Waivers

A couple of episodes back, we looked at event liability insurance: why it’s important that your race is covered by a robust liability insurance policy, the circumstances under which a liability policy would kick in, and what happens when it does.

But there was a significant part of that discussion we only briefly touched on in that episode, and that was the importance of supporting your liability protection with the use of a liability waiver.

So, what is a liability waiver? What needs to be in it? And how does a waiver protect you, the organizer, should a participant or volunteer decide to pursue legal action against you?

That’s what we’re discussing today with my guest, industry veteran Laurel Park. Laurel is not only an experienced academic researcher in data analysis and survey design, but also an incredibly active member of our industry, having served as the President of the Ann Arbor Track Club and a long-time contributor to Road Race Management. 

During her work, Laurel has developed a keen interest and expertise in liability waivers for races and with her help we’ll take a look at what waivers can and cannot protect you against, the different aspects involved in drafting a solid liability waiver, and how waivers work alongside your liability insurance policy to deter and defend against frivolous litigation directed against you and your company.

In this episode:

• Waivers: your first line of defense
• Waivers in contract law 
• Participant waivers vs volunteer waivers
• Understanding and laying out your event's "inherent risks"
• Waivers for minors and kids runs
• The legal enforceability (or un-enforceability) of waivers
• Ordinary negligence vs gross negligence
• Waivers and insurance: one or the other, or both?
• Using waivers to support insurance claims
• Are online waiver signatures as good as paper waiver signatures?
• The pros and cons of using waiver templates

Many thanks to our podcast sponsors, RunSignup and Brooksee, for supporting our efforts to provide great, free content to the race director community:

RunSignup are the leading all-in-one technology solution for endurance and fundraising events. More than 28,000 events use RunSignup's free and integrated solution to save time, grow their events, and raise more. Find out more at https://runsignup.com/.

Brooksee are the timing technology industry-leader, bringing affordable real-time tracking and timing checkpoints to races with their patented iPhone-sized micro checkpoints. Find out more and get 50% off your timing for your next event at https://www.brooksee.com/headstart.

You can find more resources on anything and everything related to race directing on our website RaceDirectorsHQ.com.

You can also share your questions about liability waivers or anything else in our Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/racedirectorshq/ 

Transcript

Panos: 0:07

Hi! Welcome to Head Start, the podcast for race directors and the business of putting on races. A couple of episodes back, we looked at event liability insurance - why it's important that your race is covered by a robust liability insurance policy, the circumstances under which a liability policy would kick in, and what happens when it does. But there was a significant part of that discussion we only briefly touched on in that episode, and that was the importance of supporting your liability protection with the use of a liability waiver. So, what is a liability waiver? What needs to be in it? And how does a liability waiver protect you, the organizer, should a participant or volunteer decide to pursue legal action against you? That's what we're discussing today with my guest, industry veteran Laurel Park. Laurel is not only an experienced academic researcher in data analysis and survey design, but also an incredibly active member of our industry, having served as the President of the Ann Arbor Track Club and a long-time contributor to Road Race Management. During her work, Laurel has developed a keen interest and expertise in liability waivers for races and with her help, we'll take a look at what waivers can and cannot protect you against, the different aspects involved in drafting a solid liability waiver, and how waivers work alongside your liability insurance policy to deter and defend against frivolous litigation directed against you and your company. And before we get into this great discussion, though, I'd like to give a quick shout out to the amazing sponsors supporting this podcast. Many thanks to RunSignup, race directors' favorite all-in-one technology solution for endurance and fundraising events, now powering more than 28,000 in-person, virtual and hybrid events. And many thanks to Brooksee, the timing technology industry-leader, bringing affordable, real-time tracking and timing checkpoints to races with their patented micro checkpoints. Two great companies we'll be hearing a bit more from later in the podcast. But, now, let's dive into our discussion on waivers with Laurel Park. Laurel, welcome back to the podcast.

Laurel: 2:21

Yeah. Thank you. Pleasure to be here.

Panos: 2:23

Well, thank you very much for making the time. This is your second time. I really appreciate you taking another hour or so out of your life to do this. Last time we spoke, we did an excellent podcast. I strongly advise people to check it out if they haven't already on race surveys because that's sort of one of your expertise fields, right?

Laurel: 2:42

Yeah. That's my professional training that's kind of outside of running but it applies to running as well.

Panos: 2:49

Exactly. And we did a podcast that I think in many ways serves some similarities with what we'll be discussing today on waivers in the sense that there are two people think of surveys. The first instinct is to just rip off some survey and get going, but we'll go into the details of why both surveys and waivers-- that kind of approach probably isn't the optimal one. Before we get into all that, I think last time we spoke, you were still president of the Ann Arbor Track Club, but I'm not 100% sure. So, you have stepped down since, if I'm not mistaken. So what have you been up to?

Laurel: 3:25

Oh, boy. I've been kind of trying to keep my fingers in a lot of different pies. I've been working-- I did a couple of presentations on the surveys. I had some requests to do that. I've been working with the Dexter-Ann Arbor Run, which is the Ann Arbor Track Club's primary event, and I've been involved with that. I'm not the race director, but I've been involved with that event for on and off for many many years. I'm going to be doing a presentation coming up at Road Race Management talking about-- back to my data background, talking about demographics in road races, where things are headed, and what we can expect in terms of race directing, so kind of as little things come along that kind of fit with my interests and my experience and my expertise. I kind of just jump out and say, "Hey, I know about that. I can help you with that. Do you want or need my assistance?" And other than that, I just keep busy with a whole bunch of other things - try and keep up to date on what's going on in the industry, which could be a 24-hour job, that's for sure, doing all the Facebook and stuff like that and webinars.

Panos: 4:31

You've been involved with Road Race Management for a while, haven't you?

Laurel: 4:34

When did Phil-- yeah, I've known Phil and Jeff Darman for, oh gosh, 30 years or so. Back from my competitive days. I knew them. And so I touched base with him during the pandemic when it was about-- no, it was before that. It was about 2019, I think that I touched base with him. I had a question for him and he remembered me. So we started chatting. He was the same thing, "What are you doing now?" And I told him about my professional work and my involvement with the Track Club. And so he said, "If you're interested, I have some topics that might work well with your expertise and your interest and so on, if you would like to be involved." And so I've done some writing for him. I've written some articles for his newsletter. I've given a couple of presentations at his Road Race Management Conference, which is always fun, always a pleasure, always an honor to do that, and really just a lot of fun to interact with these people that make these events happen, and listen to the stories and learn from them. So it's been very, I think-- I hope it's mutually beneficial. It's certainly been beneficial on this end.

Panos: 5:45

Well, definitely. I think these guys are doing great work over there. The conference is in December, right?

Laurel: 5:51

It's in December. Yeah.

Panos: 5:52

Great. We're going to be talking today about waivers, actually, a topic that we should have tackled ages ago, I guess because it's one of those things that everyone is interested in. I suspect there are lots of areas within waivers that people sort of don't fully understand. Where did your interest in waivers start from?

Laurel: 6:15

Well, my interest really peaked, I guess when I became president of the Ann Arbor Track Club and it was my responsibility to ensure that the Track Club was protected to the extent possible from any issues of liability - lawsuits and things like that. My professional career has always involved following rules and policies of some sort to a certain degree. And I've also worked in a couple of areas where, when I work with student data at the University of Michigan, the penalties for not following those rules could be pretty severe. So, I learned very quickly. You learn the rules, you read the rules, and you do your best to try and obey them. So this kind of fell naturally into that. But I think the President of the Track Club has the CEO actually. We don't have a CEO position. We have a president who has a fiduciary responsibility to the organization, and that means always having to act in the best interest of the organization. And I think certainly in the last decade, from what I've heard from various insurance companies and race directors and so on, and I think you even kind of mentioned it, I had to chuckle in your excellent podcast with Nathan Hill that suing has become a national pastime, and it's becoming more and more frequent. People are more and more willing to sue for any slight that they feel they have suffered. And the waiver is really for a race director. It's your first line of defense. It can be your best form of protection. And I was also very struck having been involved in competitive road racing for years, and road racing in general for many years, that the waiver is race directors have so many things that they have to take care of. There's so many things that draw their attention when you're putting on a race, and most of those have some type of an immediate feedback. So if you don't have enough shirts, it's bad. If you don't have enough water stations, if you run out of medals, all that stuff that has an immediate feedback and impact on customer satisfaction, and waivers don't until they are necessary. So I often say the waiver is not important until it's important, and then it's critically important. It's something that is on your checklist. You got to get it done. So you do it, you get it done, and boom, it's done. And I think, fortunately, most races haven't had to deal with this. Don't have to deal with an incident where the waiver becomes really critical. One of the analogies I use which might be a little out there but I think of it kind of as your car's airbag. You got to have it. Every car has to have an airbag, and it's in there, and you don't think of it until you're in an accident, and then you're really hoping that you have a high-quality airbag and it's installed properly because that can make the difference between a few bumps and bruises and something much more serious. And that's kind of an unusual way to look at it, but that's kind of the way I feel about the waiver. You realize the importance of the waiver when you need it. So I've always been trying to stay one step ahead of that and trying to make sure that we have the protection we need anyway. And I should add before we get into this, I'm not a lawyer. Nothing I say should be construed as legal advice. What I've done is a lot of research using sources that were written by lawyers, having spoken with lawyers, having spoken with insurance people, and pulled together the kind of the best practices that I found throughout those resources as we're going to discuss a little bit later. It's kind of a high-level view and you do need to look very carefully at the details depending on where your race is being held.

Panos: 10:07

Well, I actually think in these kinds of discussions - we've had them before - I think someone with your kind of background is a much more helpful person to speak to than an actual lawyer because you bring a lot of the background of what you know around race directing, races, runners, and, of course, all the thoroughness in where you synthesize all of the different legal perspectives to the waiver. Because, as you say, like insurance, actually, there are lots of parallels with insurance. When you were talking about the airbag analogy, insurance is another thing that applies to it. When you're thinking that you're not going to need it most of the time but, when you need it, you want to rely on it. That's insurance. And as we'll see later in the podcast, insurance and waivers work very, very closely together. We can't and we won't actually go into a discussion of this is the perfect waiver because there is no such thing depending on where you're based, what you're trying to do, as we'll see. Although we'll be discussing mostly waivers in the context of participants, you'll also be needing waivers for your team members, for your volunteers. So it's difficult to actually answer and I hope people didn't come into the podcast expecting something like that - a discussion of the perfect waiver. I think we'll go through some of the principles, some of the areas you want to be aware of, the kinds of things that must be in all waivers of which there are a couple, some things that you know may depend on state that may have to be in some states and not in others and, generally, just a general concept of the waiver. But taking a quick step back, at the risk of providing people with some obvious information over the next minute or two, can we just sort of define what a waiver is, what it is we're going to be talking about. So what is really a waiver for people who may be too new to this or may not have come into contact either as a race director or a runner with waivers?

Laurel: 11:55

Actually, I think that's a really important thing to start with because I don't think a lot of people fully realize that a waiver is actually a contract in the United States - and all of this is United States centric. It's a contract between the participant or the volunteer and the event organizer. And basically, that contract is saying that, as the participant signs it, by allowing me to participate in your event - and this is a very rough language here - I am going to release you from any injuries or liability that could be caused through negligence on the part of your event. And it doesn't release the person from suing you. My understanding is that in most states, you can file a lawsuit. I mean, you can walk downtown and file a lawsuit but it's going to protect you in the event of a lawsuit. And the fundamental objective of the waiver is to protect event organizers and affiliated parties from liability for injury or death caused through ordinary negligence. We'll get into ordinary negligence and gross negligence a little later. And what's important with the fact that it's a contract is it is governed by contract law, and contract laws vary by state, and sometimes they vary quite a bit by state, and that's where the devil in the details of what you put in your waiver and how you phrase it in your waiver can come into play. But the important thing to realize is the enforcement of waivers varies by state, so some offer considerable protection against liability. Others offer some, but they provide some level of protection in every state. So regardless of what state your event is in, you really do need to have a waiver or you really should have a waiver.

Panos: 14:02

So basically, I think it is super important and actually not at all trivial. There are lots of actual legal implications to this to realize, as you said, that the waiver is a contract. One corollary to that being that there's two sides that enter into this, and there needs to be a kind of exchange of something as with all kinds of contracts, right? So it's not sufficient, as you say, to say, "I release you of liability." There needs to be this kind of reciprocal kind of thing that you're getting something out of it.

Laurel: 14:39

And that is a fundamental aspect of any type of contract you enter into, regardless of what the topic of the contract is, and it's called a consideration, and it is stated as such. Your waiver must include a consideration. The consideration is defined as the benefit that each party receives from entering into the contract. It must be stated explicitly and it is required for the contract to be valid. So if you don't have the consideration, the contract - and I believe this is the case in all 50 states. I believe this is fundamental to contract law - it could be dismissed as not being valid. So you'll typically see in waivers language to the effect of, in consideration for your accepting my entry to this event, I, for my spouse and heirs and whatever, agree to release your race, your race company, from any liability arising from participation, whether that liability do be caused in whole or part by negligence," something along those. So, you have to have that. What are you getting out of it? And what are they getting out of it? This disagreement here.

Panos: 15:56

Because, as you say, yeah, that's an important aspect of contracts, and not having that may cause some issues to the validity of the waiver. You mentioned liability resulting from injury or death, both of which are physical kinds of repercussions. What about things like loss of reputation that I've seen in other contexts or loss of income, or stuff like that. I mean, it's harder to, I guess, imagine how those might result out of participating in a race but they do happen.

Laurel: 16:30

I don't know how those would be affected. I don't know whether loss of income could be kind of correlated with injury income. I have not seen any literature that I've come across that addresses those in particular, so I'm kind of hesitant to do so. Honestly, the best advice is to have your waiver reviewed by a lawyer, one who's ideally experienced in sports law, or sports waiver law, has worked with various types of events on waivers and liability, and have that person review your waiver, or even write your waiver. That's the best advice. And realizing that not every race has the resources to go out and hire a lawyer, but you can also talk with insurance people, people in your insurance. Whoever issues your insurance, they're going to know something about it. I think the vast majority of people who have been professionally involved with sports, with events, probably have knowledge of that. So the gold standard is a lawyer who is licensed or has considerable experience working in the state in which your event is going to be taking place.

Panos: 17:53

The one thing people may not realize - I think we touched on it briefly earlier on - is that waivers are not something that only participants should sign. It's something that most of us-- whether from the runner perspective or the race director perspective, I think most of us have this idea that a waiver is for participants, but there's more people that need to sign, probably, different kinds of waivers like your volunteers or people helping you out in the team, like anyone who might be potentially injured during your event.

Laurel: 18:30

The two big ones are participants which, as you mentioned, everybody is aware of. And the other one that doesn't get quite as much attention is volunteers and some of the other people you've mentioned, depending on their professional relationship to what is going on in the race. Have they been hired as contractors? Are they sponsored? Those might be governed under different types of laws depending on the state, but the participant and the waiver-- participant, excuse me, and the volunteers should sign a waiver. And ideally, those are going to be different waivers because the risks that the volunteers are exposed to may differ from those that the runners are exposed to, participants are exposed to. But yes, those are the two biggest parties that should always be signing the waiver.

Panos: 19:23

And this is important because in the waiver sort of text itself, you can't afford to be too vague. You need to actually spell out what kinds of activities the person signing the waiver is going to be involved in, right? You need to be quite explicit that you may get hurt riding the bus, you may get hurt running trails in the mountain or something.

Laurel: 19:48

Again, you're going to hear this a lot from me, and I apologize for that, but it depends. There's a very fine line between having enough detail and going overboard. There has been conversation, I remember, years ago, 20-25, years ago, when you signed a waiver, the kind of general consensus was you don't list any of the inherent risks in the activity, because it's going to be telling people what they might sue for. So you don't talk about the gravel on the road, you don't talk about the potholes. You just make it very general. And I think the thinking to that has changed. So now, several of the resources that I consulted suggested that you do put down some of those inherent risks but you also think about what are going to be, the most likely, the most common, and don't really parse it, "Gum wrapper fluttering across the road" or something like that. But, just think about and look carefully at the risk that we're talking about with your particular event or your particular activity within that event.

Panos: 20:57

Yeah, because, I guess you can always-- like you see in all kinds of contracts, you can always list the most common, as you say, and add the usual, "not limited to" kind of thing, right? So you're actually not closing the door on any other thing that might cause injury or risk.

Laurel: 21:15

And I should also throw out here the definition of an inherent risk, because that's what we're talking about. We're talking about an inherent risk. An inherent risk is a danger or condition that is an essential part of the activity and cannot be eliminated without changing the nature of the activity. And for running, the ones that come up most frequently are the weather, the contact with other participants, the conditions of the course, stuff like that. Depending on the type of event you have, you could have other risks involved. I also think about what is the runner going to be experiencing on my course in my particular event. Are they going to be crossingrailroad tracks? Are they trying to think of some other things that I have? Well, there was a lawsuit. I think I read about it about a month ago and I think it was Seattle where a person slipped on some algae that had spread across a sidewalk, and one and a half million dollars from the city or something like that. And the argument being, the city was aware that this algae had been there. Other people had slipped and so on. And would that then be considered an inherent risk? Do you have anything like that on your course? Is there an area where you get mud? Is there an area where you get gravel?

Panos: 22:40

When we're talking about inherent risks, most people would kind of, as you say, they'll have a mental picture of what that involves. Different sports will have different ones, I guess, like swimming, you can drown. We don't need to be too graphic here, but there are all kinds of risks, right? I remember when I was doing our one trail run I organized back in the day, one of the very important risks in that kind of context was being stung by bees or whatever because you're going through an area where there might be, like, commercial bee farming or beehives or whatever, so you need to include that. And as you say, if you're crossing a railroad, you need to think of that. You need to think of all of the possible high-level risks that you may want to run into.

Laurel: 23:24

And trying to eliminate some of those risks would change the nature of-- in my view, my perspective on that would be-- a lawyer may say it differently, but you mentioned about the possibility of death. And I did read an article written by a lawyer who does specialize in waivers and sport management, and said, "Always include that catastrophic possibility. Always include death because it is a possibility." And you leave yourself open. If you just say,"injury or serious injury or the possibility of death," it sounds very offputting. One of the other things about doing the waiver is you're kind of forced to face the worst possible of what might happen to this event and that's not fun, and you kind of got to think about it and lay it out there. But, the advice was very strong that if death is not in there, then somebody could reasonably say, "Look, my family member died. That was not ever listed." Again, depends on state, check, double check, but I took the advice.

Panos: 24:42

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Laurel: 26:46

Typically, the contents of the waiver are going to include the description of the activity which we talked about, also the level of fitness required to safely participate. So people are aware of that. So they are agreeing to that. And I think we see that. I attest that I am physically or mentally able, depending on the event, to do this - the inherent risks, the dangers of participation, which we just discussed, also have to include what we call the assumption of risk and release, which are called exculpatory clauses, and that is where you, as I mentioned earlier, release the event organizers and so on and so forth from liability or injury resulting from. And typically, the spouse or heirs or participants or state, estate something along those lines, I, for myself, my heirs, my representatives, and so on - and again, that's check with your state - are included as what we call additional releasing parties in the release clause. And something I point out and this is true for the waiver but it's also a strong argument for making sure that you do collect waivers is that, a lot of times, it's not the participant you have to worry about. It's the participant's family. So you can say, and I've heard this, that,"Gosh, we're a small race. Nobody's going to sue us. Everybody that shows up are friends of ours." That may be very true but the friend's spouse or the friend's mother-- the consequences of something catastrophic happening that affect those people, and if you're talking about children, it just goes through the roof. You have to be so, so very careful that the release is for the participants but it's for anybody else who may have the ability to file a lawsuit as well.

Panos: 28:53

Touching on the whole children aspect of things, inadvertently, I'm thinking, kids runs. Do kids also have to sign waivers if I'm a 10 year old taking part in a kid's mile or something?

Laurel: 29:07

Typically, if the child is under the age of majority, which is 18 in most states, then the parent signs for the child or the legal guardian. The advice I'm hearing now from insurance, from a couple of insurance people is, have the minor sign the waiver as well just to double check so you have the minor on there agreeing to it as well. I've also heard a recommendation which I thought was very bright one, saying that if you are signing for a child, for a minor, to include a sentence in the waiver stating that the minor has read or been told or explained the risks of participating in the event, and that they understand and accept those risks. So there cannot be a claim that, "Well, yeah, the child ran, but he or she didn't really know what they were getting into." And the parents signed. Oh, the parents, I thought they did-- and so I thought that was a pretty good suggestion. I've seen that in a couple of places. It was a new idea to me. And one of the other things that we're seeing more frequently now is for races that allow strollers or Baby Joggers is to register the kids free of charge, usually, so that you have the waiver for the child that's in the Baby Jogger stroller. Because otherwise, you don't. Think about that. You didn't really think about that but, again, when you go back to kids, all bets are off. If you're running along in the corner and one of the wheels of the stroller Baby Jogger hits a pothole, and the thing tips over, and the kid hits her head, you don't have a waiver for that child. So I'm seeing that more and more frequently. And there's been, among some race directors I've spoken with, a little bit of a pushback that it's something new, first of all. This idea it's something new. And again, I think this thought of introducing something into the registration process that brings awareness to the potential that something bad may happen is kind of a-- you don't want to do that. You want people to come to your race. You want people to participate. You don't want to do anything that's going to dissuade a potential customer. Well, maybe there are a few customers you want to persuade. For the most part, you're not. And so this is, "Is this going to make it seem as though my race is particularly unsafe?" Probably not. It just needs to gain acceptance. But I think from a liability perspective, I think it's a really good idea.

Panos: 31:47

Yeah, but to be honest, I think-- I mean, I totally get the point that you don't want to-- when you come up to someone at the start line in a stroller and you tell them like their two year old has to sign a waiver. It might sound a little bit extreme and as you say, it might get them thinking, "Oh, what am I getting myself involved in?" But on the other hand, waivers-- I mean, you tell me what you feel about this but, to me, they feel a little bit like signing Terms and Conditions on a new software release or something, or your new Apple or something. No one reads the full 50 pages or something because you know what the waiver is about as a runner. If you've done a few races, you know what you're signing and I personally won't read a full waiver, and I think most people won't because they expect them to be reasonable that way. You know what I mean? Like they expect that they know that it's kind of like typical exercise, but you are actually saying that I'm an adult, I'm running. I know what to expect out of this and I'm okay to sign this.

Laurel: 32:50

Yeah, and I think it's part of the package. People who've been running for a long time, as you're saying, it's kind of like, "Well, this is what we do. This is part of the whole process of registering." A lot of it, I think, is in how you kind of, I guess, sell the waiver. And when I have conversations with people about waivers, I really emphasize that, first of all, this is something that we are required to do, which we'll talk about in a minute with insurance. And I said, and it's really to protect us. It is not that we don't trust you, but it is something that we need to do legally to protect ourselves. And the other thing that I would encourage race directors to think carefully about is that adage, and we've all heard it, and you just said it. Nobody reads the waiver. Well, rest assured, the lawyer representing your injured participant is going to read it very, very carefully. And I've heard that excuse of, "Oh yeah, we have a waiver, nobody reads it anyway. It's just in there." I'm like, "Okay."

Panos: 33:49

Oh no, no. I mean, don't get me wrong. The waiver, particularly if you're the organizer, it needs to be bulletproof. I'm not saying just be casual about this. It absolutely needs to be bulletproof. But with my runner hat on, I'm saying it's not like when you're signing a waiver, there's a clause in there that says, you're gonna be owing me$100,000 or something. So as someone who releases someone of reasonable liability, you don't need to read it too closely, but as an organizer, absolutely be 150% diligent in what goes into the waiver.

Laurel: 34:23

Yeah, the onus of responsibility is on the person signing the waiver, as with any contract. Again, we go back to it's a contract. You're signing a contract. So if you choose to just go ahead and sign, that's fine, yes. From your runner's head, understand, yeah, I understand completely. Same here.

Panos: 34:43

Yeah. Because also I think I'm taking this kind of attitude, which actually is a good segue to the next question I had. Because in many ways, as an organizer, you can't be too egregious with the stuff you put into your waiver because if it's too egregious, it won't hold up in law sometimes, right? You can put stuff in there. For instance, I'm thinking of gross, gross negligence. One of the things that I learned quite early on, speaking to Nathan and other people around insurance, is that some things, whether you put it in a paper and you tell someone to sign it and maybe, like me, not reading waivers, they do sign it, it doesn't mean that you can actually enforce that in a court of law if you ask them to release you of absolutely anything like gross negligence.

Laurel: 35:30

Yeah, and that again-- and we'll get into the negligence in just a second here because you raised a good point. And that again, going back to it's going to fly in certain states and it won't fly in others. But, yes, you cannot put everything under the sun in there because it becomes just too broad, but you do have to have the ones that are pertinent and applicable to your event. I saw somewhere in an article that I read where something along the lines of we release from anything that could possibly happen during the course of this race, and like, no. And the other thing too along those lines, though, was to be very careful about what you say in terms of the race trying to limit any risk too is don't make anything that could be taken as an implicit promise of, "We will do everything feasible to ensure the health and safety of our participants." You just made a promise that you're going to do who knows what. How is somebody going to interpret what you should have done, what was feasible or reasonable? Yeah, one of the things that I really-- as I did the reading and did the research, I found a couple of resources that were really very detailed and written by lawyers, and very intense is the real importance of being careful with your language and concise with your language. And everything is in there, every word is in there for a reason, and those words are chosen carefully. And that, again, goes back to having a lawyer review it or having somebody who has considerable experience with doing that and has written these things and knows how to say it, and what to say and how to say it because you can inadvertently open the door through good intention and not be aware of it.

Panos: 37:30

Yeah, that's a great point. So no commitments in there, no promises, and definitely no superfluous information, as you say, right? I mean, the waiver is there for a specific reason. It needs to hit certain notes, but describing, like, how hard you're going to work towards safety of the event and all that stuff, that shouldn't be a part of the language.

Laurel: 37:54

It might be useful in certain states. I don't know that. Yeah.

Panos: 37:58

Okay. Shall we go into negligence for a sec?

Laurel: 38:01

Let's go into negligence. Fun topic.

Panos: 38:04

Fun topic, yeah. In preparing for this, I was just going back reading some stuff online about negligent, gross negligence. I have to say, I expected the line to be sharper than what I realized. It seems to be a very kind of gray zone, like the area between negligence and gross negligence, and lots of it going down to interpretation, like what should have been expected of you, what your intentions were, all kinds of stuff. So is that the feeling you get about trying to describe the difference between the two?

Laurel: 38:44

Yeah, and I think you've hit on a very important point. So ordinary negligence is typically defined as failure to exercise the care that a prudent or careful person might use, and that's pretty vague. What would a prudent or careful person use? Gross negligence is described as recklessness or wanton conduct, a complete lack of diligence or a lack of regard for the safety of others. And those definitions are not, as I put it, carved in stone. They can vary by state and, very importantly, they can vary by the person who's making the determination of whether something would fall under ordinary negligence or gross negligence. And one of the things that I found just in running in general throughout throughout my running career and working with race directors is this perception of, "Well, I don't think that's going to be gross negligence. I'm not worried about it. I don't think--" and I say, "What you think isn't going to matter. It is the person that's making the determination. That's the opinion that matters." And realize that my understanding is, in most states, the waiver will relieve you from ordinary negligence but not necessarily gross negligence. The waiver does not absolve the event from taking every reasonable precaution to ensure participants safety. As I tell, it's not a Kevlar vest. It's not bulletproof. But again, what is every reasonable precaution? You're getting into that gray interpretive area. I think there are some things that race directors who've been around for a while could say, you probably do not want to have your runners going through an intersection where there's traffic and there's no Marshall, no barricade, no cone, it's a busy intersection. That's probably not a good idea. Other than that, it's gonna depend on the person. Somebody may say that running a race when the temperature's below freezing, who would do that? That's negligence. So the person that fell on the ice and suffered frostbite or something, whereas you live in the Midwest, you live in the northeast, if you had to cancel every race that was going to take place on temperatures below zero, it's going to be a pretty slim race calendar for a couple of months there. So you don't know.

Panos: 41:11

Intellectually, it's a fascinating area to try and work out what the distinction is and where the line is drawn between those two. It's interesting that you mentioned, like, freezing temperatures or something. I was thinking of wildfires. And another example that came to mind, I think partly it has to go back to inherent risks. If you run Bad Water, for instance, which is an Ultra Marathon in the hottest place on Earth, heat is part of that. It's an inherent risk of running Bad Water. You can't turn around and say, "Oh, I got a heat stroke." Right? Because it's Bad Water. If you do get a heat stroke, for instance, because a race director, like, extreme temperatures in Oregon or something, and they don't cancel the race and you end up running at temperatures that are, I guess, completely--

Laurel: 42:02

What is it? Black zone? Is it black zone? Isn't that the highest one for heat index?

Panos: 42:06

Yeah. Like, if you're into that kind of situation where you weren't expecting it, it wasn't part of the contract, I guess, you entered into in running the race, then that might cross into negligence. That's sort of how I think about it. It depends on context, I guess.

Laurel: 42:24

Yeah, exactly. And I think that's the important point. It does depend on context. We see it on the Facebook group all the time of,"Well, I run an ultra and we don't have aid stations, and everybody knows that. It's the culture of the event." Other races, I think about this when there's always the conversation about holding cupless events, which from an environmental perspective, I think is a great idea but for a typical road race, particularly a longer road race, anything 10K or longer, the culture of that event which I think is going to remain that way as long as these races are competitive and people are trying to run as fast as they can, the nature of that is we expect to be able to transport water from the source to our mouths when we need it, and expecting that someone is going to carry their own bottle and stop and fill that bottle up - take time to stop and fill up that bottle. First, for races that are not competitive, for races that are fun runs or experiences, yeah, absolutely. But again, the context of the event is going to matter. And then my question would be, and I don't know the answer to this, you can say up front, "It's cupless. You're responsible for this, that and the other." Well, if you have somebody that says,"Yeah, I'm trying to get a Boston qualifier. I'm not going to waste a minute or 30 seconds. I'm just going to keep going." And they get to the end and they're dehydrated and they collapse and suffer heat stroke. Was that gross negligence on the point of the race that did not provide them a means by which they could grab a cup of water when they're running? I don't know, but it's something I've thought about when people talk about cupless races.

Panos: 44:16

Yeah, interesting. Well, I'm actually hoping to do a podcast on cupless racing. So maybe that's something to add on the notes.

Laurel: 44:26

And I think that would be interesting too because with some of these topics on your podcast, there is a liability aspect to them. It might be just peripheral, but it's there and I think the more that race directors understand this and realize-- not to scare them to death, you don't want to drive people from race directing-- and appreciation that this is very real and here are some things that you do need to start thinking about in terms of your overall race planning. It's an educational experience, I think. Yeah, educational facet.

Panos: 45:07

Definitely. And I think the most important takeaway out of the whole negligence discussion - because it's going to be difficult, as we say, to actually say anything specific to this - is, as you said, that a waiver is not a Kevlar vest. It's not get-out-of-jail card. It's not gonna save your ass in every single situation. And you cannot just be completely irresponsible with the way you put on races and then just rely that a waiver is gonna come back. And in a sense, it's there to-- again, in a litigious culture like the US and other places, it's there to basically cover the basics, right? Like cover the stuff that someone might go to court with, but we would discuss in the Facebook group, as you say, and consider completely irrelevant like someone doing a trail run and they trip on an exposed route or something, and they come and sue you, the kinds of things we see in newspapers, and we sort of think, "How could this possibly end up in court?"

Laurel: 46:05

Right? It's your first line of defense.

Panos: 46:07

Exactly.

Laurel: 46:08

You don't have a waiver, you don't have any lines of defense. All right? You have nothing. Also, quite frankly, it is there as a deterrent for someone to file a lawsuit. You have your waiver. You've signed this contract. Think very carefully. Is it worthwhile to sue? And the final thing is if there is a decision to sue and there is legal activity, the waiver can be the difference between a significant financial judgment or a limited one, or anything in between, the dismissal of charges. So it can play a very important role. The role it plays can differ by state, and it can also differ by what the requirements are to have in that waiver.

Panos: 46:58

Yeah. And in that first line of defense, of course, I think the waiver goes hand in hand with a solid liability insurance policy. And I know you mentioned the podcast we did with Nathan previously on liability insurance, he was actually quite adamant that insurers expect you to be using a waiver in many cases. I'm not actually that sure. I don't know whether you have any thoughts on this or whether you know the answer to this one. What happens if you don't have a waiver but I know that insurance actually insists quite strongly on your using a waiver?

Laurel: 47:32

Yeah, I got this from a couple of different insurance people. First of all, I think of the waivers and insurance as kind of two of the three legged safe event stool, and the third one being a good safety plan. A waiver is what's called an underwriting requirement. It is a requirement that must be met in order for the policy to be valid and enforced. So you have an insurance policy and you have a claim but you don't have a waiver. It is the discretion of the insurance company. They are under no obligation-- my understanding is, and speaking to a couple of insurance people, they're under no obligation to validate that claim, pay out that claim if you don't have the waiver. Now I know there are some gray areas, I don't know what they are and I don't want to promote that, but you should make every effort possible to do that. Without a signed waiver, the determination of coverage for an event would be made by the insurance carriers and the attorneys. So you have an insurance policy that has a $1 million or $2 million cap and that doesn't mean that you're going to get $1 million or $2 million. It could be much lower. It's not going to be higher because it's a cap. So, you want everything working in your favor to ensure that you do have maximum coverage there. Oh, and I just remembered it was going to say, I've actually heard this twice - comments to this effect to me - "No, we're not collecting waivers, but we have an insurance policy. We have insurance. We're good." And conversely, "No, we don't have insurance for this event, but we're going to make sure everybody signs a waiver." And both of those are worthless. They work in tandem. You really need to have both of them.

Panos: 49:28

You know how everyone these days talks about "the race experience"? Well, there's a big truth to that. As someone once said, as a race director, you're not really in the racing business, you're really in the experience design business. And one of the most important aspects of creating a great race experience for your participants is getting them to share their experience with their loved ones on race day. Well, that's traditionally been an expensive business reserved for only the largest of races, but not any more. With Brooksee's Laurel timing technology, you can bring affordable participant tracking to your race and the joy of engaging AI-driven commentary for your spectators following their loved ones around the course. Not to mention peace of mind for you and your crew with pinpoint accurate participant positioning for everyone around the course. It is that simple to make your next race an experience none of your participants will ever forget. So to learn more and to book in your next race for an amazing, exclusive Head Start 50% off, head over to brooksee.com/headstart. And see what Brookee's patented, Laurel timing technology can bring to your next race. Okay, back to the podcast. I feel dread on other people's behalf when I hear people going into such a dangerous line of business as race directing can be legally because we're putting on physical events for people. Going in with this kind of attitude, "I don't need an insurance. I have a waiver or whatever" and, like, people working out on their own, what they need, which of the two they can do without because, to be honest, an insurance is gonna cost you, like, $150, $200 or whatever for your first year event, and a waiver is going to cost you nothing. I mean, it's going to cost you the legal cost to draft it once and then you're going to have it there on your registration platform. Most registration platform supports signing waivers on checkout. Why not have a few months of just good sleep, knowing that you have those two things to protect you going into an activity that-- again, not to scare people but we need to understand this can change your life in very bad ways, if something goes wrong.

Laurel: 51:55

Yeah, and let's talk for a minute about odds. I like talking about odds. I work with data. Odds are that you're probably not going to need to use the waiver. But also, mathematically, the odds that any event is eventually going to happen are higher than zero, eventually, right? So, the Boston Marathon issue, the bombing, that kind of illustrates that. So I think, and I don't have data on this, but I suspect the majority of race directors go through their careers without ever having to deal with an episode, a serious catastrophic episode at their event that really takes them down the dark, the rabbit hole of legality and liability and stuff like that. But the fact is it could happen. Again, it's not important until it is important. And I think of my own equation for risk is you have the odd something that's going to happen and the consequences if it does. So you kind of look at that and you determine how much risk you're willing to take. The odds could be high but it could be a very minor thing. You run out of medals. Oops, okay. But the odds could be low but then the consequences could be very, very high, very catastrophic, and I'm going to do my planning around trying to avoid those consequences, doing what I can to avoid those consequences.

Panos: 53:27

Plus, I think there's a different consideration. It's not only the odds of something happening and the impact of it. I think it's very important because, in some cases, the combination of odd and impact may be significant but you also need to consider what is the cost of mitigating that risk? And in this specific case, the cost is not actually that prohibitive, right? I mean, we're not talking, like, thousands of dollars or something. We're talking really basic diligence and just, again, covering your ass in this. It's not rocket science.

Laurel: 53:58

And it is an expense. I mean good lawyers, any lawyer is not cheap. And when you're a race director, and you're particularly a small event, and you're scrambling for sponsorship, and you're looking at where every penny goes, for something that doesn't present an immediate need or an immediate aspect of your race, kind of biting your lip and deciding to spend however much it is, I don't actually know how much it would cost to have a lawyer review a waiver right now- depend, again. You're kind of like, "I think we can make do without that because what are the odds something's going to happen?" I've heard that before. Well, what are the odds something's going to happen? Don't know. Higher than zero, I guess.

Panos: 54:40

Yeah. That's a fool's game going into that. I'm guessing that if you want to have your race sanctioned by one of the major bodies out there-- I haven't looked into the details but I'm guessing most of these folks like the sanctioning bodies, they consider waivers to be best practice to be using those.

Laurel: 54:58

Admittedly, I have not read every single word under USATF sanctioning, although I've read quite a bit of it. It does include insurance. So I think that may then get back to the,"You've got to have the waiver in order to have the insurance." I would strongly suspect-- and again, I have not seen the wording myself but it would surprise me if it weren't in there somewhere that it's a requirement to collect the waivers. I don't know. I don't know. But regardless of whether USA Track and Field or any other sanctioning body, USA Triathlon, whatever requires that, it's still a good idea. And from the insurance standpoint, it's a really good idea.

Panos: 55:42

Yeah, absolutely. Wrapping up with, I guess, the practical aspects of creating waivers and collecting them and storing them and all that stuff. First of all, speaking of lawyers, what kind of lawyer would I look for for something like this to help me draft my waiver?

Laurel: 56:01

I'm not an expert in the various aspects of law, but I know that there are lawyers out there that specialize in sports waivers, in sports events, risk management for sporting events. I actually used quite a bit the resources of a lawyer based in Arkansas, - actually, I believe he's winding down his practice at this point - who specialized in waivers and risk management in sport. And I know there are others out there that their practices are built around that. I mean, that would be obviously a good place to start. Contract law-- my understanding is that contract law is fundamental to legal education in the United States, that every law student takes contracts in their first year. It's kind of like med students take anatomy. So, every lawyer out there has some training in contracts because contracts form the basis of law in many places. You will have a lawyer that you know that has been trained in contracts and, depending on where they practice or what they practice, could be perfectly acceptable. I know a lot of clubs and a lot of races that have a member or a member's relative who is a lawyer and is willing to do a review, is competent to do the review. Again, have to know the laws of the state in which your event is being held and is capable of doing that. Again, this is not my area of expertise but that is probably the approach that I would take.

Panos: 57:42

In terms of what form the waiver should take-- is there anything to be said against signing waivers electronically these days? Basically the kind of thing you get on RunSignup checkout or something like that.

Laurel: 57:53

No, I looked at a couple different sources in general. They said those are typically accepted. It's a stronger signature as it were if you actually do the typing of the name or do initials rather than just, "By clicking this check box. I agree, da, da, da, da." But yeah, there was actually an act and I don't have it in my notes and I can't remember the top of my head. I believe there was an act that passed that ensured that electronic signing is valid for the waivers.

Panos: 58:33

But as you say, best practices, instead of just a simple checkbox, get the signee to use initials, to initial it, or put their name on it or something like that.

Laurel: 58:42

Yep, three initials or by typing my name below as it appears exactly above-- because I just did this yesterday for an event. By typing my name as it appears and they had my name as I put it on the registration form, type it exactly as it appears, I state that I have read, understood and accept the aspects of this waiver however, it was phrased.

Panos: 59:06

Dated and all that?

Laurel: 59:07

Right. And again, if you have the option to add a second signature line for a minor-- and the same thing for a minor, if it's a parent, guardian doing for a minor. I haven't seen and admittedly, I haven't had a lot of experience with other race registration forms because RunSignup is the major one out there. I think most of them at this point are doing that. And if RunSignup isn't-- well, I can't speak for RunSignup. I won't say that, but that's the advice I've gotten - to try and get the minor to sign it as well.

Panos: 59:40

I'm guessing you want to hold on to that signed waiver for a while after the race. It obviously becomes relevant only after the race. But then how long typically would you expect to need to keep the waiver for stored somewhere?

Laurel: 59:55

It depends on the statute of limitations within your state, and it also depends on what your insurance provider states. And one other thing I want to throw in there about insurance is I really encourage people to read your insurance policy. I'm surprised sometimes at how many questions people will say, "Can I do this? Should I do this?" And I'll say, "What does your insurance say?" Read your insurance policy. Make sure you understand what is in there. There are certain things-- indemnity agreements which pop up in waivers every now and then, hold harmless and identify. Make sure it's valid to have that in your waiver in your state. My understanding is that some states don't allow that arbitration agreements. If you're thinking about putting an arbitration agreement in your waiver, make sure your insurance policy will cover if a decision is made through arbitration. I don't know, but again, that's that's things that you really need to be aware of and need to be educated on.

Panos: 1:01:01

I'm just sort of stepping in the shoes of a new race director here. They still believe they don't have the money to cover this. I mean, it's a charity race. I see all kinds of things where people are tempted to cut back on certain things. I'm going to ask this question, I think I know the answer to it but how strongly would you advise against ripping off a neighboring race's waiver in the hope and expectation that it probably covers your state? It's a similar type of event and you're probably going to be okay.

Laurel: 1:01:34

Probably, not going to answer it quite in the way you thought but let's pivot this a little bit and talk about the stock waivers or waiver templates that come in RunSignup and other places where they already prefill in the waiver. Those should never be used without customizing them. So they really should be-- it's a good start. Like, RRCA has sample waivers. Runsignup, of course, has it. It's a good place to start, but always, always, always should be tailored to the information for your event, so you can take what they have and then improve it. And I think the same thing with borrowing some of the races waiver, if it's a race that's in your state, I still think you're better off probably writing your own but that can serve as a starting basis, and you make sure that you have your information, you're releasing the parties that are associated with your race, you're putting in the inherent risks that are associated with your race and stuff like that. I was speaking with Jean Knaack. I actually had an email exchange with her about waivers and I said, "Well, what's the biggest mistake that you see?" Because she's involved to a certain degree with some claims that come through the RRCA insurance?" She said,"Biggest mistake by far is that people use those stock waivers and they don't tailor or customize them to their event." So again, you have that line of first defense but it's pretty flimsy.

Panos: 1:03:12

And last question, I think-- and then you tell me if you think we missed anything, because you're much more on top of the details here than I am. But last question I had and it's actually one you're probably not expecting. It's one that Nathan didn't expect. Virtual events. What's the position on those? Still sign waivers for a virtual event?

Laurel: 1:03:33

We do for our race. We still have them sign waivers. Yeah. We discussed this a while back when we first started virtual events but if they're saying that they're running the event because they've signed up and registered to do so, even if it's virtual, I don't know all the legal details of this, but we've decided we're going to err on the side of caution and everybody who is participating in our event is registered in consideration of your accepting my entry into this event, which they are registering for an event. We decided we're going to err on the side of caution and have them do it. It's much to gain and really little to lose by doing that.

Panos: 1:04:20

Okay, so it's a yes on virtual insurance from Nathan and a yes on virtual waivers.

Laurel: 1:04:27

I don't know. I have not read any cases of which someone who injured themselves in a virtual event, filed a lawsuit. I don't know, but sure. I mean, err on the side of caution, I would think, yeah.

Panos: 1:04:40

Do you think there's anything we may have missed in this discussion?

Laurel: 1:04:44

I want to bring up one other thing because I'm seeing it more frequently in waivers and that's the inclusion of an arbitration agreement. An arbitration agreement is-- I think most people are familiar with those and certainly in the States. It requires that a dispute arising from the event must be submitted to a neutral party, which is the arbitrator, who reviews the case and makes a decision resulting in binding arbitration without litigating in a court of law. The arbitrator and the venue of arbitration are typically chosen by the event that's writing the waiver. And it actually may sound like it's a good idea from the event's perspective. You're not going to have to go through all the issues of a lawsuit and litigating and so on, but you have to realize that absent evidence of fraud, corruption or misconduct, arbitration rulings are rarely overturned. So when you have an arbitration ruling, it typically sticks. Arbitrators are not required to follow the law, and there is limited legal recourse in the event of a biased arbitrator or unfavorable decision. So if it ends up that this decision is levied against the event, there really is little recourse to sue. And I think what I'm telling you, and I'm actually reading definitions that I got from a resource written by a lawyer regarding this-- I believe this is across all States. I can't guarantee it, but again, it's something to check with. Check again. Check your insurance policy and make sure that it doesn't prohibit settlements by arbitration. It's not something you would think about but I don't know the background story on that, but take a look at that. And the other thing I'm going to throw in there just as a runner, from the customer perspective with arbitration agreements, I personally am not in favor of them because I feel that it removes too much power from the consumer and I have opted not to participate in a couple of events where there was a mandatory arbitration agreement within the waiver. And I thought, it just goes against my principles, goes against what I believe in. So, you talk about not wanting to scare the participant or not wanting to do something that's going to dissuade people from coming for your race and that's something to keep in mind, I think. That's a me comment. That's a Laurel comment.

Panos: 1:07:22

Okay, cool. I think one other thing in all of these areas where we're saying, like, check what your insurance says on this, check what your insurance says on that. One thing I would-- perhaps like an obvious tip here but what you can also do is just speak to your broker, right? Someone like Nathan. You don't need to go interpret or be able to read the small print of every insurance contract. Just put it in human language, pick up the phone, speak to your broker who issued the insurance and ask them, "Am I covered for this? Am I covered for that? Is there an arbitration clause? What's the policy around this and that?" You don't have to spend time going through that stuff.

Laurel: 1:08:00

You don't. My own position is, though, that as the president of the Ann Arbor Track Club, I have the responsibility to read that policy and know what was in it. So no, you're right. We do have insurance brokers and they are there to answer your questions. But you're not going to ask the question if you're not aware that it's in the policy. I would never think to ask about including an arbitration agreement but if I see it in my policy, then I'm going to go,"Hmm, all right." So your policy is going to tell you the rules associated with your coverage. If you don't know about them, you're not going to know to ask your broker about them.

Panos: 1:08:41

Awesome. Well, I think we covered quite a lot of ground on waivers. Again, a little bit like the insurance contract. There are a few definites in there but I think lots of great, high-level principal information to give people at least a compass on how to navigate all of that stuff, which, again, may vary from state to state. And of course, we have tons of people listening from outside the US, so maybe even more of a pointer there for you to maybe check what's-- it's going to vary even more across countries than States.

Laurel: 1:09:16

Right, yeah. And one of the things that I also often see, "What do I need to know to be a race director?" You have to know this and you have to learn this, and I'm like, "Oh, you have to become an expert on insurance and liability." They didn't go to law school. A law degree would be really helpful but it is a lot. On the one hand, you're kind of feeling like, "Oh, my God, it's too much. It's too much." On the other hand, this is kind of the reality that a lot of us are operating in these days and it's something to be aware of. I don't think it is something to lay awake at night worrying about, but the way that you avoid doing that is being well informed and making sure you have all of these little details covered.

Panos: 1:10:02

Yeah. I mean, I think it's inevitable in any walk of life to not be aware of relevant laws and stuff like that, from anything. If you build a house, you need to know some laws. You do a race, you run a business-- you just get familiar with these things. And at least the one positive thing is that, in most cases, you do your research once, you have someone help you draft the waiver, and then it's not something you need to be looking into very closely or in as such detail, year in year out. So that's, I guess, the positive aspect of it.

Laurel: 1:10:35

It's not but I always strongly recommend reviewing your waiver every year before you start your race again, and particularly if there have been any changes. If the course has changed, if any aspect of your race has changed, you may need to do some updating. You actually may go through and read your waiver and realize that you probably should or need to phrase something differently or you may need to add additional releasing parties if you get a new group that is helping you volunteer or something along those lines, make sure they're in there. If you hire a new running company, make sure they're released. All of that stuff.

Panos: 1:11:14

Good advice.

Laurel: 1:11:15

I hope so. Yeah.

Panos: 1:11:17

So I know you are very active in the kinds of things that you think you can contribute value to in our group, Race Directors Hub on Facebook. I strongly advise everyone who's not part of it to come join us. So I know you offer lots of advice there. Would you be willing to maybe share some other ways that people can get in touch with you if they're interested in this topic or other topics, or some of the operational research and stats work that you do, if they need any help with that?

Laurel: 1:11:42

Sure. I have a Facebook page. You can link on to it through Race Directors Hub. That's probably the best way to get through to me - just send me a PM or DM, whatever you call it, an M through Facebook. Honestly, Panos, I'm really hesitant to put my email out in public domain. I'd much prefer that people just PM or DM me, and if I choose to respond by email, I can do that. Is that okay? Is that acceptable?

Panos: 1:12:09

Absolutely. Obviously, I mean, whatever you're comfortable with and Facebook these days is almost like an email. So people can reach out to you through that.

Laurel: 1:12:16

But there's a method to my madness. People are going to have to go to your Facebook page to find a comment by me. And no, actually, they don't have to. They can just go to my Facebook page.

Panos: 1:12:28

You're always around. I need to say that. So if someone has a relevant question, I know you'll pop up with some useful advice so they don't even have to reach you through that.

Laurel: 1:12:36

Thank you.

Panos: 1:12:37

Well, thank you so much for spending another hour with me on this fascinating topic.

Laurel: 1:12:42

You're welcome.

Panos: 1:12:43

I hope you enjoyed it.

Laurel: 1:12:44

Fun. Great conversation. Yeah.

Panos: 1:12:45

Thanks to everyone who listened in. I hope you guys enjoyed this, and we'll see you all on our next podcast.

Laurel: 1:12:51

Sounds good.

Panos: 1:12:58

I hope you enjoyed today's episode on waivers with industry veteran Laurel Park. You can find more resources on anything and everything related to race directing on our website, RaceDirectorsHQ.com. You can also share your thoughts about some of the things discussed in today's episode or anything else in our Facebook group, Race Directors Hub. Many thanks again to our awesome podcast sponsors RunSignup and Brooksee for sponsoring today's episode. And if you'd like to learn more about these two amazing companies, head to RunSignup.com where you'll find just about everything you could possibly need to set up your race for success, including industry-leading registration tools, a professional free race website, free email marketing tools and tons more. And don't forget to check out Brooksee's new innovative Laurel timing technology, giving you real-time tracking of participants and a Virtual Command Center for your race by visiting brooksee.com/headstart where you can also get a massive 50% off your first booking. Until our next episode, take care and keep putting on amazing races.