Road Rules You Can Use

Road Rules You Can Use

A big part of the joy we derive from running can be found in the fresh air, change of scenery and the variation of challenge levels afforded by taking our hobby to the great outdoors. I’d pick a trip through the hills (or even the city) over a treadmill any day of the week. But it behooves us to remember some simple safety tips to keep from running into trouble. Many of these appear to be common sense, but they’re worth repeating here.

Dress For Success

If the Shoe Fits - Buy It

As we trot into October, cooler weather may entice new or inexperienced joggers to hit the trails. Thus, I thought it would be beneficial to highlight the most important part of any runner’s arsenal: good quality running shoes. Skimp on shoes and you could develop injuries such as blisters, abrasions, shin splints, plantar fasciitis, or knee and foot pain that will leave you debilitated, disheartened, and defeated on the side of the road. Beyond that, the right pair of trainers can improve endurance and efficiency, so it pays to do your homework and invest in a good pair.

Timing vs Scoring

In the world of race timing, there are two different aspects involved that most never think about.  One is timing the participant, but the other is the actual scoring.  Both are important to cross country in order to get the individual and team scores.  In our last blog, we talked about the different technologies used for timing a race.  This time we’ll talk about the actual scoring and what has to happen in order to produce accurate results.

It's All Magic

Have you ever wondered how chip timing works?  Most people don’t know or care as long as they get a time.  Sadly, many timers don’t even understand it except to turn it on and hope it all works.  Understanding the technology though can help explain issues when things don’t work so well.  It’s like understanding why a cell phone doesn’t work in the country or inside a steel structure.

Cross Country 2018

Cross Country season is almost here!  Like you, this is one of our favorite times of year. We love the camaradie, the team work, and the competition of cross country.  Unlike any other sport, cross country really shows us how you can have a great event with intense competion, yet also show how competitors can also be friends.  It's a fun and exciting sport that has something for everyone.

Leaderboard

We're excited to announce a new feature to our growing arsenal of tools.  This will interest any of you that like to see how well you perform against other athletes.  The new feature is a Leaderboard that we're introducing on a monthly basis based on geographic areas.  For any area that we operate in, we will have a monthly leaderboard based on the times of all Athlete Guild timed races.  As a participant, there is nothing for you to do to participate except to run a race that we are involved with.  Your times will automatically be incorporated into the mont

Ranking Race Directors

I've been thinking a lot lately about race directors that we have worked with over the years.  It numbers in the many hundreds and possibly thousand with all of the different type of events that we timing, manage, and support.  It gives us a unique perspective on the personalities of race directors.  Some are amazing to work with while others we're glad to be done with.  It would be impossible to actually rank the race directors because it is such a subjective criteria but I know that I have my personal top 5 and bottom 5 race directors.  Those in the top ar

Events and Results

As a long-time runner, I was always frustrated by the number of locations that I would have to search to find events and then results.  I always wanted a single place that I could go to find all of the upcoming events in an area and then afterwards to be able to get the results of the race.  That frustration led me to create Athlete Guild.  Originally, the idea was to create a website with postings of events and results.  As a software engineer, I knew that I could create something that would work and be beneficial to runners.  I figured that if I was frustrated the

Finisher Award

There has been a recent trend we have been watching where races of shorter distances are giving finisher medals to participants.  This has been the case for a long time with longer distances such as half marathons and over but it is a fairly recent phenomenom with distances such as a 10K or even a 5K.  What is really behind this movement?