By FRED CONLEY
T-H Sports Editor
At 21, the Mightymite Triathlon is among the oldest such sprint races in the state and the nation.
But like any event that has endured the test of time, the Mightymite finds itself in need of a makeover. Maybe not of the extreme variety, but the race is losing some of its shine and there is room for improvement.
Drawing only 250 competitors for last Saturday's race the lowest number for the race since its humble beginnings in 1984 Director Wyndell Robertson and Public Relations Media Coordinator Andrew Holliday are looking for those improvements and ways to implement them over the next five years.
Robertson stopped short of calling the Mightymite broken, but did say the race needed to be "mended" in certain areas.
Tuesday, Robertson and Holliday presented their case to the Forrest City Advertising and Promotions (A&P) Commission, which involved several new promotional ideas as well as some ideas which could be put in place to help make the race "more attractive."
Holliday presented the A&P Commissioners with three main goals increase the Mightymite participation numbers, getting the field back to 500 by 2005; 700 by 2006 and 1,000 by 2007. Holliday also envisions the Mightymite as the major sprint triathlon in this region and wants to make it so and wants to dramatically increase exposure to benefit Forrest City.
As an example, he used the media exposure that Memphis receives each year during the Memphis in May Triathlon, when the race is given solid minutes on television and radio.
While both Robertson and Holliday called last Saturday's Mightymite a "success," both agreed there were problems.
Some were expected, others weren't. Some were big, others were small.
Combined, all of the problems presented "problems."
Probably the biggest problems occurred at the start of the race, at Village Creek's Lake Dunn.
Forced to use a boat ramp this year instead of the beach entry, as in year's past, the area leading the triathletes into the water was tight and cramped, making it difficult at times for the triathletes to enter the water.
"The boat ramp was about 30 feet wide and that caused some problems," Robertson said. "With only 250 people we could put in four starting waves about 60 people each and that would releive some of the congestion, but if our efforts to get the race numbers back to 500 or more, then the area we used would not be condusive as a starting point."
The lack of enough volunteers at the start and having to use the boat ramp, delayed the start of the race by about 17 minutes.
"I am not blaming all of our problems on the starting point at the park because there were a lot of things that happened, or didn't happen that caused the overall numbers to fall to 250," Robertson said. "Certainly, the start was one thing, but then again there are more races in the area now than there used to be and we have to compete with that and they are all in this same time frame. We are not going to change the July weekend for the Mightymite, but we can make some adjustments."
Robertson said signing up only 250 people for the Mightymite is a cause for concern, but not so much for the future of the race itself.
"For me and my company, financially speaking, if we throw a lot of money into the promotions and advertising for next year and still only draw 200 people, than it may be time for me to stop and evaluate the situation," Robertson said.
Robertson also pointed a lot of the blame finger at himself. "I didn't send any applications out this year by mail and we did everything over the internet and maybe that was a mistake on my part. My big mistake was not promoting Mightymite as I have promoted Memphis in May and not having the Mightymite applications available at Memphis in May, which would have gotten us some more numbers. We did a postcard mailing and that helped, but we can do better."
The A&P Commissioners were given a set of steps which Holliday feels could be utilized in achieving his three previous goals for future Mightymites.
Those steps include:
*Offering race incentives to the participants such as an age group door prize, raffle give-aways, or a larger and better post race party.
*Increased marketing and exposure for the area in print at both the local and regional levels; web advertising and promotion; grass roots marketing efforts at other area triathlons, particularly Memphis in May; press releases sent to other triathlon and regional publications to draw constant attention on a year round basis; retaining ther current Mightymite loyal athletes as well as making the event attractive to draw new athletes.
*Incorporate other events with the Mightymite, possibly a 5K or 10K road race or something along the line of a Harvestfest.
"The bottom line is, the A&P wants, as do we, to bring the triathletes into Forrest City, along with their families and provide them with a good reason to stay rather than driving in the morning of the race, running the race and then driving back home," Holliday said. "Forrest City has been a great partner for the Mightymite and we want to keep that association and make it more fruitful in the coming years."
Robertson and Holliday are scheduled to return to the A&P's October meeting with a more in-depth outline to help start the healing process.