From the 1st of January 2023, the new Athletics Ireland 'One-Day Licence' will be introduced for all club races. I covered this in a previous post but it essentially means the following...
a) All non-club runners will now have to pay an additional €2 charge
b) All entries must go through the Event Master website before race day.
This is a big change and effectively ends the traditional way of entering road races i.e. deciding on the day whether to go or not, turning up and throwing a few Euro into the biscuit tin at the entry desk.
This was the norm up to very recently, you just paid a modest entry fee on the day in cash. It was only back in 2017 that the entry fee for three of the four 5-mile races in the Ballycotton Summer Series was €5 per race. The fourth one was €6 as €1 went to charity.
If we look at a club race in 2023, €15-€20 is the norm. Add in the online charges and the new one day licence and some runners will be looking at €20-€25 per race. And they're the cheap races.
It's hard to see the same number of club races continuing going forward when 5k parkruns are free and the Cork BHAA races cost €10 max.
7 comments:
Sorry, so just to check, this is something that won't apply to Cloyne Commons for example as they don't want a license? Or they'll need one anyway?
Big mistake... thank god for the BHAA. A Cotter.
Life goes on and we should not halt progress. Online is the new way
However
The implications of this will be to the detriment of ordinary runners and clubs in Ireland.
The average will now support the elite with no way of knowing where the money contributed has gone.
In a small country we have created 2 levels of runners who are not treated the same.
Resolution 5k in Ennis at end of January 15 euro plus 2 euro AAI tax! Parkrun in Ennis day before - FREE. Guess which one I'll be doing! Non club runners like myself should be encouraged to get out and run - this is really putting a barrier between club runners and slower/fun/casual runners like myself who help fund local clubs/charitable causes by entering local races sometimes on the day because not sure in advance if we can make it. We are not all serious club runners and we all have enough taxes and charges to pay in our everyday lives without this as well. Will be focusing on the non permit races where possible. Keep up the good work with this site.
Where has this idea come from ? Or whose idea is it ? Johnny G
Sorry, but how is this progress?
Serious club runner or not, at some point you look at the price and say why bother if you can't win. Races will end up with 30 or 40 runners and that's it.
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