2020 Brooklyn Half Registration Resolution
Last week we experienced issues with our 2020 Brooklyn Half registration and we apologize again for the frustration this caused within our running community. Thank you to those who responded to our request for contact information on January 22 and asked to be considered for an entry.
In our attempt to find a resolution for runners who were unable to register, we were able to secure a limited number of additional entries to the race. However, the number of runners who showed interest by responding exceeded the number of entries we were able to secure. As a result, we randomly selected a limited number of runners to receive an entry. All runners who submitted their information will receive an email by the end of today with their selection status and next steps.
Thank you again for your patience and understanding through this process. Once again, we are sorry we let you down and we will work to be better in the future.
Read below for more information about the resolution for 2020 Brooklyn Half registration, as well as answers to frequently asked questions about the resolution.
A Letter from NYRR President and CEO Michael Capiraso
Dear NYRR Community,
On behalf of the entire NYRR family, I want to express our sincerest apologies for the frustration many of you experienced today while attempting to register for the Brooklyn Half.
When we first experienced issues with our online registration at 12:00 p.m. today, we immediately began to determine the cause of the problem. We took the system offline with the intent of finding and correcting the issue within minutes. As time passed and we got closer to identifying the issue we continued to work to bring the system back online in a manner that would best serve our runners, and we are sorry for the extensive amount of time many of you spent waiting.
Ultimately, we were able to get the registration process fixed and the system working by 4:00 p.m. We understand that you wanted to hear more from us. We tried our best to share updates on our progress but realize that we could have done better.
We are working to make more entries available. Please let us know by Sunday, January 26 at 11:59 pm ET if you’d like to be considered in the distribution of these additional entries. Click here to submit your contact information. We will follow up by the end of day on Monday, January 27 after we determine the number of runners interested.
Looking ahead, we will evaluate whether to move to a drawing for the 2021 Brooklyn Half so that we can avoid this from happening again.
Again, we are sorry we let you down today and we will continue to look at ways we can be better in the future.
Thank you,
Michael Capiraso
President & CEO
Why did you randomly select runners to receive additional entries?
How did runners have the opportunity to be considered in the distribution of additional entries to the 2020 Brooklyn Half after the registration reached capacity?
Following the technical problems we experienced during the 2020 Brooklyn Half registration last Wednesday, January 22, we posted an open letter on social media to our runners apologizing for the issue and the frustration it created. We explained that we were working to make more entries available. We asked runners who wanted to be considered for an entry to submit their contact information by Sunday, January 26 at 11:59 pm ET.
How many runners were considered for a randomly selected entry?
7,625 runners were considered to receive a randomly selected entry.
How many runners were randomly selected to receive an entry?
1,040 runners were randomly selected to receive an entry. Due to not being able to increase the overall field size, we had to limit the number of entries we were able to reallocate to this resolution. Although we would love to accommodate all runners, we have to consider the safety, security and experience of runners on race day.
You closed the entry registration on January 22 because the race reached capacity. Where did the additional entries come from?
As with all NYRR races, a limited number of entries are used for organizational needs including partners, Team for Kids runners, and other initiatives. Following the technical problems we experienced during the 2020 Brooklyn Half registration last Wednesday, January 22, we made the decision to use as many of the organizational entries as we could for those runners who were impacted and responded to our questionnaire with their contact information.
Looking ahead to next year, will you be changing the entry method for the 2021 Brooklyn Half?
We have not determined our registration process for the 2021 Brooklyn Half. We are looking at all options, including moving to a drawing or staying with our current first-come, first-serve registration method. We will share more details on next year’s process later in 2020. We have received feedback from many runners on this topic. If you would like to share your opinion on this, please do so by emailing us at help@nyrr.org.