The beginning stages of race directing

So I'm officially on year 3 of starting my own race directing business. It's an exciting and completely confusing place to be, as is most things in life.

The first race I ever put on was the first annual Broke Man's Half marathon. This free, non permitted race taught me a lot of event planning, but not too much about legit race planning. It was a great place to get my feet wet because with no cost was no expectations, so everything that did go well was just an added bonus and I was able to see if I was truly cut out for what I thought was my dream job.

At the end of that year I landed what I thought was my dream job as a regional race director for a national company. While it turned out to be such an AWFUL company to work for, and the job ended after the execution of the first race series for the National Veterans Day Run, it turned out to be a no-joke crash course in the race directing business after 4 races in 2 days. What an awful experience that I am so thankful for.

The next race I did was the following fall with the second annual Broke Man's Half Marathon. This was my favorite race. It was all mine with no higher end up front expenses. I was able to put on a great race with about fifty bucks in my pocket. This race taught me a lot about my passion and what people want. And don't want.

I followed that one up with a low key veterans day race on my own, as the company I worked for the year prior disbanded, and was happy with this small race despite a lot more complications then I had hoped for. Another learning experience.

So now here I am here, at the end of 2014, preparing for my 2015 race series and where I want it to go.

The beginning is always the most daunting stages of race planning. The PLANNING part. Lots of phone calls are made in the beginning stages and lots of carefully thought out dreams are finally spoken into words to complete strangers. Lots of dreams are crushed in the beginning stages of the race planning.

I can't tell you how many times I have been so happy and positive about an idea I had, to finally get up the courage to make the necessary phone calls to start execution for the plan just to receive an over the phone slap in the face. Oh those over the phone slaps are so painful.

The race directing world is not a do what you want field, and as an inexperienced entrepreneur I struggle with a do what I want attitude. It's taken a few years to realize my races are not about what I want even if what I want is for the people. My races are #1 - about what is actually possible and #2 - about what the people issuing my permits and approvals want. #3 - its a lot of what the people paying for the registrations want, and #4 - my vision.

Who knew?

So the first thing to do in the beginning stages of a new race is to take a deep breath, smile politely, and go for a lot of runs. Because it isn't easy to be told no all the time. Or that's not possible, or your idea is bad, or I don't have time for you, or to be treated like you have no clue what your doing. Because I'm young most people think I have no clue what I'm talking about I assume, and it's a hard ball to swing at over and over again.

But you learn over the years that as long as you keep taking a deep breath and picking up that phone again and again things will always get better. You will eventually find someone who thinks your ideas are great and want your vision to succeed. And by the time it's all done and over, your race will be done and over and you can focus on all the positive feedback you receive, and your able to forget about all the phone slaps that had to happen to make it all happen.

And pretty soon you'll be planning for the next year...