FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Running Boom Reported All Over The World With The Greatest Growth In China
With Over 5 Million People Running The Marathon
The Association of International Marathons & Distance Races (AIMS)
representing 447 of the world's best races across 117 countries and
territories, including Boston, Chicago, Berlin, Paris, Tokyo and Athens-The
Authentic Marathons, held its 22nd World Congress this week in Tallinn,
Estonia (6-9 September 2018) at a time when Estonia celebrates 100 years of
Independence.
Ms. Shirley Yang, AIMS PR Manager for China and representative of the
Chinese Athletic Association (CAA), reported on the development of marathon
running in China. In 2011 there were 22 Marathon races that were
co-sponsored by the CAA. This reached 328 in 2016 and 1,102 in 2017 (an
increase of over 335% year on year), 50 times the amount in 2011. Over 5
million runners competed in these events.
AIMS President Paco Borao commented: "The popularity of running around the
world is progressing at a rate never seen before in world history. China is
the biggest example of this showing an increase in events in one year from
328 races (2016) to 1,102 (2017) an increase of 335% in a year with over 5
million people now running. The members of the AIMS marathon movement now
represent the best factory in the world for generating physical and mental
health and wellbeing."
Running through history
Makis Asimakopoulos, General Manager of the Athens Marathon-The Authentic,
gave an excellent presentation explaining the origins of the marathon
arising from the run of the soldier messenger Pheidippides who ran from
Marathon to Athens to deliver news of victory over the Persians at the
Battle of Marathon in 490 BCE to the evolution of the modern marathon
represented through races around the world being part of AIMS, 'the
custodian of running through history'.
Mr Asimakopoulos explained the innovative collaboration between SEGAS
(Hellenic Athletics Federation), The Athens Marathon-The Authentic and AIMS
that sees the Marathon history brought to life through the creation of The
Marathon Flame that is lit each year in the tomb of marathon and travels
around the world promoting the history and tradition of the marathon
movement.
The head office of AIMS is based in Athens on Spyros Louis Avenue, the
street named after the winner of the first Olympic Marathon event in Athens
1896. The annual AIMS Athens Symposium on running and the Best Marathon
Runner Awards Gala (BMR) is shown live each year on Greek State Television
Channel (ERT), celebrating and recognising the sport's top performers the
greatest athletes and officials - 'The Running Oscars'.
To register to attend this year's Symposium (10 November 2018) and attend
the Gala, The Lighting of the Flame and the Athens Marathon the Authentic
contact:
Mr Andrew Horsewood, a Senior Analyst at Sportcal, a world-leading provider
of sports market intelligence spoke to the Congress on 'Evaluating the
value of hosting sporting events'.
Mr Horsewood talked impressively about how sport events should be evaluated
in many ways - 'of course volume of involvement and economic impact but
also to consider the wider social impact, sustainability and legacy'.
Further, 'the narrative is as important as the numbers'.
Sportcal have sought to create a Global Sports Impact (GSI) Project to look
at a unified way across the world to assess the impact of sport on the
economy but also wider society. The GSI project has 10 pillars or
categories of impact: Economic; Tourism; Event Experience; Media; Social
Media; Sponsorship; Sporting; Social; Sustainability; Legacy.
Mr Are Altraja Founder and Co-owner of Sportland International Group spoke
about 'The value of the Tallinn Marathon to the city economy'.
Mr Altraja talked passionately and inspirationally, stating 'everything
starts with emotion and emotion creates culture and culture affects quality
of life and the economy.' He posed the question 'how do you define value?'
Running events create a lifestyle and impacts upon health and wellbeing
which impacts positively upon culture and in turn the economy and the
overall attraction of a city and a country as somewhere to live and visit.
Stacey Conley, former President of Conley Sports Productions gave a
presentation on the subject of 'Making the Most of Marketing: Increasing
Women's Participation in Running Events'.
Ms Conley gave a very interesting and passionate presentation about women
in running. 'Women: The fastest growing demographic in American running'.
Ms Conley went on to say barriers still exit around the world to female
participation and urged organisers to keep making events more and more open
to increased female participation pointing out 'women are the number one
business opportunity across all sectors of the economy'.
Ms Conley praised several AIMS events such as the Nagoya Women's Marathon
in Japan that saw 21,915 women running together in 2018 with every finisher
receiving a Tiffany necklace from the world-famous New York luxury
jewellery store Tiffany & Co. presented by men in black tie formal evening
wear at the end of the race.
Other important elements highlighted include having female imagery in the
promotion of your race showing successful and happy women finishers
celebrating with family and friends. Ms Conley stressed the importance of
having women represented in key positions, especially marketing and images
of women role models who women can relate to and trust featuring in
advertising in social media and all forms of communication.
George Kazantzopoulos, International Sustainability Expert & President of
the 'Institute Team for the World' addressed the Congress on 'Greening the
Running movement'.
Mr Kazantzopoulos spoke about the importance of 'writing the philosophy of
looking after the environment and building sustainability into the DNA of
the event'. He talked about 'sport's power to influence society's
philosophy, values and behaviour'.
Mr Kazantzopoulos collaborated with AIMS to create the AIMS global Green
Award and to produce the booklet titled 'AIMS Green Guidelines to Run a
Marathon event that respects and protects the environment',all designed in
line with the IOC Olympic Movement's Agenda 21.
Michael Nishi, General Manager of the Bank of America Chicago Marathon
Events spoke on the subject of 'Safety-Security: Best Practices'.
Mr Nishi gave a highly impressive presentation on excellence in scenario
planning and implementation that the Chicago Marathon completes each year
to give the best possible protection and service to its runners,
spectators, staff and volunteers.
He said that, by organising big successful events, 'we have to realise we
are potential targets and we have a duty to make sure that our events are a
target that is as difficult as possible for any bad guys to hit'.
Mr Nishi stressed the importance of pre-planning, mitigating risk by
scenario planning and then walking through each scenario before the event.
Among the excellent practices of the Chicago Marathon is that they send a
CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) video to every runner, staff and
volunteer. This of course has a far wider and sustainable community value
that is a positive health educational legacy lasting well beyond the event
itself.
Mr Nishi mentioned the importance of the AIMS Congress in exchanging
helpful information and in that spirit, he referred to the available guide
prepared by The National Center for Spectator Sports Safety and Security
(NCS4) document 'Marathon and Running Events Safety and security Best
Practice Guide'.
www.ncs4.com
The Chicago Marathon, a founder member of AIMS, has 45,000 runners from
over 100 countries and all 50 US States and an estimated 1.7M spectators
creating an economic value of $282M.
Chris Troyanos, Medical Co-ordinator for the Boston Marathon & Executive
Director for IIRM (International Institute for Race Medicine) discussing
Endurance Medicine Outcomes and Global Weather Changes "A tale of two heat
stokes".
Dr Troyanos gave a fascinating presentation on the impact global climate
change is having on sporting events. He mentioned that there had been a new
study saying that heat stroke in some areas of the world can be more than
10 times the danger of heart attacks, although some experts disagree. He
gave a great insight into the role and importance of decisions of the
medical director of a race including pre planning and analysis, monitoring
of weather and the importance of early intervention for heat stroke
patients.
https://www.racemedicine.org
The AIMS members also heard from a selection of their global sponsors.
Including Chinese based company 'Health' (see www.health1984.com) that has
been developing innovative running shoes.
R-Bies (see http://runnetglobal.com) in conjunction with AIMS have created
a global window for races and runners to connect and run around the world.
Mr Yutaka Sasai of R-bies talked about the success of races in Japan such
as Nagoya Women's Marathon attracting over 20,000 runners. The Tokyo
Marathon with 30,000 runners but having over 350,000 applicants for those
places. Mr Sasai emphasised that Japanese runners are looking for new
experience, via the AIMS and the http://runnetglobal.com partnership, where
a database of over 2m Japanese runners exists, is a gateway for millions or
runners in Japan to visit races around the world. It is also an opportunity
for millions of runners around the world to visit Japan.
AIMS photography partner Marathon Photos marathon-photos.com founder
Francis Kay made a spectacular presentation of innovative photography
services for athletes and races. Two new services that Marathon Photos have
created include a system to identify 'bandit runners' (runners who have not
paid and faked a duplicate running number). Marathon Photos have also
created a system that pictures, evaluates and profiles with demographic
analysis of every running shoe make worn by every runner.
AIMS Children's Series
Martha Morales, AIMS Vice President and Director of the AIMS Children's
Series, commented: 'AIMS organises events around the world to help create
opportunity and introduce young people to a healthy life style through the
sport of running. To date AIMS Children's Race Series has had over 50,000
runners. 30% of young people have come from orphanages around the world.
The most recent events being held in Ecuador, Iraq and India. 'AIMS seeks
to continue to create opportunities for young people around the world,
seeking where we can to help young people have wider and better
opportunities in life.'
AIMS Medal & T-shirt Awards
Frank Baillie, the Founder and Director of the AIMS Running Medal & T shirt
awards, informed: 'the marathon and running medal T-shirt industry within
AIMS alone is valued at over $10 million dollars and the T-shirt industry
at over $27 million dollars per year and growing year on year.'
A range of innovative ideas were highlighted such as medals being created
in the form of a year on year jigsaw where over several years the medals
fit together to form a picture. The Hans Christian Andersen Marathon,
Odense, Denmark has a medal each year that celebrates a different story
from the world-famous writer Hans Christian Andersen's wonderful fairy
tales, encouraging runners to come back each year and build a wonderful
collection celebrating the rich history of Danish literature.
Prices across the world ranging from for medals $1 to $30 and T-shirts from
$2 to $10. The founder of the New York Marathon Fred Lebow famously said
'never underestimate the power of the T-shirt'.
The winners of AIMS T-shirt Award 2018: PKO Poznan Marathon (Poland)
2nd place: Scotiabank Ottawa Marathon (Canada). 3rd place: Maraton Valencia
Trinidad Alfonso (Spain)
AIMS Medal Award 2018: U.S. Marine Corps Marathon (USA)
2nd place: Ravenna Marathon City of Art (Italy) 3rd place: Wuxi Marathon
(China)
Modelled by the first triplets to run in an Olympic event. The Estonian
triplets who ran the marathon in the Brazil Olympics Leila, Lily and Liina
Luik. Pictures available by clicking the links below:
Medal Winners T-shirt winners
The next and 23rd World Congress of AIMS will be hosted by:
The Great Batumi Night Race in Georgia 23-26 April 2020
They won the bidding process against impressive bids from the Bucharest
Half Marathon in Romania and the Hans Christian Andersen Marathon from
Odense, Denmark.
Election success
The congress saw the following people elected:
President: Paco Borao (Maraton Valencia Trinidad Alfonso, Spain)
Treasurer: Al Boka (Rock 'n' Roll Las Vegas Marathon, USA)
Director: Martha Morales (Tangamanga Marathon, Mexico)
Director: Rachid Ben Meziane (Marrakech Marathon, Morocco)
Director: Fernando Jamarne (Maraton de Santiago, Chile)
Director: Tetsuya (Teddy) Okamura (Nagoya Women's Marathon, Japan)
AIMS Board Members - Post Tallinn Congress
A copyright free image of each AIMS Board Member courtesy of Francis Kay of
AIMS' sponsor: marathon-photos.com is available by clicking their name
below:
President: Paco Borao
Vice President: Dave Cundy
General Secretary: Hugh Jones
Treasurer: Al Boka
Board Member: Martha Morales
Board Member: Fernando Jamarne
Board Member: Rachid Ben Meziane
Board Member: Gary BE Boshoff
Board Member: Tetsuya (Teddy) Okamura
Board Member: Arpad Kocsis
Board Member: Vaclav Skrivanek
AIMS HQ Administrator: Theo Livitsanos
A group photo of the new AIMS Board is available by clicking here:
Back row Left to Right: Gary Boshoff, Fernando Jamarne, Rachid Ben Meziane
Tetsuya,(Teddy) Okamura, Theo Livitsanos
Front row Left to Right: Martha Morales, Hugh Jones, Paco Borao, Al Boka,
Dave Cundy
The World Congress was organised by the Tallinn Marathon and held at the
Original Sokos Hotel Viru Tallinn. The weekend will end with the running of
the 2018 Tallinn Marathon & Half Marathon on Sunday 9 September.
In addition to the congress having been broadcast live on YouTube, the
presentations from the AIMS Congress will be available (in the coming days)
to AIMS members on the AIMS website: www.aims-worldrunning.org.
For non-member races. For information on how to become an AIMS member
please go to http://aims-worldrunning.org/whyaims.html
About AIMS
AIMS is a member-based organisation and since being established in 1982 has
grown to a membership of more than 447 of the world's leading distance
races, from over 117 countries and territories. AIMS Members come from
every continent on the planet and include the Athens Marathon, The
Authentic formed on the legend of Pheidippides, the Greek soldier-runner
who ran from the town of Marathon to Athens in 490 BC to announce the
Persians had been defeated in the 'Battle of Marathon'. Other AIMS members
include many of the world's greatest distance races in history such as the
Beijing, Berlin, Boston, Chicago, Comrades, New York, Paris & Tokyo
Marathons. The three key objectives of AIMS are:
1. To foster and promote distance running throughout the world
2. To work with the International Association of Athletic Federations
(IAAF) on all matters relating to international road races.
To exchange information, knowledge and expertise among members of the
association
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