The current rule state that...."Numbers are issued to the individual athlete completing the application form and are non-transferable, except with the specific authority of the Race Secretary."
The 'disciplinary action' I presume would refer to members of athletics clubs who are swapping numbers. For non-club runners, there's not much that can be done except for maybe disqualifying them from that individual race and for individual race organisers to ban them from future events.
Some may be wondering why number swapping is such a big issue? There are probably two main reasons...
1) Insurance and medical.....If a person states on an entry form that they have a certain medical condition and then that race number gets swapped to another person then it might be a serious issue if an accident were to happen.
2) Prizes....This is actually a common problem. A typical example might be say a women in a masters category (F35 and above) giving their race number to a male colleague who then runs a fast time. The women gets listed in the prizes while the rightful winner of a prize loses out. In short, it creates huge problems for the organisers.
Now that UK Athletics has introduced 'disciplinary action' for club runners, should something similar be introduced by Athletics Ireland? Comments.....???
I'm all for a similar disciplinary approach in Ireland. Race popularity lends itself to number swapping. The medical risks are obvious and serious, the race prize effects are very annoying. Some years ago, a friend of mine was third female over 50 to finish the Ballycotton 10. However, another Over 50 lady had swapped her number with a man who beat my friend in the race. To say my friend was angry in not being acknowledged as the prize winner at the presentation is an understatement. Absolutely no blame whatsoever to the Ballycotton organisers who actually are extremely strict on number swapping and published a video some years ago highlighting obvious examples of number swapping. Final point: why would a man wish to run in a lady's number? If a race is full, run another race soon with one's own number. There's now a comprehensive race calendar covering all distances.
ReplyDeleteI say discipline the swappers! A few years ago I was a spectator at a fully booked race due to injury.When my physio confirmed I was unfit to run, I was very disappointed and put my race number in the recycling bin. During the race I met a fellow runner, let's call him Joe Bloggs here, who was also unable to compete due to injury. We discussed our injuries and wished each other luck with recovery. 15 minutes later I was near the finish line and I heard the PA announcer say "Joe Bloggs is now approaching the finish line, 100 metres to go"! Obviously Joe Bloggs had swapped his race number! The announcer was simply using the official entry list in his announcement.
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