social media "bib" profiles for races

I'll confess, my FB profile pic is currently my bib for Ohio 70.3 this weekend. Somebody else posted the image for me on the a FB group I'm in, so I just copied that. I tried to figure out how to do it from the official site, but could not so I don't know if they are coming from Ironman or a 3rd party.

I was a little leery about using it because I've always heard you are not supposed to do that with marathon bibs (especially popular, big races) without blocking out part of the number. I figured it would be harder to bandit a tri, so I went ahead and used it for my profile pic.

Don't get me wrong....I'm not knocking it at all. $100 bucks says I would have done it before I knew what banditting was (which was just 2 weeks ago).
I'd still give it slightly less than even odds I'd, at the very least consider it....I do triathlons after all, and I'm just as guilty as the next guy for talking about it.

I think to bandit a tri, especially a branded one, you'd have to really up your game. Then again, there's that marathon dentist dude who went to great lengths including making up an entire race, complete with website, results, and an imaginary RD.

In the end, I think my curiosity is whether that's 3rd party or the brand. If it's not the brand, they should be on this and recognize it's a "thing" and create their own "completely safe to use" version. Just another instance of that brand not recognizing opportunity when it knocks. I'll add it to my list of missed opportunities....

1. "selling/renting" their own GPS based athlete tracker. I gotta believe they could find a way to manage that with a net revenue greater than whatever they get from a kickback from a license they sell to a 3rd party.
2. A wide selection of branded "thank you" gifts in THEIR shop for spouses, friends, coaches, supporters, sherpas
3. far better capitalization of social media

There's this new thing where all the cool kids are posting videos of kitties in tri kits riding bikes with the participant's face Face Swapped onto the kitty as they cross the finish line. And then it's followed by a political post where friends turn on each other. And then a 12 page, ad filled clickbait story on "30 things all triathlonners don't find embarrassing. You won't believe #7!!!!!"

Actually...
It just seems like everybody I'm FB friends with who's doing an IM branded event will change their profile picture to what I presume is/would be their bib. Complete with race name, logo, number, and first name. If you know someone's doing a race, you can almost predict when it'll change....within a day or two of the race numbers being released. They appear to be digital, not like text photoshopped on to a real picture of a bib.

It's so prevalent, my assumption was racers were getting an email from Ironman. "Race numbers have been released. Don't forget to change your FB profile picture to let everyone know you're racing! Click here to change your profile." And VOILA...

But then I read about banditting and started wondering.

Edited by jhaack39 2017-07-26 1:03 PM

Just a basic third party app. Really simple to create. As for why, people love to get excited about their race coming up and this is just one more way. No different than painting the car for the road trip. I am all for doing whatever it takes to promote health, fitness, wellness, racing, triathlon, Ironman etc. Great way for people to recognize and connect.

Some thoughts:

1. bib lists are available prior to every race to everyone on the planet, so if someone wants a bib number, or your bib number, it won't make a bit of difference whether you post it online or not

2. it's the timing chip that matters, the only thing someone else with a bib number will do is mix up your pictures after the race

3. anyone that does this would be easily found out by the race pictures

4. if someone wants to bandit a race, they could just put any number ever on a fake bib...it's not like they actually check your numbers prior to the race

5. the only thing someone could gain by stealing someone's particular number would be to recreate their wrist band so they could steal your bike. But again, if they wanted to do that, they could do so from the bib list, so it makes not difference, the information is public

6. go ahead and post your bib

To me, this is a lot like people covering their license plate when they post a picture of their car. Ummmm...guess who can see your license plate every day? EVERYONE who drives behind you....EVER. It's not a secret! That's the point of the license plate; it's to let everyone on the planet see it...that's why it's on the OUTSIDE of your car and not the inside. The entire point of the thing is so that everyone and anyone can see it...but when posting a picture of a car online, all of a sudden it's as secret as a credit card number lol.

Timing chip, and the wrist band is pretty important as well.