Charity.....no such thing!

Following on from my previous blog discussing prize money I have put together my opinion on charity running events stealing athletes money, or are they?

I have points for charity and against, I might even change my mind during this blog but as I type this having written just one and a half paragraph I would say runners deserve a bigger cut.

Over my years more and more road races are rising with more and more entrants with Nova leading the way in 'charity events' and it seems to be the best way to raise money for charity. It is now not unusual for 10-15,000 people to be racing around a 10k apparently contributing to people who need it more. But for the guys and girls at the front don't they deserve a thin slice of the money generated by the income from the race having put so much time and effort in. Well to that you might say "Well, no one force's you do train hard and enter the race", or "If it wasn't for the people entering on the basis the money would go to charity people may not well enter and in turn not generate the big income".

Going back to Nova who raise a lot of money for charity they do actually offer good prize money but then they can also afford the top runners to take that money which leaves good club runners stuck in 'no mans land', you might well say they should train harder then and it is Nova's right to bring in better runners which may well help improve the UK athletes and from my experience they do try to help British athletes as much as they can. I would also like to say having run in Nova events they are very professional and well organised and would lean towards them trying to help the 'Brits'.

The other thing with charity is how much being raised by all these 'runners' taking part thinking they are helping a sick child in Africa is actually getting there. Do people work for charity organisations for free?? How much will go to an admin worker or a marketing team and how much are they paying for entries, well a recent investigation aledges that charity's have to pay £750 per number for the London Marathon....where does that money go then?

Local races with less than 300 entrants can afford to give good prize money and money to charity so why can't more races find the balance and reward hard working runners as well as helping a good cause. Will giving more prize money reward mediorocracy or will it improve standards and in turn help us compete on an international level? But then is that the responsibility of local race's and do they care.

A local race near me recently stopped all prize money and will now give more to the local school who enter the most children in the junior races. Is £250 really going to help that school and isn't that the job of the council to help the school and not events like road race's.

I am rambling a bit and for every good point I make for more money to charity I feel runner's deserve more, but then I am a runner. There is no doubt that if you are after money you are probably in the wrong sport but that doesn't make it right, although I have even given prize money to the local charity hospice the race was on for and a runner once told me he gives 20% of all his winnings to charity (buys them something though as thinks it will get sucked up in admin cost's).

I think to give account you should try to be a runner, organise a race and work for charity to see all points of view. I know one thing though.....you get nothing when you're injured!

Simx

p.s Welcome to Matt and Rory.