ELBOW ROOM

Years ago when managing a race, all you needed to do is draw a chalk mark in the road and tell your runners to just stand behind it. No problem.

Now, however, with thousands and tens of thousands of participants, you have to do just a little more planning than that. As such, the often asked question is, "how much space do I need to plan for at the start to accommodate all my participants?" Like with most operational aspects of this business, there aren't a lot of standards to go by so you have to either create your own or simply ask someone else in the know.

I have found over the years that planning for 3 square feet per person works well. Can it be a tad more or a tad less? Sure.it is all a matter of how much "elbow room" you want togive your participants and how much space you actually have at your disposal. Thus, if I had 3,000 participants I would need 9,000 square feet of roadway to properly line everyone up. This formula certainly helps when determining a). if you have enough space and b). how far back the line up will be. If your road width for example is 30 feet wide, you would need at least 300 feet of road (length of a football field) to adequately handle that size field.

Once the start system is structured, you can either side load or back load your participants based on ability level (pace). If you have pre-determined corrals of say 1,000 in each, you would need 3,000 sq. ft. for each corral. Finally, it is always best to leave adequate space behind the starting line (30 feet or so) so as to easily front load the top runners (elites).