Looking for Help on How to Organize and Run a Rail Jam

CrazedSkier1080

CrazedSkier1080

Active member
So I got a job as the terrain park manager at a small local mountain here in NH. it's called Tenney Mountain in Plymouth, look it up. I have some experience building and maintaining features but I want to do more than just that.

Unfortunatley, the mountain im working for isnt run by the most park friendly and "new school" supportive people. Its a small hill that just barely makes enough money to be kept open. We have a handful of rails and get a few small jumps built every season.

Since the mountain is tiny and is in a college town I wanted to throw down a rail jam early in the season when we get enough snow to build a few features. I have zero experience on running an event and I'm looking for some advice. Any help would be way appreciated!

Basically, if you could have your voice be heard about a rail jam, what are things you like, dislike, want more or less of.

+++K to all who help!

Spark Notes:

I run the park at a shitty mountain

I want to get a rail jam going on

Give me advice on how to make it not suck.
 
I think a rail jam would be a great idea! Since it's a college town I bet you could get a lot of kids to come and generate some solid marketing for the resort.

I just judged a rail jam yesterday in Lakewood, CO, I can certainly give you some suggestions on how to do the event right.

First off, I recommend you have a registration fee, not a lot though, something small like 10 or 15 bucks. If you are going to do a rail jam right, its going to take a lot of time and time is money so make a bit of money! Next you need to make sure you have a legit waiver, something where no one can sue you for getting hurt etc. Then you have the features that you want kids to session...make sure both skiers and snowboarders will be able to hit it, the setup I was at last night was more setup for snowboarders, skiers were still throwing down but they were certainly limited. Try and get two or three features in the jam, an easy feature(flat box or flat rail) so that all levels of ability can participate and then some sort of urban down, maybe a feature with a kink(s). Once you have that down you need to decide how you are going to judge it, if you have multiple features then you may want to have everyone session one feature and then move on to the next feature and assign each rider a score of 1-10 for each feature based on how large their bag of tricks was and their overall style. The next big thing is making sure your seperate the riders into small heats! It sucks when you have a heat of 20+ kids and you have a huge line to wait through before you drop and the smaller the heats...the easier it is to judge the riders and make sure you get everyone. After you have the infrastucture laid out, the next step is making people want to come. You need sponsors there who are giving out product and donating gear to be given to the winners. You also may want to give out some cash to the top riders, even if its small amounts, like $25 or $50, it will motivate more people to come show up. The next important thing you need is a good announcer person who can hype the crowd up and be term savy with tricks riders are throwing, has to be someone who knows skiers and snowboarders well. I hate when you go to a rail jam and its been organized by only snowboarders and they don't know anything about skiing and pretzls and what not. Another important thing is to thank your sponsors of the event and get them publicity. Companies that show up need to get some marketing out of it, this is key, again time is money and they want something out of it as well. Yesterday the announcer for got to give a call out to my company and another company, that didn't go so well for the guys who organized it.

Hope this helps! Let me know if you have any questions.

 
just do exactly what cranmore does those are fun. and that is including the rope tow, if you don't have one install one.
 
What SickStickz said pretty much sums up the major steps on what you need to do. Definately make sure you've got a good waiver, as well as legitimate sponsors. I think the most important part of a rail jam though is the marketing involved that promotes your mountain and your sponsors. You're trying to get people to ski/ride at your mountain, thats the purpose of the event. More money is going to come from people returning to Tenney after the fact rather than what you'll make from the event itself. And as long as people show up and have a good time, that will definately happen. Being a Plymouth Student, I've got a tight grasp on the skiing/riding community here. I know tons of kids here that would definately be interested in participating in a rail jam at Tenney, especially with its proximity to the campus. If you preplan everything from the contest set up, format, price to enter + prizes, sponsors, date and time, ect, and the kids here are pumped about it, they will come for sure. Send me an email at dcshorrock@plymouth.edu if you need help with anything. I live on campus and I've had plenty of contest and terrain maintenence and building experience. Goodluck - Derrek
 
he said hes the new PARK manager! not an event planner! asshole

anyway what the first guy said is pure gold! get those sponsors a shout out and they will sponsor more jams in the future and it will grow!
 
Here's some basics:

-Plan everything in advance: Sponsors, insurance, waivers, prizes, set-up, location

-Lining up sponsors for prizes or cash to help put it on is always a good thing

-Insurance/waivers are a must. Get a good, well written waiver that covers all your bases. You don't want anyone suing you, and if they do you want it covered in your waiver.

-Like someone else said, registration fees are a good way to make some cash, or if you can't line up sponsors for prizes you can take what you make from registration fees, keep a bit and split the rest among the winners.

-Set up and location should be pretty easy, but you probably want something to cover all ability levels. Something simple for the not-as advanced riders, and the advanced riders can have fun on just about anything, but you still want to cater to them.

-Advertise advertise advertise

Hope that helps at least a little
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top