How much more would you be willing to pay for an event to have a real contingency plan? Would you be willing to pay 75%-100% higher entry fees to better insure the event is held?
As an open water event planner/director and a member of the USMS Long Distance Committee, I’m interested in understanding how much swimmers really want full blown contingency plans or is this more of a one off because of a 1 in 25 occurrence.
Contingency 1 – Delay start until weather clears. Currently I pay lifeguards, EMT, ambulance for a 5 hour event. If I was to have an all day weather contingency I would need to book and pay safety staff for 10+ hours and some of my lifeguards would need to take the day off their regular guard jobs. My timing guys are paid by the job, so there wouldn’t be any additional cost there. I would also in some cases have to pay additional usage fees for the lake and facilities. I would also need to plan for an additional event staff meal.
Contingency 2 – Delay to the next day. This pretty much doubles the cost. I would need to have all safety, timing and event personnel contracted for 2 days instead of one. Along with getting lake and facilities use permits. And depending on the lake, I’d need to breakdown and reset parts of the course.
Contingency 3 – Delay to a future date. This wouldn’t be as costly as 2, since I generally wouldn’t be locked into paying all costs upfront for this new date. However, if this is a late season event, then there are new cold air/water considerations.
Contingency 4 – Change of venue. This isn’t practicable for me since weather from lake to lake is likely to be the same. I see this could be a different issue if moving from ocean to inlet or great lake to pond. But, if I were to move an event I’d guestimate 6+ hours to breakdown, transport and set-up the course and staff. And the cost would be similar to contingency 1, plus there would be additional usage fees.
And even with a comprehensive contingency plan there is no guarantee that the contingency plan won’t get rained out. It may just bump the needle from 1 in 25 to 1 in 100.
I don’t believe we ask our national championship bidders if they have contingency plans, but I’ll ask the Long Distance Committee to consider this going forward.
Contingency 5 - check the weather and make an educated guess based on forecasts. in this case it was clear the weather was going to blow over mid afternoon. if there could have been a mass announcement (gathering everyone together, or an email, etc) and announce that based on forecasts it will be delayed "X" hours and ask for "donations" from swimmers to help cover the costs of postponing vs cancelation, i can almost guarantee you that people will be shoving $5-$20 a person into a donation box. i personally would rather donate $20 to have a shot at competing that day based on favorable forecasts.
one thing that isn't really being addressed is the time it takes to train for this event. i would be furious about losing the $$ but i think i would be way more upset that i spent my summer training for an event that was going to be cancelled. i'm not saying that this can be compensated for, but its just another aspect of cancel vs postpone a major race like this.
What about a delay of 5 or 6 hours or 24 hours (I know this wouldn't have worked for some, but if they'd had know in advance, perhaps it would have)? Seems like there could be contingency plans made in advance and communicated to participants so that they could arrange their travel plans around those plans in case they need to be executed.
Just really, really stinks to come all that way for a swim, spend all that time and money to get there, do all the training to be prepared and then come home having not done it. Even a delay to the afternoon would have allowed for the swim to go off safely. As would have a 24 hour delay.
A delayed race would have been great, sure. But I can absolutely see how that's not always possible, especially in a situation like Chicago where you've got to use a paid lifeguard staff (as opposed to volunteer kayakers) and have permits that run out after a certain time. The organizers were clear in their FAQ that they had the water for a limited time. There's a reason they specify that everyone will be pulled out of the water at 11:00am, period, even in the best of situations. Everything's a little more complicated in a big city, after all. And while just collecting the money to pay the lifeguards, etc. for the rest of the day is great in theory, there are so many pieces of the puzzle that would have to still be available in the afternoon, too, that I'd be shocked if that was actually possible to make happen on the scale of a race that size.
I felt like the multiple emails leading up to the day did a very good job of letting us know that cancellation was a possibility. Yes, I'm disappointed and yes, I'm out some money, but them's the breaks sometimes in a sport that depends on mother nature. And yes, this was my big event for the season, the goal I trained for all summer. I was really upset not to be able to race. But I'm damn proud of the gains I made training for it, and not swimming the race doesn't take them away.
I think this is really the bottom line. You want to race in downtown Chicago, you've got to realize there are some logistical hurdles. A smaller race in a lower profile venue is going to be much easier to postpone or reschedule.
Yes, good point.
Everything's a little more complicated in a big city, after all.
I think this is really the bottom line. You want to race in downtown Chicago, you've got to realize there are some logistical hurdles. A smaller race in a lower profile venue is going to be much easier to postpone or reschedule.
