AATRA meeting Minutes Saturday, March 19, 2005
Following the Swift Skeedaddle Snowshoe Race Frisco, CO

Meeting called to order at 1:30pm by AATRA president Adam Chase.
Attendance - Danelle Ballengee, Reno Cappelli, Adam Chase, Bob Cottrell, Sue Covington, Elliott Henry, Nancy Hobbs, Julie Hudetz, Marin Paul

Minutes from last meeting (October 26, 2003) for approval - Danelle motion to approve minutes, Elliott second. All approve.

• Membership - We need to boost our membership, not only with individuals, but with corporations. We have secured a relationship with Running Times magazine (first ad to run in the May/June issue) to provide our members with an annual subscription. This benefit along with Trail Runner magazine, discounts to several other publications (Marathon and Beyond, and Ultrarunner), our newsletter Trail Times make an attractive package. Nancy has renewed many of the corporate members and is working to add new participants including Vasque (and others) whom she had a conversation with last week (one of their team members was very positive about Vasque joining). One of our main attractions is our calendar on the website which Teva now sponsors. Nancy and Elliott update the calendar monthly. We have nearly 700 events listed on the website - trail, mountain, snowshoe - (Nancy has been updating since the meeting and we now stand at more than 1000 confirmed race dates for 2005 and the calendar will be updated April 1). We recently added to new race members from South Africa. This is exciting to become more international and help to promote events outside the U.S. Nancy will send out an email to race directors in the hopes of signing up more races to AATRA. One thought was to again work on the proposed sanctioning program. We have clear criteria which was approved in 2003, but we haven't really promoted this. One question was whether we could provide insurance to other races and we can not. We do need to increase our individual members and the group discussed options for increasing membership. We currently hover around 300 members depending on the renewal month (we dip to just over 100 and then climb back up with renewals). It was suggested to put AATRA membership forms in race packets. One suggestion was to have races link to the AATRA site, or to offer discount to AATRA members at races. Mike Heaston was very kind to offer a discount to AATRA members in the 24 Hours of Frisco run last fall. Perhaps waiving late fees for AATRA members if not a discount on regular entry. It was suggested that a discount on race entries is probably our single best way to increase membership. It was suggested that we BOLD the races in the calendar that are AATRA members. Elliott says we can do this. USATF/Running USA will have a booth during the June 2-5 Teva Mountain Games in Vail and there was discussion that Teva may be able to provide a promo item to people who register for USATF on site. Perhaps we can do something at the booth to promote AATRA since we're a USATF and Running USA member. Sue suggested we work with Adam Feerst to promote AATRA to the Denver Trail Runners and also to Matt Carpenter with the Incline Club, and Buzz Burrell with the Boulder group. This will help in Colorado and we need to outreach to other locations in the country.
• AARC/RRCA merger - after some financial mending and reorganization the two groups have merged and we are a member of the one group, RRCA. Our insurance and dues this year were close to $700.
• Finances - again, we need to work on increased revenues through outreach to increase individual, corporate, race, and club memberships. Danelle again stated that we should "hit the race list" to promote AATRA and generate memberships. Doug Laufer, our treasurer, has done an excellent job with the record keeping and providing financial reports.
• Newsletter - Nancy puts together the newsletter (since 1996 and we're at more than 30 issues) with the next issue due out in late April/early May. We need contributions to the newsletter. Think about writing and submitting articles. Buzz has been writing some great stuff lately on his adventures. The more articles, the better. If they don't fit in the newsletter, we can always include on the website.
• USATF Convention - the 2004 convention was in Portland, in 2005 Jacksonville, Fl will host. This is a great networking opportunity for us. Nancy usually attends and the past two years Anita attended as well. Brian Metzler attended one year while an AATRA officer. We have a limited budget and need to be selective where we send people. It would be great to get a corporate sponsor, but we can't see the benefit for them.
• Snowshoe - Updates for 2005 - USSSA Champs was successful according to Adam who attended. The date was tough since it was up against the North American Snowshoe Champs in Beaver Creek (which offered prize money), plus it was a tough travel option for many. In 2006 the event will be in Bolton, Vermont though a date not yet set. Anticipate a bigger crowd for an east coast location. The qualification process has become easier and more are qualifying. Sponsors see more from their participation in an event that is a qualifier. It was suggested that more qualifying events per region would be a plus so people don't have to travel so much, or make the regions smaller. They have done away with having to live in the region you intend to qualify in. USSSA is coming along and growing. It is probably not a good idea to make pre membership in USSSA a requirement (like it is for USATF and Teva US Mountain Running Team selection races - must be a member of USATF to be consider for selection to the team prior to the race). We talked about teaming up with USSSA. USSSA is a member and supporter of AATRA and its programs. Adam will talk to Mark Elmore to get his thoughts about some join work. USSSA membership is $15/year, but no benefits. It was pointed out that snowshoeing and trail running attract a similar audience and makes sense to work together.
• Event Involvement '05 - We're working with Swift Skeedaddle races this year and hopefully the Danielesque in the fall. Not sure of others. We aren't planning to start an AATRA event at this point. The Mt. Evans Hill Climb will go on June 18 this year (same date as Mount Washington) and Darrin Eisman is organizing.
• Website - Since January we've had 13,682 hits which translates to more than 100 per day. Elliott says we typically get 4,000 plus hits per month. We continue to climb with hits on the site. We need to leverage our website more as the numbers are good for our audience. Calendar gets the most hits. We need to add a trail shoe review. Nancy and Adam will visit with Running Times to see if we can link to the shoe review in Running Times. Other ideas on shoe review are welcome. The home page is updated with our new corporate members and we're adding more articles. The trip reports are very well received.
• Other Business - Nancy and Adam will represent AATRA during a Goodwill mission to Japan April 26-May 3 to participate in the inaugural 100km Challengers race (Adam will run the 100k, Nancy the 50k, and the other team members Anita Ortiz, Paul Low, Kelli Lusk, and Ethan Hemphill will run 10k). The race is in the Okutama Mountains outside Tokyo. There will be several VIP functions with dignitaries in Tokyo and the goal of the event is to promote Goodwill among our countries and to have a link with trail and mountain running worldwide. We hope the event goes well and will continue in coming years with more outreach to other countries. We will provide a report upon our return.
• Next meeting - we discussed during the Teva Mountain Games, but it will be too crazy for several of the folks involved with the Games. It was then suggested for October 1 during the 24 Hours of Frisco race. Nancy will visit with Mike Heaston to see if this will work during his event (Mike has said a resounding "yes" so plan on October 1 in Frisco).

Adam motioned to adjourn, Julie second, all in favor. Adjourned at 2:10p.m.
Secretary Julie Hudetz provided the minutes and we thank her!

For additional details contact: trlrunner@aol.com or 719-573-4133.