Charity road races must be BNAA sanctioned, says Watson

Donna Watson, president of the Bermuda National Athletics Association, has admonished charities for staging road races not sanctioned by the governing body.

Watson says this leads to events being held on the same day when ‘one race will always suffer’. She added that the BNAA has the right to cancel a race they have not sanctioned.

In a statement, she wrote: “We the BNAA understand that the economy is not in a good space but charities need to realize that they can not just put on road races as they please.  

“Any road race has to come through the BNAA as the governing body to be sanctioned.  We are seeing races pop up that are not on our official calendar and they are being scheduled for the same day as other races.  

“The public need to know that every sport has a governing body and they can not just go out to any sport and do as they please.  We have all rights to cancel a race if it has not been sanctioned by us.  

“We have already had an incident last year when two races were held on the same day and that was a disaster. We would never schedule two races on the same day be it one in the morning and one in the afternoon as one race will always suffer.  

“The public need to respect our organization and again realize they can not do what they want to do when it comes to road races.  They have to follow the governing rules and go through the right channels by contacting the BNAA to ask for the race to be added to our calendar and based on the date they choose we will grant them permission.  

“We normally have our calendar out by September 1 with the first race taking place Labor day. If anyone wants to submit a race they can send a submission to our office [email protected] and we will advise if we can accommodate the race.”