I think that was probably a big part of the problem. I work in downtown SD, about a mile or so from Balboa and I never saw any kind of advertising. They absolutely needed ads to draw in the couch to 5k crowd because they would jump at the chance to say "Yeah, I ran Worlds last month" to their sedentary friends.
I wonder how many of the 500 total were unique. I signed up for both the mile and 5k
Jonathan Gault wrote:
The meet was initially meant to be held in San Diego in September, but World Athletics pulled the meet from SD in March because it wasn't confident in preparations. WA said it considered a number of alternative hosts but didn't think there would be time to get the championships organized by the end of the year.
"Following the decision last month to move the 2025 World Athletics Road Running Championships from San Diego, World Athletics has held discussions with a number of alternative hosts, some with great potential.
"While some of these discussions will continue for other editions of the event, the World Athletics Council has decided not to award the Championships to an alternative host this year due to lack of essential planning and preparation time required to cater for both elite and mass participation race elements."
I wonder now if the World Running Championships will be on the same year as cross country worlds? Or will it revert back to odd years in 2027? A pretty big failure for this event. Lets hope the World XC is organised.
So disappointing! How did USATF screw this up so badly? I feel for the athletes who made teams and are now missing out, as well as the other folks who were training for the mass event.
notachance wrote:
So disappointing! How did USATF screw this up so badly? I feel for the athletes who made teams and are now missing out, as well as the other folks who were training for the mass event.
There is a thread from about a month ago when San Diego pulled out but there was hope the event could still be staged somewhere else in November. That thread contains several comments as to why it collapsed.
My comments, #77, #86, put the blame on the USATF / WA contract structure which means they are sure to rake in a nice profit while the LOC is carrying all the risk. For example:
Bidder acknowledges that USATF owns all revenue sources, including all commercial rights to the Championships, including media, marketing and licensing rights. USATF may negotiate in good faith with Bidder to transfer certain mutually agreed upon rights to Bidder.
To the extent that USATF approves and Bidder is able to secure additional sponsor revenue, USATF shall be entitled to receive a percentage of the gross amount from said revenue.
This is disappointing on many levels. It was to also be the USATF masters national championship race. Personally it is gutting. Our club has put together decent division teams over the past two years. We were looking forward another, fun trip, fast race, and hopefully podium. Now it looks like there may not be a 1/2 event at all for 2025. Ugh!😑
WA pulled it from San Diego prematurely. It was only March and now it's only April. USATF just needed to advertise more. I didn't know about the mass event, but now I would sign up. I'm about an hour and a half away from SD. The Dana Point turkey trot gets like 40,000 people. At last resort, they could have postponed it by a couple of months and add it on to a turkey trot. But I think plenty of people would've signed up for Sept if they'd heard about it. Calling it off is so pessimistic. As long as they have the roads cleared, it would have been a go. People need like 2 months notice to prepare for a half.
Good. This is an irrelevant event. Put more into World XC.