of people, or am I missing something?

It's very common. Even in the NYRR Fifth Avenue Mile the walkers and joggers with headphone are invited to stand at the very front. 'cause no-one could jog/walk a whole mile without their headphones, and certainly not from the back of the pack.

 In addition we faced pressure form members of the Hartford Track Club Board to make special exceptions for certain individuals who were long time members.

Shame on them!

In an attempt to avoid bandits and all of the liability and resource issues bandits create we tried to develop a system to accommodate additional runners. What we did not explain on the Face Book posts is that a number of runners have informed us that they will not be able to run and that we may transfer their bibs to other runners. Those are the bib numbers that would be transferred on race day. We would not be "stealing" bib numbers from some poor runner who had car trouble, got lost, or was running late. We don't want to create the circus of a general transfer policy, but if a runner was willing to show up on race day and run the risk of not getting a bib, we wanted to be able to try and accommodate that runner (and to raise additional funds for Running for Rescues).

I think it was a good attempt at a "win-win" for the organizers and some folks that might still want to run the race.  No use letting open slots go to waste if you've got people who want to run. 

With that said, I'd say take some notes, think about the process, tweak the deal to something that fits the situation better, and give it another try.     

This thread started on an incorrect assumption. The RD is not doing anything wrong. They are only re-selling bibs of people that said they no longer plan to run the race. I don't see a problem with that. Nobody is going to show up and find their bib gone.