2009

I am looking forward to 2009. There were several good things in 2008, but for the most it sucked. We learned that Louisville had decided to start charging for police at the races. I had expected that to happen at some point, all the other large cities I am aware of already charged. From the experiences I have had with the Louisville police in our races they are worth it. Whoever made the decision to start charging did it in a piss poor manner and set the tone for every other decision made by the people who do that sort of thing in Louisville. First there was very little warning that the charge was going to start so every race that had already planned their event budgets were forced to make less, lose money, or cancel their race. The later was what happened to the KHF Duathlon Series. Not only did we get no warning we were told originally that they could not tell us how much it would cost to provide the service. There reason was that each officer may be paid differently and they would not know who was going to work the event. What kind of moron would start any kind of business project without being able to plan for the cost involved. The bright side of the situation were the police themselves. Thanks in particular to Lt. Curtis Flaherty. He takes a look at races we have done in previous year and can tell exactly what we will need for the current year and if it a new race quickly comes up with a plan and a cost estimate.

The next thing that happened involved Cardinal Harbour. The folks over at WTC called the Louisville Sports Commission and gave them instructions to get me to stop the race. I won't go into the details, but the race will go on. I can see everyone's point. I know I present a serious threat the Ironman. I almost feel bad that I am taking so much money out of their pockets. I mean they sell out every race at over $500 per athlete so the few hundred athletes I get at a fith of that price must hurt them badly. Or it could be that they are just assholes. The fact that they tried to get the Louisville Sports Commission to have me stop a race in Oldham County is kind of funny. The Sports Commission was another one of those organizations that got their budget cut in their Healthy Home Town, so they have to do everything they can to keep what they have. You can't really blame them for calling me and giving it a shot.

Just when I thought the year was going to end without any more drama I got an email that said Otter Creek was going to close. The initial date they announced was December 14 which was the same day as the Otter Creek trail Marathon. It seemes the same Mayor who just weeks before fought so hard to spend money on land so we could have more bars in your Healthy Home Town made a decision to close the park for financial reasons. We had 400 people at the event representing 29 states. We filled all the cabins at the park plus paid to have the race there. I don't know that they could have covered the entire amount thay loose every year, but if Jerry would spend a fraction of the time he spends promoting downtown, promoting things like Otter Creek more people would have used it. How many of you knew about the 2900 acres of beautiful forest, great view of the Ohio River, the cabins, campgrounds, and conference center. Anybody aware of the historical communities that were along the creek, one of them was even started by Squire Boone. How many other facilities owened by Louisville gave you the opportunity to fly fish or go caving. The loss of Otter Creek is without a doubt the saddest event of my professional life. The park is one of the treasures on this area and not only was the staff easy to work with they were alot of fun. Jack West actually worked with us from the time we showed up to start marking the trails until the time we had everything cleaned up after the race was over.

Not sure what happened in 2008. Either I missed the Mayor's announcement that he was ending the Healthy Home Town thing, or he made a New Years Resolution last year to make my life difficult.

There is no way to go but up in 2009. Hope you come along for the ride.