Hosting a race takes a lot of planning. You have to get permissions from local authorities, governments, police, fire, the local trail commission or even homeland security depending on where your race route is located. You make plans for the expo, ordering shirts and medals, port-a-pots, advertisement, insurance and a whole host of other details. No matter what distance of race you are putting on the one thing that every race has in common and needs is volunteers.
When you participate in a race, almost everyone you will come in contact with is a volunteer. There is no way a race could happen if they didn’t have volunteers doing the majority of the jobs. Why are they there? Why give up their early morning to stand in the heat, cold, rain, snow, wind to help out? There are many reasons why people volunteer, sometimes it is because they support the race cause or they are friends and family of the organizers, sometimes their volunteer work is “court appointed” or they have to do it for school/church. They all give of their time with no pay except maybe a t-shirt but the race could not happen without them.
For those of us who participate in races, we should think about giving back and volunteering for a couple of races per year. Volunteering takes many forms, there are jobs before race weekend like stuffing bags or handing out numbers at packet pickup, race day brings many many jobs like being a course marshall to direct people along the route, handing out water at water station or medals and heat sheets at the end, even help with the start/finish setup and teardown. For some smaller races, you may only need to be there for an hour or two, if you are helping with a half or full marathon, you will be there longer. Every race has a volunteer area on their website, usually they even have a volunteer sign up linked to their website which makes signing up to help very easy. All you need to do is to choose a race to volunteer at and get signed up. Grab a friend and get out there and volunteer!
It is fun to participate in a race and it is also fun to help out at one. You are helping the organizers to run a smooth, fun race, you are helping to encourage and support the race participants and you are having fun. And don’t forget, next time you participate in a race take a moment and thank all those volunteers who make the race possible!