Cupids Dash in the Phoenix

8ofSpades

Awful

6.17 miles according to my Garmin Forerunner 310XT
which is 9.92965248 kilometers according to google.

Here it is for anyone interested.

I didnt cut any corners however I did wander around a bit at the finish line trying to get my watch to stop. (20 -30 metres max I'd say)

Guess my 197 HR was not condusive to good hand to watch co-ordination. :rolleyes:

I treat this as a fun run rather than a race as there have always been problems.

However a short course and running out of timing chips are 2 cardinal sins IMO when it comes to road running races.

They also had run out of Medium singlets by about 9:15 a.m. however thats just a minor gripe which wasn't really a major concern of mine.

Other than that I though the race was pretty good which is a pity really as the 2 major failures are pretty basic to get right I would have thought.

Newaglish

Average

Anyone know where to find the chip times?

T runner

**Portia** wrote: »

Yes but they need to be hit where it hurts - in the pocket. Why are we so reluctant to demand some sort of monetary compensation.

As for boycotting their races, I can't see this happening because races are known as e.g 'Cupid's Dash' not 'Irishfit's Cupid's Dash' and the same could be said for the other races they organise - most people will not even notice who is organising their race and will inadvertently end up applying for one of their races again, even if they say they never will sign up to one of their races again, busy lives etc. mean people will not do background check like this.

I think boycotting races is the best regulation. If the race is poor leave it. I do 5-6 road races every year. Dont think there are many people who would do so many as to not remember the bad ones.

Its the same reasoning as avoiding overpricedn or poor shops or services. It keeps teh standard up. Other people may not do it, youd hope they would, but thats their business, I can only ensure i dont do it.

T runner

RacoonQueen wrote: »

Yep, I avoid any event run by these guys. Partly because they're so bad and partly because everything he's involved in is horribly over priced. They don't get big numbers in general any way, haven't read the thread so not sure about today, I wouldn't touch any of his events again.

I agree 100%. I had a few dealings with them re this race last year. A bad expensive pantomine!

ButchMG wrote: »

Despite being short by about 140 metres (I measured 6.12 miles), I enjoyed the event. It's a good challenging course and the stretch up the Kyber separates the boys from the men. I took up running again about two years ago and this was my first 10k race since 1983 (the Radio Nova Puma 10k - anyone remember?). Happy with my 40:45 time. I think if you add 30-50 secs depending on your pace, you'll have your accurate time.:)

Fair play to you, excellent comeback time, you were clearly a flyer in the 70s and 80s id say ... There should be more coming up in the park with similar courses too later this year so you can check your progress. Good luck with the training.

mloc123

Poor

Hadn't expected much myself knowing who was running it. Didn't matter to me that it was short either as it was a last minute sub for a cancelled duathlon, I am pissed that I paid €25 for it tho'

Mr Slow

Awful

Live and learn.

I've emailed them to complain pointing out that I am an Irish Fit customer too and if I don't get a satisfactory response, I'll neither run their races nor buy their products in future.

tang1

Did you get any reply to your email mrslow?? There not quick with any results either.

Mr Slow

Awful

tang1 wrote: »

Did you get any reply to your email mrslow?? There not quick with any results either.

I'm not holding my breath, I'm not too fussed about the results, where you position in a club race means more to me than a fun run for obvious reasons. Then again if they can't measure the course how much confidence do you have they'll get the results right?

tang1

Good point, results will probably all over the place to. Had my reservations about doing this to be honest and they were spot on

Mr Slow

Awful

tang1 wrote: »

Good point, results will probably all over the place to. Had my reservations about doing this to be honest and they were spot on

If you're looking for a good 10k check out Dunshaughlin AC, they put on a great show at the end of June.

tang1

In total agreement there, done it last year for first time, didnt have great run but atmosphere and organisation were top class.

tHE vAGGABOND

Good

Not happy about this at all, but could not find my 405 this morning so had no idea about the shorter distance.

I was guess I would only have had 3 1/2 minutes of a PB and not a 4 minute PB. Im still happy with my own race, but its annoying to have that question raised about how long it was and what the result really was.

But as many posters have said, I wont be doing anything organised by this lot again.

TheRoadRunner

Any idea of winning time ?

average_runner

Awful

Did this race for the firs time and was my first race in 13 months after injury etc.


I was surprised by the turn out and the organisation with the roads shut etc, they did that well.

Also enjoyed the race and wasnt taking it too serious as was more a test for me.


Bad points:

I knew after the 5k marker something was wrong with the distance, and i think they change the route that morning just before the race as i saw the 5k marker at the water stattion at 9.15 !!!

Not getting the distance right is a disaster and i know they wont come on here and say sorry.

One thing that really annoyed me was they said the goody bag was to a value of 30 euro, which is true, providing you spend another 80 euro in the shop, this is false advertising.

No choc bars or anyhting at the end was shocking also.

Was planning on doing the gaunlet half marathon in november with this crowd but its a long way to travel for them to mess it up, so will pick a local race in dublin by some club instead.

Mr Slow

Awful

average_runner wrote: »

Did this race for the firs time and was my first race in 13 months after injury etc.


I was surprised by the turn out and the organisation with the roads shut etc, they did that well.

Also enjoyed the race and wasnt taking it too serious as was more a test for me.


Bad points:

I knew after the 5k marker something was wrong with the distance, and i think they change the route that morning just before the race as i saw the 5k marker at the water stattion at 9.15 !!!

Not getting the distance right is a disaster and i know they wont come on here and say sorry.

One thing that really annoyed me was they said the goody bag was to a value of 30 euro, which is true, providing you spend another 80 euro in the shop, this is false advertising.

No choc bars or anyhting at the end was shocking also.

Was planning on doing the gaunlet half marathon in november with this crowd but its a long way to travel for them to mess it up, so will pick a local race in dublin by some club instead.

Agreed on every point. Especially the 'goody' bag.

dub8

was delighted when i finished just under 52mins as i really struggled up the hill, only noticed later that my watch read 9.87, was hoping it was inaccurate , but not the only one who had that problem, so we cant all be wrong! my watch was bang on at the 3km mark , but didnt check it after that !

its dissapointing as i really enjoyed the run otherwise , the goody bags werent great, i picked mine up on the saturday and proceeded to spend over 100euro in the shop as well, was annoyed when i got home and saw the vouchers in the bag!! :rolleyes:

RayCun

dub8 wrote: »

i picked mine up on the saturday and proceeded to spend over 100euro in the shop as well, was annoyed when i got home and saw the vouchers in the bag!! :rolleyes:

They gave you the bag then sold you stuff, and didn't tell you there were vouchers in the bag? That's bloody cheeky.

average_runner

Awful

Now thats really bad form.

mloc123

Poor

average_runner wrote: »

Now thats really bad form.

I didn't walk back up to the papel cross with you by any chance AR?

menoscemo

average_runner wrote: »

Not getting the distance right is a disaster and i know they wont come on here and say sorry.

Which is ironic since the OP of this thread signed up in cognito to 'pimp' Irish fit products and events (and is now banned for doing so).
Unfortunatley it looks like his pimping efforts have been very successful.

average_runner

Awful

Could of!! You doing the Austria Tri?

mloc123

Poor

average_runner wrote: »

Could of!! You doing the Austria Tri?

yup, small world

Newaglish

Average

Can't seem to find the results on the web anywhere - I'm starting to suspect there might be a problem with those too!

Mr Slow

Awful

RayCun wrote: »

They gave you the bag then sold you stuff, and didn't tell you there were vouchers in the bag? That's bloody cheeky.

I'd march back in for your €20 refund!

groovyg

average_runner wrote: »

Was planning on doing the gaunlet half marathon in november with this crowd but its a long way to travel for them to mess it up, so will pick a local race in dublin by some club instead.

I wouldn't waste my energy doing gauntlet - its 50euro for a half marathon and a bit of a drive down. It starts just above kate kearneys goes over the gap of dunloe, down to to lord brandons cottage and back. If I recall the winners of the race got vouchers for the organisers store, my overall peeve was when e-mailing the result he sent an e-mail with everybodys entry details, names, addresses, dob, phone numbers , e-mails etc along with their time for the half.
Its pretty hilly and a nice run but not worth 50quid. If you are down in that part of the country at any stage I would suggest doing it as a training run.
There are loads of half marathons on - and seems to be new ones cropping up all the time. The Waterford half is on in December - think it was 20 quid entry and got lots of good reviews from other boards members.

Mr Slow

Awful

HI,
I'm very sorry that you didn't enjoy the event because of the distance query. We did measure the course properly so not sure why there is a discrepancy of 100m.
We work very hard to organise fun and enjoyable events and I do appreciate your business in all aspects so I find it very disheartening to hear that you had a bad time when we worked so hard to make it a good event.
Let me know if there is anything I can do.
Thanks
Sean

theT

Average

Has anybody goten any results from this yet?

Mr Slow

Awful

theT wrote: »

Has anybody goten any results from this yet?

I have emailed him to query this also!

tang1

Very poor no results up yet, 24hrs after race finished. See in the 10km in Enniscorthy yesterday they had results posted by 6pm yesterday evening.

Mr Slow

Awful

tang1 wrote: »

Very poor no results up yet, 24hrs after race finished. See in the 10km in Enniscorthy yesterday they had results posted by 6pm yesterday evening.

There'd be some excuse if they were jotting the times down on a pad as you ran through!

Bps

My garmin 405 had 9.8 k too. So there is definitely a problem. I agree with previous posters about "goody" bag. I wonder how many people will actually redeem those vouchers. Won't be doing this event next year.

Bps

Did I miss the timing mat at the start ? Wonder were our times recorded at all.

average_runner

Awful

I think the chip kick in dead on 10 am, thats why it was said racing starting 10 am sharp.

So further back you are you need to know a few secs off but not much

tang1

Thinking exact same thing myself, i never ran over any mat at the start.

Bps

Thanks for that. It'll be interesting to see if and when the times are put up on their website.

mloc123

Poor

mrslow wrote: »

There'd be some excuse if they were jotting the times down on a pad as you ran through!

They were, mainly because they 'ran out' of chips. The more I think about it this must have been one of the most poorly organized races I've been to... and they offer their services to other people :rolleyes:

Mr Slow

Awful

mloc123 wrote: »

They were, mainly because they 'ran out' of chips. The more I think about it this must have been one of the most poorly organized races I've been to... and they offer their services to other people :rolleyes:

I've heard that too, they're currently working on a p1ss up in a brewery

Sklarker

Awful

Just re-iterating what everyone else's experience was but here's my rant:
Narky guy handing out the singlets and '€30+' goodie bag containing only Flahavan's oats and flyers set the scene!
The race start was on time and pack fanned out quickly and I was well on course for my prediction of finishing with a new pb of 43:30 at 5km going through in 21:37. Then there was no 6km marker so I stopped worrying about splits. Was shocked but delighted to finish in 42:30. So pretty annoyed but not surprised to find that the course was 150/200m short.
Don't think I'll run in future events by the organiser if they haven't got it right after 3 attempts.

tHE vAGGABOND

Good

I like what someone else said here, I think I will be sticking to events run by clubs and running/sports/athletic associations from now on, rather than shops and individuals out to make a few quid.

menoscemo

The question is who voted this race as 'good' and 'excellent' :rolleyes: Did they even run the race or are they more irish fit 'plants'.

Mr Slow

Awful

menoscemo wrote: »

The question is who voted this race as 'good' and 'excellent' :rolleyes: Did they even run the race or are they more irish fit 'plants'.

I think this thread has erased any thoughts of 'good' and 'excellent'

JosDel

I had a choice last weekend Cupids or the BHAA Farmers...It was a no brainer.

tHE vAGGABOND

Good

I voted excellent before I had read the thread properly and discovered some of the many short comings. I was on a high from being happy with my own run

Alas there is no undo vote, or reverse vote function [with good reason I guess]

Newaglish

Average

Yeah, I voted good; I guess I was still feeling good after the race! On reflection, it's a pretty poor show for an expensive race.

Mr Slow

Awful

I just rang them, the results will be up later today or tomorrow :eek: apparently the people who registered on the day have to be put in manually!

Doinker

I also ran this race yesterday. I timed myself at 40.30 which was slightly faster than expected so was fairly happy. Not so happy now, if the distance was off. Some of my views.

- €25 fee is very harsh. Mitigated by the fact that some went to charity. In Cork (when I lived until recently), road races (5k, 5m, 10k) organised by BHAA Cork are €7 for Non-members & €5 for members.

- No drop off area for bags. Very poor. I walked to the park and had to stash my gearbag during the race. Not the most difficult thing to organise.

- Race number came in a envelope, singlet came in a black bag along with flyers etc. Couldn't everything be placed in the one bag to reduce rubbish/costs? The contents of the alleged 'goodie bag' has been well covered at this stage

- I don't know if this has been mentioned yet. I thought the finishing area/funnel was very small. The whole finishing area was very congested and constricted. Runners coming down the hill would be picking up speed to knock off a few seconds. Once you passed over the finishing mat, you had to make a sharp left/right turn if running fast as there was no-where to run-off (as far as I can remember). I left immediately after I finished, but was thinking that it was going to get very crowed behind the finishing line when the main group of runners came in - did this happen?

- Still haven't received a time. Fair enough if there times were taken manually. But with a timing chip, I would expect to have my time within a few hours of the race finishing.

In general I don't like to knock race organisers cause I know how difficult race are to organise. But with better organised races on offer, Irishfit would really need to will pull their socks a bit.

Mr Slow

Awful

Doinker wrote: »

I don't know if this has been mentioned yet. I thought the finishing area/funnel was very small. The whole finishing area was very congested and constricted. Runners coming down the hill would be picking up speed to knock off a few seconds. Once you passed over the finishing mat, you had to make a sharp left/right turn if running fast as there was no-where to run-off (as far as I can remember). I left immediately after I finished, but was thinking that it was going to get very crowed behind the finishing line when the main group of runners came in - did this happen?

I came through the finish and ran into someones back, there was nobody directing anyone and they had a van parked about 20 feet from the finish line, I had to find someone to remove my chip and queue to get out of the area and up to the refreshments. I finished in 46:09 and left a few mins later but I can imagine how bad it got after that!

Doinker

mrslow wrote: »

I came through the finish and ran into someones back, there was nobody directing anyone and they had a van parked about 20 feet from the finish line, I had to find someone to remove my chip and queue to get out of the area and up to the refreshments. I finished in 46:09 and left a few mins later but I can imagine how bad it got after that!

I have memories of a van being behind the finishing line but thought I must have imagined it. Can't see any reason why the van needed to be there. I felt that with a downhill slope to the finishing line and limited area behind it, a dangerous situation was created

I appreciate that space was an issue, but you need a run off area behind the finishing line. You also need stewards to move finishers on from that area. The start line could have been moved back 100 meters which would have allowed for a greater run off area after the finishing line.

Easy for me to say now with hindsight, but this is Road Racing 101. Anyway, I hope that these issues are sorted for next year, as it is for charity.

Mr Slow

Awful

Doinker wrote: »

The start line could have been moved back 100 meters which would have allowed for a greater run off area after the finishing line.

That would have brought it quite close to 10k too!

mloc123

Poor

Doinker wrote: »

as it is for charity.

Meh, not an excuse. Also I wonder how much actually goes to charity