Sleep-deprived New Father Talk

Posted by Grant on 25. October 2010 19:08

Our baby girl has arrived, welcome Freya Killian to the world!  Mom and baby are healthy, and while there's not as much sleep in our house as we'd like, I think it's to be expected and we're hanging in there.  When looking back on our lives, I think Freya will be the best project we ever undertook!

As I get back into the swing of things and catch up on email and internet news, I found Clay from Adventure World Magazine filed the most recent commentary on the condition of AR in the States; he points out 5 problems.  I chimed in via the comments to his post, but the formatting got all screwy (maybe it's sleep deprived new father syndrome?), so let me share my thoughts in tidier fashion here:

• Clay's 1st point on redundancy of race location: while it's often cheaper and easier for the organization, of course no racer wants to run the same course year after year. For Untamed events, we pride ourselves on variety and not repeating terrain. Zooming out a bit, as to why Untamed New England is held in New England and we don't run an Untamed Alleghenies or Untamed Chesapeake or Untamed Rockies event, the answer is that we follow the $ and if a venue or jurisdiction likes us and makes it viable to conduct a race (as northern New England does) then we don't burn too many calories trying to relocate our entire operation someplace else. If we made money on the sport, then it would be different but right now we don't shop around too hard for a new general location.

• Clay's 2nd point on race locations far away: I want to race in far away places. I've organized races in suburban areas of Richmond Virginia, for example, but it is nothing like a race through some of America's remote wild places. Moreover, the insurance and permitting involved in areas where more people live can be overwhelming. We operate on the US/Canadian border because there are hundreds of miles of wilderness there -- it is a pain for people to travel to, and if we held Untamed New England in the Boston area we'd get lots of interested teams, but after a day of racing from one 4 mile parcel of "wilderness" to another through suburban Massachussets, I think people wouldn't come back. Rugged and remote are two of our hallmarks, and not every zip code can deliver on this. 

• Clay's 3rd point on date conflicts: organizations must balance many factors in determining race dates. We often have tourism $ dictating what general time of year we hold an event, and then other regional events that could conflict witha specific weekend (wine festivals at your preferred host venue, for example). I think most organizers do look at other event calendars, and Geoff from Raid the North did in fact ask us about our 2011 race dates on a couple occasions (and we are not running our North American race in 2011, focusing on Switzerland instead). Established races often confer with one another on dates. The other two races you reference are new and come out of the blue, so impossible for established races to know who to check with. For a new race to pick a date that conflicts with an established race is either foolish/ignorant or a clear challenge to the existing race. For Untamed New England, we have the added scheduling hassle of the other AR World Series events and the World Championship to plan around -- so we have added international considerations. There are only so many weekends, and Summer is the prime season for this activity. There comes a time when every organization has to commit to race dates and stick to it -- and planning around every other race that is advertised can drive you crazy (and know that some expedition events that are announced aren't actually ever held, witness the "Best of the West" race in Canada this past Summer).

• Clay's 4th point on too much required gear: I don't know any specific event in the US that has a giant mandatory gear list, I think it's a generally accepted policy to be minimal in race requirements. We do require a satellite phone (that teams rent), which is exotic but as cell phones don't work in Untamed New England territory it's been critical to several rescue scenarios over the years. I do know that Chris Caul and PQ used to require things like gaiters for trekking legs -- and I think surely gaiters can be a personal choice! -- but I don't think Chris maintains that level of detail on his gear lists anymore.

• Clay's 5th point on high costs: adventure racing is expensive, no argument from me. The catch is, we have racers clamouring for more Untamed events (as you know, Clay, each year we get suggestions/requests/proposals for a new race location or to partner with an AR club on a race in their area) -- but with our entrance fees at $1,500-$2,000 per team we don't make $ from organizing, so there's no real incentive for us to pursue these new opportunities besides the satisfaction and enjoyment we have in operating a race. So we focus on a single North American event and leave it at that. Standard business protocol would be to raise our fees, and we may do that in the future (and be the only way we grow in new directions in the US), but that would fly in the face of your call for less expenses. I'm just speaking for the Untamed Adventure organization, here, but when we return to the US it will likely be at $3,000 per team (and at least 1 more day of racing). We should be charging more, not less. I've had conversations like this for years now, and the reason long course racing in the US isn't popular comes down to money. If Untamed Adventure made money (by charging lots more or enticing more sponsor $), we could hold a 5-race series across the US and begin to work on the media blackhole AR is in. Sponsor $ isn't there. Participant $ isn't there. So we arrive at the current steady state.
  

With Adventure World Magazine, Clay, you're advancing the cause and doing unquestionably good work for the sport of AR (working a bit on that "media blackhole"). There is no national leadership in terms of governance for adventure racing in the US (USARA says the right things on it's website, but doesn't advocate, govern, or promote) . . . it's a miserable US economy . . . and reality TV is far cheaper to produce than sending camera crews out into the remote wilderness and edit it into compelling programming.

The bottom line is that things like the Muddy Buddy series, where people pay $150 to bike and run and then crawl through a contrived mud pit for an hour or so, are very successful because they can be completed by a couch potato and are located in the town park. There's a whole niche of "races" that follow this pattern and the strong promoters make a good living with this thing. There are some real adventure races out there that aren't like the Muddy Buddy -- thank goodness there are organizations that take pleasure in all the details of planning, logistics, and wilderness operations -- but where would the smart investor put their time and resources?