hawkeye Sports and Entertainment

Mixing Business and Pleasure

Because hawkeye sports and experiential (hse) works with national active lifestyle brands, the majority of our clients' events take place all over the country; being a part of last weekend's Rock 'n' Roll Dallas Half Marathon close to home was a nice change of pace for our team. Some were able to participate in the expo and the race itself, while others made sure client activation was flawless as usual. hse clients, Gatorade and Michelob ULTRA, had a presence during the event and provided products that athletes craved on a warm, beautiful day in Texas.

Finish area at Fair Park in Dallas, TX

Friday afternoon, we visited the Health and Fitness Expo at the Dallas Convention Center to pick up race packets and get a sense of what some brands are doing in the experiential space. hse team members Nate DeMercurio and Michelle Sparks ran the full 13.1 miles through the streets of Dallas, while Kate VanHee and Carly Mathews teamed up to run the relay. hse Managing Director, Amanda Dempsey, and Account Director, Jamie Schneider, were there with their little girls at the finish line to congratulate the runners. Jamie oversees the Michelob ULTRA account for hse, which is a series-wide partner of the Rock 'n' Roll Race Series, and was there to lend a hand to hse Client Associate Malisa Sirucek, responsible for quenching lots of thirsty palates in the beer garden.

Rock 'n' Roll Health and Fitness Expo, Left to Right: Michelle Browning, Kate VanHee, Weston Gouger, Michelle Sparks, Becca Ellinor, Carly Mathews

Rock 'n' Roll Half Marathon finish area, Left to Right: Jamie Schneider, Carly Mathews, Kate VanHee, Nate DeMercurio, Amanda Dempsey

As the official Celebration Partner of the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon Series, the most rocking run on earth, Michelob ULTRA activates at all 24 U.S. races as well as the Montreal event in Canada. The Rock 'n' Roll Marathon Series brings over 10,000 runners to all 24 of their half marathons across the nation. At the Rock 'n' Roll Dallas event, Michelob ULTRA was able to reach over 5,000 consumers with an ice cold Michelob ULTRA on the warm Texas weekend. Over 14,000 runners participated in the event this weekend bringing out family and friends totaling approximately 25,000 spectators for the event weekend.

Runners enjoying ice cold Michelob ULTRA at the finish area

Runners posting photos on Facebook from the Michelob ULTRA Finish Line

The Michelob ULTRA activation footprint at the finish area

Going on 8 years, the Michelob ULTRA sponsorship continues to bring an impressive Post-Race Party footprint. The footprint consists of a 24' Michelob ULTRA stage, 50' inflatable dome, 16' inflatable image columns, tents, interactive kiosks with the ability to post race photos on Facebook and, of course, ice cold Michelob ULTRA. The Race To The ULTRA tour consists of 80+ events through out the year, including running and cycling events, such as AMGEN Tour of California and staple events, such as OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini Marathon and ING Miami Marathon. Each year, the Race To The ULTRA tour reaches over 6 million spectators and participants and distributes over 300,000 samples of Michelob ULTRA throughout the United States.

Having expanded Race to the ULTRA to two teams that travel the nation for the 80+ events, hse's role is to evaluate and negotiate partnership contracts, manage tour travel, communicate with local wholesalers and event partners, and manage all day to day activity of the tour. hse is focused on  providing Michelob ULTRA with the promotion and activation needed to become the leading superior light beer in the beverage market. 

Gamification

In January 2012 we reported on the 10 marketing trends to watch and trends #6 (experiential embraces technology) and #7 (Gamification) were taken to the streets in late 2011 for Gatorade at the Nike Women's Marathon and Half Marathon in San Francisco.

The challenge: Provide athletes with a memorable experience that set the stage for their upcoming race and helped them understand the importance of sports nutrition while running.

The solution: We created The G Series PRO Sports Nutrition Zone race simulation and connected runners to the brand through gesture control technology ("GestureTek Cube") that allowed athletes to step into the screen and test their sports nutrition knowledge in an interactive way.

GestureTek Cube running the G Series Pro simulation

Gatorade products are heavily rooted in science, and as such, hawkeye designed and programmed the simulation to have a sleek, realistic feel with a link to the scientific principles behind sports nutrition. To begin, runners would be introduced to a Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI) representative and tap the "Start" indicator on the floor mat.

Start Screen

Screens detailed instructions for the simulation as well as the "gesture" technology

Once they had received the instructions, the simulation started with a pre-race scenario that prompted runners to select they would eat/drink prior to running by tapping their foot. The zone meter on the right side of the screen would register the appropriate relative amount of carbohydrates, electrolytes and fluid.

Pre-Race selection screen

After selecting an option before the "race," the screen would change and the runner would step into the shoes on the starting line to begin the race simulation.

Athletes would step onto the (Nike) shoes to begin the race

The road began moving and nutritional items slowly moved toward the runner, whose task was to select the appropriate products with the necessary nutritional elements to keep the zone meter on the right at optimal levels. For example, selecting only water would raise the blue fluid meter, but the carbohydrates and electrolyte meters were unchanged; if the athlete selected G Series PRO Endurance Formula, all three meters rose to reflect the nutritional benefits provided by that product during the race. During the entire simulation, which was timed to be a "sped-up" 3:30 marathon, the GSSI representative provided sports nutrition insight and recommendations based on what the athlete was selecting.

Sports nutrition items began moving toward the athletes, who could step on them to select

The zone meter on the right of the screen reflected certain nutritional levels of the selected items

Once the race ended and the athlete crossed the finish line, the Post-Race screen displayed items for athletes to choose as they would for race recovery. 

The post-race selection screen offered items to choose to begin the recovery process

A final screen would show totals of consumption before, during and after the "race", at which point the athletes briefly received a valuable, overarching sports nutrition consultation from the GSSI representative.

Summary screen displaying what the athlete consumed during the simulation

As you can see from the photo below, the simulation was popular. Gatorade was able to present the science of sports nutrition to athletes through an innovative, interactive and personal medium, while providing the athletes with advice and information from experts on the topic. 

Runners lined up to watch and take part in the simulation

Giving Back

At times we get wrapped up in the logistics, branding, operations and strategy of building our clients' brands through race experiences. It's nice to be reminded how good it can feel to focus on simply giving people something to smile about along the way.

The very first Hot Chocolate 15K/5K Run took place in Dallas over the last weekend. This race began in Chicago in 2008 and has grown to seven cities for 2012. One of the fastest growing race series' around, the Hot Chocolate Run is sponsored series-wide by Ghirardelli Chocolate and claims it will draw 200,000 across all races in 2012.

Just so happened the Dallas race course passed right in front of one of our houses, and a few of us decided to get out and cheer on the athletes. Despite temperatures in the low 30's, music and dancing (and wigs) were on display to give runners a boost just after the halfway point. It was a great opportunity for us to see an event not as an organizer, promoter or athlete, but as crazy, running super fans - and we may have had more fun than they did!

 

Race or Rally?

After running in a 7,000+ person road race on Thanksgiving, I was checking my time/result and it occurred to me that much of the field really weren't there to race.  Then exactly what were they there to do?

Finishing the distance, time-trialing, getting a great workout, justifying a lot of turkey and pie, have fun….all fine missions.  The reality is that it's not racing. Grassroots running has mostly evolved into a giant fun run.

Grassroots cycling certainly does it differently.  Bike races clearly difference
themselves from organized rides or events.  Those racing bicycles
are truly competing against one another and have impact upon each other
while on course.  The races are primarily broken out by experience based categories which aim to put people up against others with like ability.  Sure this system has its flaws but it does a much better job than basing things only on age and sex.  For those that find this too hard-core or complicated, there are “open” rally rides.  These can be plenty hard and by some ridden as races (very true here in Texas).  But no matter the games at the front, these are not races.  

The organizers of the Lifetime Fitness Triathlon series are separating their
Elite (or, amateur racers) from the Pro ranks and the traditional age group methodology.  If the analogy works, age group = rally rider.  For those that are serious and fast enough to be racing, but not quite professional, this category allows them to mix it up with others there to race.  The age
group division has become a much friendlier point of entry to the sport and the experience those less competitive seek.

When the abilities within an Open class get to be as wide and varied as in running, are age-based categories still appropriate?

Should running adopt some kind of staggered competition levels?  Some might
say that it’s not broken, so don’t mess with it.  Growth in running
events continues, especially within the half and ultra marathon distances. And maybe the unstructured come-all, Open way of holding races/events is partly why the Active Culture participates within running events in such dramatic numbers.  From the view of someone that likes to compete and race in
various disciplines of self-propelled sports, it’s easy enough to turn to
other options that have a system for managing true races.  Running can stay
a rally and we will just have to wonder if we finished ahead or behind the
guys and girls that were there to race…or to finish.

Michelob ULTRA: Life Time Fitness Torchlight Run

Big-D Texas Marathon 2008

The day began at 4:30AM with a cup off coffee and bowl of oatmeal. My mission? To complete a half-marathon that started in 3-hrs. After some thought, I put on my gear and headed downtown to face this challenge.

As I walked in the building to stretch, I said to myself, "finish this race sub 2:30:00." I made my way to the start line and I was off. The first couple of miles were easy and then I started eating my Gu. About, 12 miles later my thighs began to get heavy. As I approached the finish line, I saw at least 500+ people; I couldn't look weak in front of that many people. I downshifted to fourth gear and pushed it as hard as I could. Finally, I crossed the line and almost took down some lady, who decided to stop as she crossed the finish line.

I'm pretty happy with myself knowing that I completed the half in 2:01:43.55 and I didn't stop one time during the whole race! I couldn't have done it without the encouraging support of the spectators on-course.

I'm ready for another one!

Grasslands 50M Race Report

It was time. 2004, when I had last done anything “special” in the endurance way, was a year I had heard myself talking about like it was not something I do, but used to do. I didn’t like the sound of it. At the close of 2003, I PR’d at the marathon distance and qualified. A few months later, I tried to run sub 3 hours at Boston and that July competed in IronMan Lake Placid. I didn’t PR at Boston, but I raced hard, learned a lot, and went onto have a much improved overall IM time that summer. Lately, there had been too much chatter (by me) about doing an ultra. It was time.

Going back to September, I had been keeping fit by being pathological about nutrition and doing whatever activity I could fit in, around having a new baby and new job. It was a decent enough little exercise program, but was far from “training”. I might be in good shape, but certainly am not on proper form of any kind and certainly not ultra-marathon fit. All that aside, I was ready to experiment, see what kind of glory might come through some extra special suffering, all for the sake of getting back to really challenging myself.

I picked the Grasslands for its proximity to home. Like most racing, of any kind, here in Texas, it would be a flat course. This was soft trail, too, nothing too technical or rocky.

In a quickly disappearing darkness, we started at 7AM on time from the imaginary start line that the race director pointed to. The first lap was 15 miles. It would end back at start/finish, as the remaining 3, unique loops would, too. It was nice having crew and gear in one place and having access to everything every few hours.

Two or three guys went out fast. They were gone. I sat in about 5th (?) out of 50, just being as comfortable, level 1 effort, as I could be. It was a very enjoyable 2 hour, 40 minute trot. The surface was super soft and it made me think that the trauma that the shear mileage would create could be lessened. I was drinking about 4 oz every 7-10 minutes of nuun, nibbling a Clif Bar, and taking in one AccelGel during this section.

Tahoe Rim Trail Endurance Runs

“A glimpse of heaven, a taste of hell” is the tagline for the Tahoe Rim Trail 50km/50m/100m runs that took place this weekend.

Garrett and I headed out to Reno early Friday morning to get an inside look at one of the top events in the west, for the 7th running of the race.

Race Director’s David Cotter and Kevin Bigley were a tremendous resource and had us involved in all the major aspects of the event. Whether it was helping to setup an aid station or 4-wheeling out to the Red House, known as being the toughest part of the course, the two of us saw it all.

Our day ended at the Mt. Rose Aid Station, 25.8 miles from the start to watch some of the top 100 mile racers come through before heading back to Reno for our flight home.

When we arrived the camaraderie of ultrarunning was in full effect, runners who had just hours earlier finished the 50mile distance were now out in force to support their friends running a 2nd lap.

If your running could use some variety, check out the online calendar at Trail Runner for anything from a 5km race to 100mile and beyond events for the truly hardcore.

- Jim Anderson

NYC Experience

Heading to New York for the Times Square event last week, I expected to witness an amazing launch of the Accelerade trademark and to finally celebrate the partnership we landed with Dean and Accelerade.

When I left New York, my takeaway from the experience was something much different.

You know Dean can run. You know he thrives on pushing the limits of endurance. But during this hugely successful launch of Accelerade, Dean redefined my definition of determination.

The 2007 ESPYS

It's more Dean, but you can't refuse it. He's just been nominated for an
ESPN ESPY as 2006's Best Outdoor Athlete. Of course this stems from The
North Face Endurance-50 that saw him run 50 marathons, in 50 states, in 50
days. The nomination makes hse especially proud because we activated the
event, start-to-finish - 50 times over.

Let's all lend our support and get Dean an ESPY - Vote here.