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Race Preview: Silver Strand Half Marathon Fewer Skaters Expected for This Year's Silver Strand Promoter Had Hoped to Hit 300 But Expects Fewer, Barring Late Surge By Robert "Just the Factoids" Burnson The promoter was But barring a late surge in registrations, it looks like the number will be closer to 200. "We're down about 50 skaters from last year," said Rick Kozlowski, president of Koz Enterprises. The Silver Strand (Sunday, Nov. 13) is a mid-sized San Diego event for runners, wheelchair athletes, amputees and skaters, both inline and quad. Koz added skaters to the event three years ago in an attempt to build its numbers. The first year (2003), 165 skaters signed up. The next year, the number climbed to 265. But this year, the number of skaters registering for the race has fallen. That drop is disappointing for Kozlowski, whose goal is to draw 500 skaters a year to the race. With that many skaters, Kozlowski figures he could generate some support from skate companies. Nonetheless, he hasn't given up on the skate event. "We'll still be here next year," he said. The challenge for Koz, like other race promoters, is figuring out how to get the word out to skaters. "The hardest thing has been trying to find a direct mailing list of inline skaters," Kozlowski said. With a list of 20,000 active skaters, Kozlowski believes he could attract 300 to 500 to the race. "But we haven't been able to find a viable list," he said Another problem has been finding enough time to devote to the skate event. With a staff of two, Koz Enterprises puts on 13 events (mostly running) a year. "We just don't have the time to devote to the event," Kozlowski said. "Unfortunately, skating is at the bottom of the totem pole." Talk about this story on the forum (posted on Nov. 9, 2005)
| Discuss Related reading • Go to last year's story about the Silver Strand • Go to Silver Strand web site Race info Expo is noon to 4 p.m. Saturday at the Imperier Beach Pier You can register online or at the Expo ($65). If you can't manage that, you can register Sunday morning before the start at Sunset Park in Coronado ($75).
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