Slowtwitch will publish a series of articles over the next few weeks on triathlon's national federation in America (USA Triathlon). This is the first of those articles...

The headbadge—that thing riveted to the front of your bike's head tube. Your bike's hood ornament. If I was still making bikes (I did that in another life) I might make spectacular carbon-titanium-monocoque laser-etched, waterjet-cut C-n-C futuro bikes. But I'd rivet an old-style, stainless steel, high-polished headbadge on the damn thing anyway. Screw the weight.

And my customers would ride my bikes with just that much more pride because there's something about that headbadge. I can take all the history, the victories, the mistakes, the sweat equity, the investments (good and bad), the customer service (good and bad), the cold nights, the hand-wringing over how I'm going to make this week's payroll, all of it, and it's all embodied in that stainless steel stamping. It's the first part of the frame that sees every new mile of road, and rightly so.

Every business—every business, of any kind—strives for a shiny headbadge. It signifies the premium an enterprise is able to charge. It's emblematic of the glue that binds that company to its end users. Without a shiny headbadge you've got no basis for existence. But the headbadge doesn't exist in a vaccuum. It means things. The question is, how prominent is it, and does it mean what you want it to mean?

I'm writing of these things because I recently served on the search committee looking for USA Triathlon's new executive director. One of the themes that kept coming up was the meaning and power behind USAT's "brand." It's headbadge. This question often arose in connection with USAT's sponsors. Is our federation getting its fair share of sponsor money? What can we do to increase our brand worth?

There is nothing wrong with this line of inquiry, considering how the typical federation under the umbrella of the USOC is run. Just the same, is this the proper approach? Not precisely so, I don't think. I mean, yes, our brand ought to mean something quite powerful. But no, our goal shouldn't be to increase its market value—not in financial terms.

Our federation enjoys a government-sponsored monopoly, and it uses its monopoly status every chance it can. Nothing wrong with that. However, this monopoly (the USOC recognizes only one federation per sport) ought not to be used to compete with its customers, but to make life easier for its customers. This isn't to say that USAT ought not to seek sponsors. However, USAT ought in many ways to be as invisible as possible. Its job is not be to toot its own horn, but to toot the horn of the sport it serves, and the customers from whom it holds and spends money in trust.

"How can USAT do its job, if it can't raise money through sponsorships?" Fair question. But consider where USAT's money comes from. It will take in upwards of $5 million in 2004, however only $300,000 of this will come from its sponsors. USAT will also probably earn about $300,000 this 2004, and in an exceptional year where better than $200,000 will be spent in legal fees and special election costs unanticipated at the year's beginning. So, USAT will usually earn a very good return on operating profits excluding any money from sponsors.

Yes, USAT should put an effort behind increasing its brand value. However, I don't think the brand ought to mean return on federation sponsor money. I think the brand ought to mean safety and fairness. As regards safety, I think the federation's headbadge ought to mean, "If you enter a typical USAT race, you're more likely to have a safer race, with more and better trained and deployed lifeguards, and more attention to bike course safety, than is evident in typical unsanctioned races." Is this what the federation's brand means?

I'll focus on "fairness" at another time. I think most people would say that safety trumps every other category, and ought to top the list of federation objectives. During my brief, 5-month tenure on USAT's board I was able to kick the federation's tires and this included a look at what we're doing in the area of safety. Our federation does make a significant effort. However, there are some things we ought to do, and without delay. Here are a few.

MAKE VEHICULAR CROSS-TRAFFIC ON THE BIKE COURSE A DEFAULT NON-SANCTION

By "vehicular cross-traffic" I mean an intersection, controlled or not, during which a vehicle is allowed to enter the path of a cyclist. In other words, even if there is a policeman on each side of an intersection, waiving cars through only when the course is clear, yes, even in a condition like this the default federation response is, "NO, we can't offer you a sanction."

This does not mean that this is federation's final word. But it is the first word. In order for the race director to receive a federation sanction he must demonstrate why there are circumstances that mitigate the risk. Yes, this means more work for a race director. However, it means more work done only once, in all likelihood. Should his course not change in future years, he's simply got to attach this "mitigation explanation" to subsequent years' sanction packages.

What mitigating circumstances would the federation accept? Good question, and food for a future discussion. My point is this: When we've had a very bad accident on the bike course throughout our sport's history, it has often been, "car hits bike," or "bike hits car," and it quite often occurs in a controlled intersection. Should it prove to be the officer's fault, as a matter of law it is USAT's fault, since we hold the city and the police force harmless. How strict should we be on this issue? Even if we're not any more strict than we are now, we need to start putting race directors on notice that we are concerned about intersections like this, and we want them to share our concern.

WE NEED TO LEARN THE WORD "NO"

We, at the federation, don't wield this word often enough. We are too accommodating. We are too cowed by large race directors who control a lot of athlete registrations. We need to bite the bullet and say NO to a few RDs who just won't adhere to high standards of safety.

Now, I write this against the backdrop of a particular view I hold about proper business practices. My first axiom of business is, "Say YES to your customer if there's any way to say it." Look for ways to say YES instead of ways to say NO. At the same time, there are times to say NO. We need to have the balls to say NO, and the moxy to sell NO. The idea of a NO response is not to non-sanction a race, but to get the race director to come in the direction of the federation, so that an accommodation can be made in which everybody gets what they want, and a better race is the net result.

WE NEED TO LEARN THE WORD YES

When our head official writes his report and includes, as an aside, that race conditions were not up to an acceptable standard of safety, we need to say YES to these reports, and make sure the complaint is addressed with the race director prior to the granting of the subsequent year's sanction.

USAT works very hard to acquire talented people to work for no pay or low pay. These people travel from race to race and whether they're officials, USAT "registration table" personnel, or those who serve on regional federations, the federation needs to listen to these people, and investigate their field reports. No, we don't want to lose race directors by adopting a hard line approach. But we do need our sanction to mean certain concrete things, and yes it certainly currently does. I don't believe anybody connected with our federation believes it currently means as much as it can, however, and we often just don't heed the warnings about certain races or race directors, even if these warnings are persistent and come from a variety of quarters.

THE HEADBADGE MUST BE HONORED

Of course, part of the responsibility belongs to the end-user. As the federation continues to increase its attention to safety and fairness, the end-user ought to honor this and make a special effort to attend USAT-sanctioned events. This admittedly takes a bit of forward thinking. This might mean attending USAT races in order to help the federation work toward that day when its emblem really does mean concrete, demonstrable, measurable, visible, safety standards that are not as readily evident today.

If you feel, however, that there is not much difference between sanctioned and non-sanctioned races, this should not necessarily be an indication that the federation doesn't diligently push for better safety and more fairness. I attend a race more or less annually that is not USAT sanctioned. And yet there is a USAT official there every year, in his black and white striped shirt, in charge of a bevy of officials who are also USAT-trained. This race piggy-backs on USAT's investment in rules, trained officials, protocol, and safety standards. Of course there is no difference between this and a USAT sanctioned race. However, this race would be a lot less safe and fair were there no national federation to make the sport a better one for everybody, sanction or no.

That does not mean the federation can rest on its laurels. As our sport continues to grow, and courses are opened in new locales, then athletes, police who control intersections, lifeguards patrolling waters with hundreds of newbie swimmers, race directors new to triathlon, will all have to learn our sport's peculiar nuanced approach to safety (even trained, seasoned police officers are not accustomed to the speed at which triathletes ride their bikes if they've never worked traffic control at a triathlon). Our sport's existing, old-time race directors will have to agree to answer a few more questions than they're used to answering on the sanction application as our federation's risk management department works to impress and train newer RDs on how triathlons are safely conducted.

Yes, I think our federation deserves to have robust cash sponsors. I would prefer to think that those sponsors will be better, they'll stick around longer, and they'll pay more money, should our federation's headbadge shine brightly, and correspond to its proper mission.