Responsible Events
We care hugely about our world. The places we hold our races are hugely special with great environmental importance and they're also our homes. We want to inspire activity in the outdoors, appreciation of the natural world and action to protect it.
We recognise that when it comes to an Always Aim High event, we are responsible for achieving good environmental practice and operating in a sustainable manner. We are committed to reducing our impact and it is our priority to encourage our customers, suppliers and associates to do the same. Not only is this sound commercial sense for all; it is also a matter of delivering on our duty of care towards future generations. We continue to seek out ways in which to improve our performance and impact the behaviour of others.
Delivering responsible events has become key to our ethos and over the last few years we have introduced some exciting environmental initiatives.
Tees for Trees
We no longer offer free t-shirts at any of our events. We made this a choice as textile waste is a major issue and we hope to make a significant contribution to reducing this within the race community through this initiative. We continue to offer an event t-shirt for participants to purchase as we recognise that for some a t-shirt is an important mark of their achievement and worn regularly. These are pre-ordered to prevent waste.
We offer our participants the option to reduce your carbon footprint of attending the event by 'planting' trees. Unlike offsetting schemes, we work with the charity Size of Wales, directly supporting communities and Indigenous Peoples to protect tropical rainforests. Size of Wales provides funding and expertise to local and indigenous communities in tropical regions to support them to secure and sustain their precious forests, grow more trees and establish sustainable livelihoods.
Cupless Races
All our trail races and triathlon bike sections are now cupless and bottled water is not used at any of our events.
For trail races, participants are issued with a lightweight, foldable, re-usable cup and for triathlon a sports bottle. We encourage participants to re-use these for all future races.
In other races, where water is offered in cups all cups will be recyclable and there will be clear recycling points around the event village.
Slate Finisher Mementos
We are proud to present our race finishers with a locally bought slate coaster to mark their achievement and provide a lasting, unique, and usable memento of the event.
As well as being shipped from China leaving a great footprint, medals are non-recyclable and not re-usable. In contrast, our slates:
- Are locally sourced in North Wales, supporting the local economy
- Are made from slate that would otherwise be waste
- Can be used time and time again or displayed in many different ways
- Can be taken into work to 'subtly' show off and provide fond memories during a long day in the office
- Are unique to our events and linked to our history
- Are beautifully designed to mark the event
Find out more about our locally-sourced slate mementos
Litter
Since 2013 we have had an incredibly strict littering policy on all our events. If someone is caught littering they are disqualified from the event. We have actioned this on numerous occasions and will continue to do so.
Signage
All our signage is re-usable and de-rigged as soon as the event is finished along with a full litter pick. Routes are checked the day following an event in case any have been missed. If anyone reports litter or Always Aim High signage still in place following an event, we will act immediately to rectify the situation.
Sustainability Commission
We're proud to announce that Always Aim High Events Director Nigel 'Kenny' Kendrick will be part of the new British Triathlon Sustainability Commission.The key aim of the Commission is to see the sport and physical activity sector built upon sustainable foundations. We're proud that Kenny will be part of the team supporting the triathlon industry and participants to become as sustainable as possible. We want our industry to have a positive effect on our world.
There are many other promises we are making and actions we are taking to improve our environmental practices. Read our full environmental policy.
Making Your Visit A Positive One
We want our events to benefit the communities that host them as much as possible, and so we've put together some info on responsible travel, a little starter on the Welsh language and info on places to visit, stay eat & shop that are all locally owned, and our personal favourites in the area. Click on the link below to find out more!