Modern Athlete Magazine Issue 123, October 2019 | Page 26

ROAD RUNNING country events this year, hence the reason for me to encourage our running community to get involved. After a very, very long lay-off from being active in running, I decided to help a few athletes, and it got me started again. Being part of the admin is part of the solution, but what we need is clubs in the community to get programmes that attract youth. Maybe at our big races, let’s a have short race just for juniors, with incentives for clubs. So for now we highlight certain issues, but this may fall on ‘good ears’ and we will see the fruits of it. And rest assured, I will drive this in my conversation with people higher up. Have Your Say Ed’s Note: I find this an interesting debate. But I encourage all of you commenting here and elsewhere to get involved at a provincial admin level, where you can actually influence change. Sitting with ideas and complaints on Facebook is a lazy and negative way out. Put your money where your mouth is, so to speak. Candyce Hall: If you’d been at a cross country Wietse van der Westhuizen: I have been event in the province in the past two years, you would have seen that there has been pretty decent prize money (road race equivalent). And (I am pretty sure, regardless of prize money), most of the top athletes in our province have actually run cross country, so that the selected team to SA Champs was very strong. (As a province, our focus has to be on juniors and seniors. For Masters money, you should actually be speaking to the WP Masters Association, Peter.) 26 involved with running for more than 40 years. Of those years, I was the chairman of various clubs for more than 20 years, and I served on the old Transvaal committee for years in various positions. The only reason I have started this was not to step on people’s toes, but to get them thinking how we can improve running in SA. Peter Farao: Candyce, I’ve done five of the cross ISSUE 124 OCTOBER 2019 / www.modernathlete.co.za Therefore, it may make more sense to have different tiers or classes of races, where smaller races are not expected to pay out prize money, or can pay less, due to their focus being on social and entry-level runners. Then the elites would choose their races more carefully and go after bigger prize money at the upper tier races, and thus not over-race, while smaller races could survive better financially. However, I know there will be those who object to this solution, so I am keen to hear what readers think. Please send your thoughts to [email protected] and we’ll look to publish them in an upcoming edition. veiligheidsbeamptes, tydhouers en beamptes betaal nie. Die verkeer vir, byvoorbeeld, die Brackenfell 21km was meer as R25,000! As jy nie ‘n borg het nie vir n 10km wedloop, en na alles betaal is, is jy gelukkig om ‘n wins te maak. Dit is werklik n risiko vandag om ‘n wedloop aan te bied sonder ‘n borg. On the one hand, I feel that races should have prize money in order to attract the top runners and give them the opportunity to make a living from their talent, but asking these elites to race flat-out each weekend in order to win a few hundred Rand is not benefiting anybody in the long run. The athletes often end up burnt out or injured, and without having made enough money to get through the period of the injury. Added to that, many road races are barely surviving financially, but are compelled to pay out prize money they cannot really afford.