Most days on the water are not races. Somebody picks a Saturday, tells four people, and eleven turn up. That is the sport, and until now there was nowhere to put it.
The Event Coordinator is where you put it. Register an eFoil event anywhere in the world and it gets its own page, its own link and its own QR code. List it publicly and it surfaces for every rider searching near them. Keep it private and it goes only to the people you hand the link to.
Riders sign up in one press. You get a roster before the day so you know how many boards are coming, and a check-in list on the day so you know who actually made it. Afterwards the page stays up, and everyone who was there adds their photos and video to it.
Races run on the same rails. A race is the fourth kind of eFoil event you can register, and it uses the same page, the same roster and the same check-in as a Saturday meetup. What it adds is the clock, the course and a place on the global leaderboard. The Racing League is not a separate product. It is the option with the most asked of it.
The other three have no leaderboard, because there is nothing to rank. What there is instead is a record of turning up. Badges accumulate for riders who keep showing up, and for the people who keep organising. Hosting is the harder job and the rarer one, and the site should say so.
Automate eFoil Events
- Ride Meetup. Open group ride. A time, a launch point, and whoever comes.
- Lesson or Clinic. Structured instruction, from a first-time intro to a skills session for riders who can already foil.
- Demo Day. Boards to try, or someone strong walking a group through one specific thing.
- Race. A timed run over a course built to the league standard, ranked against every other course in the world. More work than the other three, and the only one with a stopwatch.
If it does not fit any of these, register it as a Ride Meetup and describe it in the notes. That is also how we find out what to add next.
What a race asks of you
Three of the four need a date, a launch point and somebody who turns up early. A race needs all of that, plus a course built to the league standard, a reference time run honestly before anyone else rides, and a Race Marshal willing to run a stopwatch all afternoon.
That is real work, and it is the price of a time that means something against every other course in the world. Pick Race when you register and the form asks you for the course layout and hands you the standard to build to. Pick one of the other three and nothing about the event is timed, ranked, or dependent on anybody buying a buoy.
The course standard, the reference time and the Race Marshal app are all set out in the Racing League.
What every event gets
- Your own event page, link and QR code.
- Private or public, your choice, with public events surfacing to riders searching your region.
- A roster riders add themselves to in one press, and take themselves off just as easily.
- A map pin and driving directions straight to the launch site.
- A rider cap, if you only have room for so many.
- A shared photo and video wall that everyone who was there can add to.
A race gets all of that and a leaderboard, times recorded to the tenth of a second, and a reference time that lets a lake in Minnesota be compared with a bay in Portugal.
Hosting an event
An event is only real once someone puts their name on a date. That person is the Host. Whoever registers sets the date, the launch point and what kind of event it is.
From that point on Verdant Ride does the promotion. Send the link to the riders you already know, and let the public listing bring you the ones you do not. On the day you open the event page on your phone and tap people present. That is the whole of the admin. It gives you a headcount, it gives every rider credit toward their badges, and it means you are not trying to remember in a week’s time who actually came.
You decide who sees any of it. Private keeps the whole thing between you and the people you hand the link to, which is all you need for a few friends and a quiet stretch of water. Public puts the event in front of every rider in your region and lets search engines find it. Public is how you meet the riders you have not met yet.
Registering is tied to an account. Riders will turn up somewhere on the strength of your listing, so it has to be attached to a real, accountable person.
What the Host is responsible for
- Being there, early, and being findable at the launch point.
- Saying honestly who the event is for. A beginner at an experienced-riders session has a miserable afternoon and does not come back.
- Checking that everyone has registered and signed the release before they get on the water.
- Checking riders in on the day.
- Keeping an eye on conditions, and calling it off if they turn. Nobody has ever regretted cancelling.
- Posting something afterwards, even if it is three photos. An empty event page tells the next rider nothing.
Setting expectations
This is the part that decides whether your event works. Say who it is for, say what it costs, say whether there is a board to borrow, and say what happens if the wind gets up. Riders will drive two hours for a well-described meetup and will not drive twenty minutes for a vague one.
When you have a date and a launch point, register your event.
Joining an event
Pick the eFoil event you want and press the green button. That is the whole of it. One press puts you on the roster, and one more takes you off again if it stops working for you.
Races and events are listed together on purpose. A meetup two miles from you is worth knowing about whether or not you came here looking for one, and the coloured tag on every card tells you which is which at a glance.
Before you turn up
- Check who the event is for. Hosts are asked to say plainly whether beginners are welcome, and it is worth believing them.
- Check the cost and whether there is a board to borrow. Both are on the card.
- Take yourself off the roster if you cannot make it. A host planning for nine and getting six has bought too much of something.
- Turn up early. The launch is always busier than anyone expects.
