17 Tips for running a tournament.
If you have anything to add, please send us a note.
1) The most important step is to secure your facility. Once your facility is
secure you can start to work on the next step. Make sure you understand the
politics of getting your facility and confirm that you actually have the
facility. Get everything in writing as soon as possible especially if it is your
first year. Most high schools say there is no charge to use the gym, but there
usually are charges for the custodians or school employees required to be there.
These can add up to $600 to $800 a day.
2) Get some help from your local high school team. We would pay the high school
team to run the scoring tables. They have the expertise to keep score
accurately and we had fewer complaints about scoring when the high school
wrestlers ran the tables.
3) Get the word out. For Illinois, that is getting the
tournament on the state web site. Many people visit our state web site to find
out information. If affiliated with USA Wrestling, you can get on their schedule
simply by sanctioning it early. We would typically get several wrestlers from
out of state at our tournament. This was because the wrestlers had family in the
area and could visit family on Saturday and wrestle on Sunday.
4)In Illinois, the state organization makes available its list of teams. We
always sent fliers to the entire state and found several teams that traveled a
long distance to our tournament. We would get several teams that we would not
think to invite to our tournament by sending the fliers to the entire state.
5) Offer an incentive to pre-register. Most teams will not take advantage of the
pre-registration. Offer $12 if you pre-register and $14 if you pay at the
tournament. Don’t compete based on price. Be in the middle of tournament prices.
Don’t set prices too low or too high.
6) Saying “no” your first year is critical. You do not want to over book your
tournament. If the first year you run a tournament, the parents and coaches get
out of their late, they will tell their friends the tournament was run horribly.
However, the opposite is true, run a good tournament and they will tell
everybody about it.
7)In order to figure out how many kids you can handle use 30 to 40 kids a mat.
When you get to the 50 to 60 kids per mat, you are talking about a long
tournament. Particularly your first year, try to stay around 30 to 35 kids a
mat.
8)Use square mats, you will save space and not waste it by making circles so you
can get quite a bit of wrestling space. Some coaches hate square mats, but they
won’t be complaining when you get them out a little quicker because you were
able to squeeze another mat or two out of your available mat space.
9)If you have different size mats, don’t simply cut all the mats in half. Use
some of the space on your larger mats to make your smaller mats bigger in size.
Also, use marking tape and make sure it is a color that is not on your mats.
Marking tape can be bought at McMaster Car.
10) Do not run a round robin tournament. They take longer since every bracket
will have all wrestlers wrestling. Using an 8-man bracket will reduce the number
of matches your final round. Also, for the eight year olds and under, use a
4-man bracket. They will get two matches and should be out early in the
afternoon. The kids and parents will appreciate getting out of your tournament
early.
11)If possible, split the 5 and 6 year olds into a separate division.
12)Awards should be the best you can afford. A shirt to the first place winner
really does not cost that much and you’ll have people talking about your
tournament. I always saw our tournaments t-shirts during the season. If
possible, award first to sixth place a medal.
13)Another key to running a good tournament is to make sure you do not have too
many or too few kids. Try to get good numbers from your coaches. Ask them how
many kids are on their roster and figure they will usually not have more than 50
to 60% participation. Some teams will have 80 to 90%. If a coach has 40 kids on
his roster, chances are they will not bring 35 kids like he would like. I’d look
to see what the teams were brining at other tournaments through out the year. At
a typical tournament, we would have 15 to 20 teams. If each team’s count is off
5 kids that is 75 to 100 kids. At $12 an entry fee, gate fee, and concession
stand revenues, each missing wrestler is close to $15 to $20 in profit. Much of
your profit is in the last 100 wrestlers.
14) My last couple tournaments, I asked the coach if I asked you to guarantee a
number how many kids would you have. That number was always significantly less
then the first number.
15) Take care of your referees. They will talk about your tournament to other
ref’s. Pay them well, but don’t pay them too well. If you run 10 mats (400
kids), get 12 refs for your tournament. An extra $10 or $20 a ref times 12 refs’
is $120 or $240 of profit. That extra money can be used to pay for uniforms.
16) Finally, the day of the tournament. Make sure you have enough scales at your
tournament. In Illinois, the 8 & Unders are the largest group. We bought two
scales from Walmart. These are fine for the little guys and will allow you to
have 2 scales for the 8 & Unders, and then one scale for each of the other
divisions.
17) We always asked the coaches into the bracketing room. This allows your
tournament to start on time. The coaches have a vested interest in helping start
the tournament. Plus if they have a complaint about the bracketing, you can
remind the coach you invited him or her to the bracketing room.
