Men running in ladies numbers.

Ceekay

Number swapping is obviously very prevalent in races. At today's Aware 10km, a friend of mine was originally listed as 5th finisher, but thanks to video evidence of the race results organizers she was rightly promoted to 2nd place. Guys should at least have the cop on not to wear a ladies number if they are capable of running a 10km in less than 42 minutes!

robinph

Just don't swap numbers ever, unless authorised by the race organiser. Grrrrr.

Murph_D

For the organisation, it’s a charity race. The focus is not on the competition. My advice would be to enter the county or provincial or national 10k where these issues of personation would actually be treated seriously. The Aware race (a good one, I’ve run it myself) is not competitive, it’s a fundraiser.

Ceekay

Murph_D wrote: »

For the organisation, it’s a charity race. The focus is not on the competition. My advice would be to enter the county or provincial or national 10k where these issues of personation would actually be treated seriously. The Aware race (a good one, I’ve run it myself) is not competitive, it’s a fundraiser.

I actually agree with you, I try to just compete in club races myself. Maybe there were even no prizes in this race...although there were certainly elite athletes taking part....and running serious times!

ger664

People should never number swap even in a charity race. It creates havoc if there is a H&S issue trying to identify a participant who maybe unconscious.

Djoucer

ger664 wrote: »

People should never number swap even in a charity race. It creates havoc if there is a H&S issue trying to identify a participant who maybe unconscious.

The health and safety is a nonsense excuse. Just ask people to write their next of kin details on back of the number.

And allow number swaps. It’s not that difficult. Baffled as to why runners are happy to pay out €30 and be told no refunds.

M.m.m.

Djoucer wrote: »

The health and safety is a nonsense excuse. Just ask people to write their next of kin details on back of the number.

And allow number swaps. It’s not that difficult. Baffled as to why runners are happy to pay out €30 and be told no refunds.

Couldn't agree more.

SeeMoreBut

If taking a female number and you’re are a male you should either start miles back so not effect the podium or remove the chip so missed on the timings.

chinguetti

Djoucer wrote: »

The health and safety is a nonsense excuse. Just ask people to write their next of kin details on back of the number.

And allow number swaps. It’s not that difficult. Baffled as to why runners are happy to pay out €30 and be told no refunds.

I beg to differ. I did a 10k a few years ago now. Guy collapsed and sadly died. He had got the number from someone who didn't run so I can only imagine what happened when the organisers rang the NOK on the number.

And yes, I know that its incredibly rare but number swaps just shouldn't happen for that reason in my mind.

adrian522

Races should facilitate name changes on race numbers for that very reason. Timing companies can do this fairly easily.

robinph

The health and safety issues are very real and valid reason for not allowing transfers. I have serious health issues, and if you get mistaken for me by wearing a duplicate number in a marathon (it has happened, hello "Keith") then it could be a fatal mistake if you get scooped up off the road in a delirious state during a marathon as they start giving you my medication. Hell it's dangerous enough for me if they start giving me my medication as there are many instances of medics not knowing about what/ how much to give and when.

Quite apart from that you have issues with the wrong families being connected.

Don't care how much people think they deserve their entry fee back because they got injured, you don't. Duplicate number, swapping numbers, banditing with no number is all wrong, dangerous and theft

Hurrache

chinguetti wrote: »

so I can only imagine what happened when the organisers rang the NOK on the number.

I'd hope that when they got an answer they didn't just blurt out sorry your husband is dead or something like that, I'm sure there was a bit of verification before hand.

But the arguments put out there by organisers for them not facilitating transfers is usually just an excuse not to do it, it's pretty easy to do so and takes not particular set of skills.

SeeMoreBut

robinph wrote: »

The health and safety issues are very real and valid reason for not allowing transfers. I have serious health issues, and if you get mistaken for me by wearing a duplicate number in a marathon (it has happened, hello "Keith") then it could be a fatal mistake if you get scooped up off the road in a delirious state during a marathon as they start giving you my medication. Hell it's dangerous enough for me if they start giving me my medication as there are many instances of medics not knowing about what/ how much to give and when.

Quite apart from that you have issues with the wrong families being connected.

Don't care how much people think they deserve their entry fee back because they got injured, you don't. Duplicate number, swapping numbers, banditing with no number is all wrong, dangerous and theft

Giving medication hasn’t got anything to do with number swapping. I seriously doubt anyone transferring a number would fill the back before passing it on.

What races ask you your medical history when registering.

If you need help I’m not sure you’d get someone ringing up asking to speak to rd to give me the medical info on number 12345

No excuses for big races not having a facility in place. Build it once and reuse it

Birdsong

adrian522 wrote:

Races should facilitate name changes on race numbers for that very reason. Timing companies can do this fairly easily.

The majority of races are organised by volunteers, especially all the good club races. These guys really don't have the capacity to add an extra layer of administration on to an already big under taking.

chinguetti

Hurrache wrote: »

But the arguments put out there by organisers for them not facilitating transfers is usually just an excuse not to do it, it's pretty easy to do so and takes not particular set of skills.

Most races are run by volunteers who give up their time for nothing. Imagine the hassle if people wanted to swap their number and the paperwork involved if you didn't advertise this fact and then decided to do it. The volunteers would be driven mad with people changing all the time.

Charge them money and people will complain, don't swap numbers and people will complain. I'd love to know how many races who do swaps apart from the Waterford Half in Ireland as I don't know of any.

crazy 88

people get injuries and plans change so there will always be number swaps. If you're running a race for profit and scaring people into signing up early through early birds and heavy marketing you should be making allowances for race swaps.

Djoucer wrote: »

Just ask people to write their next of kin details on back of the number.

this is a great idea. or even on the front

M.m.m.

I have on a number of occasions passed my number to another person when I couldn't run. In some cases I gave the number away for free, just happy that someone else who was really looking forward to running and never got a chance to sign up could benefit from my misfortune or lacklustre training.



The only thing I ever said to them when passing it on was to make sure they put THEIR name and address on it and to try not to pass out on the course.


Seriously, passing on a number shouldn't be viewed so negatively if the person in question has the common sense to write their details on the number and hang back from the top 3 or 4 in a race.



I actually find this thread difficult to comprehend, thinking of a guy who must be dedicated enough to run 40 mins or so but doesn't have a number for the race and doesn't cop that the front women will be in their time bracket...the mind boggles.

robinph

I distracted things slightly with my talk of faked numbers and people getting wrongly identified. But that is only a very slight deviation and number swaps, fake numbers, banditing is all part of the same thing where people think that the rules don't apply to them.

If you have not paid for a race entry and you run a race then it is theft. You are stealing resources from the race organisers and increasing their costs such as for water, food, tshirts, medals, road closure charges, emergency service cover etc. And that is even if you think you are not actually taking of those facilities/ services. Just by you being there is increasing those costs. It is all factored into the entry fees as they know how many people will turn up each year and deliberately sell more places than they are licensed to have on course.

Swapping numbers, if not permitted by the event, is also causing issues for the events. You are causing extra admin, causing errors in the results (regardless of if you are finishing in the top three or not) as you will screw up all results throughout the field, causing extra costs for the the event as you mess up their predictions on how many people will turn up on the day, so they then have to reduce numbers/ increase costs to accommodate that in the future. It is also cheating the system as why are YOU deemed more important that anyone else and you are allowed to break the rules, why do you get to take a number from someone else rather than any other person who missed out on entry, why does the person giving up their number get to have their entry money paid back from someone because they got injured but someone else doesn't who happens to follow the rules.


It would be great if events allowed numbers to be returned and then re-issued, but if they don't then that is not justification to do it anyway. The rules that you sign up for when you pay are the same for everyone.

Hurrache

robinph wrote: »

If you have not paid for a race entry and you run a race then it is theft. You are stealing resources from the race organisers and increasing their costs such as for water, food, tshirts, medals, road closure charges, emergency service cover etc. And that is even if you think you are not actually taking of those facilities/ services. Just by you being there is increasing those costs. It is all factored into the entry fees as they know how many people will turn up each year and deliberately sell more places than they are licensed to have on course.

None of this is applies if you run under another's number and that person doesn't.

IvoryTower

Id agree that you either give them their money back or allow them to change the name on it, can't have it both ways. People are going to run with someones elses name if you don't allow either.

robinph

Hurrache wrote: »

None of this is applies if you run under another's number and that person doesn't.

But it does.

Big events will be anticipating a certain percentage of runners not showing up on the day. The licenses they get for number of people on the course is based on knowing how many will not turn up on the day and that then determines how much police/ ambulance/ water/ food/ baggage storage/ etc cover they need.

If people are swapping numbers then that is disrupting those calculations and so increasing the costs. If everyone who has just paid for an Dublin Marathon entry for 2019 did actually turn up next October then they will be massively over capacity for the space available on the roads and the numbers would have to be reduced the following year despite the costs going up. The entry fees would then jump up as well, but the number of entries sold would reduce.



You can make the point that it should be relatively easy for a big event to implement a number transfer/ waiting list option, but that is still going to increase costs for carrying it out. Smaller events might not have the same ratios of people not turning up on the day, but they are probably also not sold out, so by swapping numbers you are denying the race the extra entry fee whilst at the same time creating extra work for them to figure out errors in the results that they are probably less able to figure out than a big event could.



I can't see any justification for swapping numbers that doesn't come down to someone thinking they are above the rules that everyone else has to follow.

As a non-runner, I'm intrigued........how / why do people swap numbers? Like, how would a man end up with a lady's number in the first place? After selling their entry?

M.m.m.

robinph wrote: »

But it does.

Big events will be anticipating a certain percentage of runners not showing up on the day. The licenses they get for number of people on the course is based on knowing how many will not turn up on the day and that then determines how much police/ ambulance/ water/ food/ baggage storage/ etc cover they need.

If people are swapping numbers then that is disrupting those calculations and so increasing the costs. If everyone who has just paid for an Dublin Marathon entry for 2019 did actually turn up next October then they will be massively over capacity for the space available on the roads and the numbers would have to be reduced the following year despite the costs going up. The entry fees would then jump up as well, but the number of entries sold would reduce.

I'd love to see your proof that organisers are allowed to organsise an event that does not have the capacity to hold the number of tickets they are supplying. That sounds totally illegal.


So I sell 20,000 tickets for DCM and I know as an organiser of the event that it will only hold 17,000 or there will be a possible catastrophe but you know based on statistics and past events that wont happen.
Yeah, tell that to health and safety.

Stark

robinph wrote: »

causing extra costs for the the event as you mess up their predictions on how many people will turn up on the day

Surely the predictions already account for number swapping which is commonplace?

If I manage not to get injured between now and DCM 2019 for once, I'll have to feel bad for messing up their "predictions".

robinph

Stark wrote: »

Surely the predictions already account for number swapping which is commonplace?

I think that social media has made it far more common as previously you wouldn't be able make contact with someone else prepared to swap numbers so easily if you were just stuck with the circle of friends that you actually knew in real life.



For the ratios of how many entries to sell v how many people take part: If you have a license and capacity for 17,000 runners on the route, but know that 20% won't turn up on the day do you sell 17,000 places for €100 and have 14,000 runners turn up on the day, or do you sell 20,000 places at €80 and have 17,000 turn up on the day? I don't think the numbers turning up on the day v entries has massively changed since it's been selling out in advance and when you could still enter the couple of weeks before, it's also very similar to other city marathons.

London Marathon issue nearly 50,000 numbers and get just shy of 40,000 on the day, the entry fee is less of an issue there as it is heavily subsidised by sponsorship and is exceedingly cheap. The costs to the organisation if an unexpected 10,000 more people turn up though would be massive. Whilst I'm not suggesting that 10,000 extra people will be turning up, that just brings it back to someone who is swapping their number thinking that the rules don't apply to them so why shouldn't they be allowed to get away with it because they are more important than the rest of us?

Hurrache

robinph wrote: »

But it does.

Big events will be anticipating a certain percentage of runners not showing up on the day. The licenses they get for number of people on the course is based on knowing how many will not turn up on the day and that then determines how much police/ ambulance/ water/ food/ baggage storage/ etc cover they need.

So big events are banking on people not turning up, keeping their money, but it's the runners who turn up that are the ones that are stealing?

robinph

Hurrache wrote: »

So big events are banking on people not turning up, keeping their money, but it's the runners who turn up that are the ones that are stealing?

Nope, it's the people who are not paying the organisers for their entry fee that are stealing, or causing extra admin for the organisers, or causing people to miss out on age group/ gender awards, or who think the rules don't apply to them.

M.m.m.

robinph wrote: »

Nope, it's the people who are not paying the organisers for their entry fee that are stealing, or causing extra admin for the organisers, or causing people to miss out on age group/ gender awards, or who think the rules don't apply to them.

This is just a farcical, its on par as saying I'm happy to pay bank charges, they are legitimate and justified.



So you're saying that a woman for example would miss out on her gender award because Jack who came in ahead of her has gone up to collect her prize with his 12 o'çlock shadow and a pair of apples up his top.


There is no admin since organisers havn't organised the swap. If they're supplying 20,000 numbers and selling them all then they need to organise facilities for 20,000 people.

IvoryTower

[Deleted User] wrote: »

As a non-runner, I'm intrigued........how / why do people swap numbers? Like, how would a man end up with a lady's number in the first place? After selling their entry?

If you can't make a race you give your number to a friend

fletch

Surely it's the timing companies that simply need to put a bit of development into their websites to facilitate swaps (up until a certain date)? Thus no cost to the organisers. (Perhaps the timing company may increase their fee slightly to pay for the dev cost but it should be nominal when divided out over all the races and tbh the companies should be looking at something to set themselves apart from the competition and this would definitely help).

Hurrache

robinph wrote: »

Nope, it's the people who are not paying the organisers for their entry fee that are stealing, or causing extra admin for the organisers, or causing people to miss out on age group/ gender awards, or who think the rules don't apply to them.

So say a friend pays for a service, can't use that service so gives me the ticket/voucher/whatever, and I use that service to the full, I'm a thief?

fletch wrote: »

Surely it's the timing companies simply need to put a bit of development into their websites to facilitate swaps (up until a certain date)? Thus no cost to the organisers. (Perhaps the timing company may increase their fee slightly to pay for the dev cost but it should be nominal when divided out over all the races and tbh the companies should be looking at something to set themselves apart from the competition and this would definitely help).

Some events do such a thing, a webpage exists in which you can log on, change the entry details, and away you go, everyone happy because you get your fee from the person you're handing over your entry to and the other person a race entry.

If an event doesn't facilitate such a thing, it's through no blame of entrants to circumvent the no race swap rule to stop themselves being out of pocket. For a recurring event such as the marathons it's not that difficult, or expensive, a system to introduce in the grand scheme of things. The excuse of added admin overhead no longer applies in the days in which you don't have large teams of data admins manually reading and entering race details.

robinph

M.m.m. wrote: »

So you're saying that a woman for example would miss out on her gender award because Jack who came in ahead of her has gone up to collect her prize with his 12 o'çlock shadow and a pair of apples up his top.

But what would actually happen is nobody gets the award, the woman thinks she finished 2nd and that the person finishing 1st just couldn't be bothered to hang around for their award. Or even if it is figured out before presenting on the day and the 4th woman across the line has already gone home by then because the online results say she's 4th, but then shes really 3rd and misses out on her moment of glory. How is that fair on her because some bloke couldn't be bothered to enter on time?

Or the awards just get posted out to the wrong people and nobody knows any better. Only the really obvious errors such as a vf80 winning overall would get picked up at that point.

Stark

fletch wrote: »

Surely it's the timing companies that simply need to put a bit of development into their websites to facilitate swaps (up until a certain date)? Thus no cost to the organisers. (Perhaps the timing company may increase their fee slightly to pay for the dev cost but it should be nominal when divided out over all the races and tbh the companies should be looking at something to set themselves apart from the competition and this would definitely help).

Quite a few have this functionality already.

Lazare

robinph wrote: »

But what would actually happen is nobody gets the award, the woman thinks she finished 2nd and that the person finishing 1st just couldn't be bothered to hang around for their award. Or even if it is figured out before presenting on the day and the 4th woman across the line has already gone home by then because the online results say she's 4th, but then shes really 3rd and misses out on her moment of glory. How is that fair on her because some bloke couldn't be bothered to enter on time?

Or the awards just get posted out to the wrong people and nobody knows any better. Only the really obvious errors such as a vf80 winning overall would get picked up at that point.

The points you've made are all based on extreme rarities, the vast majority of swapping goes on unnoticed.

To say it's theft is frankly ridiculous. Laughable.

robinph

Lazare wrote: »

The points you've made are all based on extreme rarities, the vast majority of swapping goes on unnoticed.

To say it's theft is frankly ridiculous. Laughable.

It's not a rarity though.

Race I was in at the weekend which has been won by the same woman for the last several years but it happened that she was beaten by 2 seconds by another female this year, except a minute ahead of the pair of them was some male wearing a females number. It happened to be noticed at 3km into the race where we all ran back past the start/ finish and the females actually contending for the win were well known on the local circuit that even through the christmas themed fancy dress they knew exactly who was in the lead despite what the chip timing was telling them and the correct results were fixed by the end of the race. But how is it OK to be wasting the time and effort of the organisers and what they have to pay their timing service provider?

Happened that I was 4th in my age category as well, but I'll never know if I was due a prize* because some senior male was running under a vet male number instead.

I completely agree that it would be good if races did allow for transfers, for a fee, but because they don't is zero justification to do it anyway.

Theft doesn't have to be physically taking something, making use of a service and resources that you have not paid for is also theft.



*I've previously been given a £5 voucher for a local running shop but that is only valid for spending over £50, so I can live without that.

robinph

fletch wrote: »

Surely it's the timing companies that simply need to put a bit of development into their websites to facilitate swaps (up until a certain date)? Thus no cost to the organisers. (Perhaps the timing company may increase their fee slightly to pay for the dev cost but it should be nominal when divided out over all the races and tbh the companies should be looking at something to set themselves apart from the competition and this would definitely help).

I've seen it in some instances over this side of the water where it has been possible to make changes online through the timing company website, so it is likely to become more common eventually when they all get on board.

Hurrache

robinph wrote: »

zero justification to do it anyway.

Theft doesn't have to be physically taking something, making use of a service and resources that you have not paid for is also theft.

But it's not. As I said in a previous question to you, if I'm given use of a service paid for by another person who cannot use that service, you're saying that it's perfectly acceptable for the Gardai to be waiting to arrest me for theft of that service once I use it.

And god help all the kids at Christmas time, the gardai won't have enough resources to arrest them all for the theft of the gifts Santa left them.

Equally, you pay a company for a service which you cannot avail of, and they don't offer a refund or deferment, you're implying that's a lesser offence than someone using that service which has been paid for?

TheJak01

robinph wrote: »

Theft doesn't have to be physically taking something, making use of a service and resources that you have not paid for is also theft.

It's not like the registration hasn't been paid for though, is it? If a race entry is bought and swapped, the organiser still receives the money for it. If I give my pal down the road 40euro for the 40euro entry that he's not using it's exactly the same as me paying 40 euro directly. Duplicate numbers - sure, that would be theft, but to imply this is stealing is pretty daft. Is buying a second hand phone off ebay also theft because the manufacturer receives none of that money? Same deal.

I see the issue with prizes/health, but that's going to be a minority of cases. Picking out one anecdotal example, and a further example where you may have missed out of a prize is hardly strong evidence. Races should allow transfers, or certainly refunds up to a certain point before the race. You'd struggle to find another industry where this isn't possible. To say they're only licensed to 17,000 of the 20,000 that register due to dropouts is farcical too IMO. Health and safety would never allow that. Airlines do that, and pay great expense if everybody shows up. A race organiser would and should do similar, except that in this case nobody will be left without an entry.

robinph

What makes you think that races don't over sell above the number of places they have a license for, or at least genuinely expect to turn up on the day? If airlines do it (and they have an absolute fixed capacity that you can't just squeeze one extra person in and nobody would notice) then why do you think that other places don't do it as well.

And sticking with the airline example, would you expect it to be OK if you turned up with your mates plane ticket and just be let on?

RayCun

Race entries are bought on the condition of non-transferability (same as airline tickets). Yes, this means that sometimes you buy an entry that you can't use. It also means that anyone who wants to enter the race has to buy an entry from the race, so the race is collecting more entry fees.

If the race collects fewer entry fees but their expenses remain the same, what happens? If expenses are going to stay the same, and fewer entries are going to be sold, those entries will have to be more expensive.

so that's the deal, really. Entries that are slightly cheaper and non-transferable, or entries that are transferable but slightly more expensive.

How many people would happily pay an extra 10% for race entry if it meant their entry was refundable?

robinph

Hurrache wrote: »

But it's not. As I said in a previous question to you, if I'm given use of a service paid for by another person who cannot use that service, you're saying that it's perfectly acceptable for the Gardai to be waiting to arrest me for theft of that service once I use it.

And god help all the kids at Christmas time, the gardai won't have enough resources to arrest them all for the theft of the gifts Santa left them.

Equally, you pay a company for a service which you cannot avail of, and they don't offer a refund or deferment, you're implying that's a lesser offence than someone using that service which has been paid for?

It may not be the crime of the century, but if you are making use of a service that you do not have the right to use then it is theft. Pester the organisers and timing companies to allow for legitimate way to carry out transfers, but doing transfers by other means that the organiser has said are not permitted when you sign up is wrong however you want to try and twist it though.

Ultraman100

Lazare wrote: »

The points you've made are all based on extreme rarities, the vast majority of swapping goes on unnoticed.

Happened this year at a national championship,Dude running under a Burds number came first in the F age cat

Hurrache

robinph wrote: »

What makes you think that races don't over sell above the number of places they have a license for, or at least genuinely expect to turn up on the day? If airlines do it (and they have an absolute fixed capacity that you can't just squeeze one extra person in and nobody would notice) then why do you think that other places don't do it as well.

And sticking with the airline example, would you expect it to be OK if you turned up with your mates plane ticket and just be let on?

Nobody's problem but the organisers if they oversell a race and run into trouble then.

And if you want to stick to your airline analogy
A) they offer compensation if you're bumped,
don't call the gardai on the excess number because they're trying to steal airplane seats.

robinph wrote: »

but doing transfers by other means that the organiser has said are not permitted when you sign up is wrong however you want to try and twist it though.

But not theft, nor a crime. Only person twisting things is you who's trying to argue from the outset that it's theft.

robinph

Hurrache wrote: »

But not theft, nor a crime. Only person twisting things is you who's trying to argue from the outset that it's theft.

Taking something you've not paid for. What would you call it then?

Causing extra expense/ costs for the organisers, however tiny that might be. What would you call that?

Causing gender/ age group winners miss out on prizes. What would you call that?

incentsitive

Did the OP just assume their gender.......

EDit

Genuine question...if (using an example given earlier) DCM sell 20,000 tickets, but are only legally allowed 17,000 participants, what happens on the morning of the race when they realize they have screwed up and 18,763 runners have actually turned up? What do they do...arbitrarily pick a random selection of 1763 people and tell them to go home? Seems like it would be a slightly foolhardy policy.

Hurrache

robinph wrote: »

Taking something you've not paid for. What would you call it then?

You've ignored this twice now, I'll try again.

If your mate gives you the use of a service which he can't use but has paid for, and you use it, lets say a cinema ticket, are you stealing if you go watch that movie?

I think you've dug yourself into a hole by initially claiming that it's theft and aren't willing to accept it, but are rather doubling down on it, no matter how silly it makes the argument.

robinph

Hurrache wrote: »

You've ignored this twice now, I'll try again.

If your mate gives you the use of a service which he can't use, and you use it, are you stealing?

Wasn't deliberately ignoring, but it depends on the service and the terms associated with it.

If he bought a sandwich and I then ate it, nope.
If he'd booked in for a hair cut and I went instead, nope.

If he'd bought a plane ticket then yes.
If he bought a Glastonbury ticket then yes

manonboard

robinph wrote: »

Wasn't deliberately ignoring, but it depends on the service and the terms associated with it.

If he bought a sandwich and I then ate it, nope.
If he'd booked in for a hair cut and I went instead, nope.

If he'd bought a plane ticket then yes.
If he bought a Glastonbury ticket then yes

They seem incredible arbitrary and personal preferences, not based on anything substantial at all.
Why would a hair cut be any different than the others?

Hurrache

robinph wrote: »

If he'd bought a plane ticket then yes.
If he bought a Glastonbury ticket then yes

No, it's not stealing. It may be against the terms and conditions, but you'll be laughed at by anyone in the law and legal profession if you try call the police to arrest someone for using a Glastonbury ticket a mate paid for and gave them.

To call anyone who uses a number paid for someone else a thief is ridiculous, and moreso the fact you're trying to argue more and more that it is.

RayCun

manonboard wrote: »

They seem incredible arbitrary and personal preferences, not based on anything substantial at all.
Why would a hair cut be any different than the others?

Conditions of sale