Bandits

[Michelle Lowry]

I consider banditing unethical.  In my ethics class in college we were taught 6 different codes, or ethical paradigms.  One basically states that if everyone made the choice you are making, would the advantage you are claiming be erased?  This is why staying in a lane on a road, when you know the lane is closing, until you get ahead of dozens of cars that merged earlier is unethical, you are seeking an unfair advantage over your community.  There would be no races, no events, if a large percentage bandited.  If you are not obtaining a benefit, even if not using their water/portapotties, then why are you showing up?  Part of the benefit racers pay for is the environment of a race and the marking of the course.  If you don't want to pay for a 10k, then mark your own 10k and run it on your own or organize a group of your friends, but I don't think its right to jump into a for pay race.

[David S]

Does pacing someone in a race that you did not sign up for qualify as being a bandit? 

[Steve P]

David, my personal opinion is that it would be fine if you first asked permission from the race organizers. If you didn't, I'd say you would be a bandit.

Michelle, nice explanation. I was trying to think up an analogy to help myself understand. The best I could come up with is that of other sports competitions. Since this is running, let's say it's an Olympic race held in a stadium. A very few people participating in that event (the elite runners, coaches, etc.) would get to participate for free or even get paid by sponsors to participate. These could be compared to elite runners in a road race. The rest of the participants are the spectators who have to pay a fee to participate. They could be compared to non-elite participants in a road race. No matter how high the price to get into the Olympic stadium or whether the stadium were sold out, it wouldn't be right (in my opinion) to sneak into the stadium and participate anyway. As Michelle said, if 100,000 people did that (an extremely high number for illustration purposes), it would be mayhem. The analogy isn't perfect, but hopefully it makes sense.

[Sasha Pachev]

Michelle:

If everybody free-loaded, my race would still be around. I suppose I would have a problem with permits and insurance becoming cost-prohibitive to do it out of pocket, but then if I had several hundred people show up I'd be able to find sponsors to pay for the permits. Everybody is a free loader when using Google but Google is thriving as a business. At least they do have a revenue model. Twitter does not, and they still have capital to operate, their investors, investors who are money-hungry and not stupid,  still believe in them. We are entering a new era in economics. We are realizing that whenever a sufficiently large crowd gathers around, there are economic opportunities that can be realized without charging mandatory fees.

This is not to encourage banditing, though. If your budget does to permit $20 entry fees, come to my races. That is one reason I have them - to give those who cannot/will not spend $20+ per race an option to race legally and get an official time. Unfortunately a free or low-cost race is still a strange idea in Utah. From posters from some other states it appears that it is more of a local problem.

Interestingly enough Utah is one of the leaders in the nation in the area of bankruptcy. The proposed explanation has been that we have too many children. I wonder if the true reason is that we do not know how to manage our finances having a tendency to shop for frills we cannot afford.  Which carries into racing among other things.

[Jon Allen]

Sasha- if 300 people showed up at your race but refused to register or wear bibs, but they still lined up at the start, ran the course, and ran across the finish line, I imagine it would tick off you and all the runners who did register, plus may clog the course and confuse the people at the finish line.  As RD, you can ask runners to do certain things- pay (not for your race), register, run the correct course, don't litter, etc.  If they want to run the race, they should do what you ask.  Bandits, whether they just don't pay or if they don't follow what the RD asks, can affect every race to some degree, even your free races.  I know I would not be happy if people chose to mess up a race I was in charge of.

[Eric Day]

Police should just shoot bandits down during the races...

[bencrozier]

There are dozens of ethical stances that could be made for or against banditing a race, depending on your perspective, your world view and the span of your time horizon. 

Is it ethical for a race director to use public streets or land that were paid for by a disproportionate amount of taxes levied against the few prosperous citizens in a community who may or may not then be allowed to use the race course while the race director profits from it? 
Is it ethical to pay to enter the race using a fiat based currency (a debt instrument in and of itself against the nation of its origin), thus further putting said nation further into debt against aggressive creditor nations?  Perhaps we should pay for races with gold or silver to remove the moral dilemma.
Is it ethical for there to even be a road that we run on after it was stolen from Mexico and Native Americans? 
Is it ethical to use money to "frivolously" spend it on a race when that same money may have a higher and better use being spent on starving children?
Is it ethical to even be running a race when our time should be spent fighting disease, poverty, and world hunger?
Is it ethical to disallow economically challenged runners from entering a race, thus further contributing to their downward spiral of physical and psychological problems while the "have's" are allowed to have access to such venues?

I won't continue making a list of possible moral dilemmas here, but I will recognize that as long as I wish to be a "morally upright runner inside of the current paradigm" I should always strive to pay entrance fees to races. Haha. I sure do long for the "good 'ol days" when running was about running and you could participate in races for a few bucks for a T-shirt and didn't have to deal with all the other crap.  Races nowadays are all about frills and fast times.  Where are all the "fun" races that aren't all down-hill and on boring, uncreative courses?  What would be wrong with allowing elite runners to always run free or get a refund of their entrance fee as long as they break a certain time?

I think I'll endorse Sasha's races and perhaps we can see more runners demand races that are about running and not all the other nonsense.

--Ben

[Matt Konold]

I think I'll endorse Sasha's races and perhaps we can see more runners demand races that are about running and not all the other nonsense.

Vs. "endorsing" other races you don't pay for? 

I actually have bandited a race and didn't/don't feel too bad about it, but it's not something I think I'll do again.  More 'cause I don't see the purpose (when I could just go run somewhere else on my own that day and be guaranteed to come in 1st place).

Just wanted to take a cheap shot Ben!

[Maurine Lee]

Where are all the "fun" races that aren't all down-hill and on boring, uncreative courses?  --Ben

Ben - come over to the dark side and run an ultramarathon.  They are not all downhill and they are not boring.

[Sasha Pachev]

Jon - it would be a very hypothetical situation that 300 people would show up, run the course, and not register when registration is free. And, if it did happen on a regular basis, this would attract sponsors. I can say I had 20 official participants, and 280 spectators along the course.

Besides, a race director does not usually receive the exclusive right to use public roads. I am not a legal expert, but it seems to me that if you removed a bandit from the course, and he decided to sue he would win unless the race director posted a "no trespassing" sign on every cone or something like that. How would you defend against the argument that if somebody not registered is allowed to ride a bike or walk on the course, that somebody could not run?  Removing a bandit would work maybe on a course like Boston where there is some legal provision that the course is available only to registered runners and support vehicles.

I think if the course is on a public road that is not explicitly closed to all non-race related traffic and the race director is charging money, it is his responsibility to give people a reason to pay to be officially in the race. He has to rely on the good will of the runners. If  runners do not feel like paying $20 for a shirt, some food, official time, and a chance to compete for awards, then it is his loss for not offering a $5 bare essentials option. But I do not see this happening in Utah very soon - most runners, odd as it is in tough economic times, prefer to pay $20 or more for the full service. I suppose we would need to wait for the tough times to get tougher before we see a change.

[bencrozier]

Matt, thank you for pointing out the subtle hypocrisy of my nihilistic rant.   Maurine, I would LUV to run an ulta... but I have a ways to go before I will have that level of conditioning... perhaps I'll see you out there next summer?