Assessing the Ecological Impact of Ultramarathon Events in Protected Natural Sites: ‘Le Grand Raid Réunion’

Sandra Heck

doi:10.3390/heritage2010048

Abstract

Outdoor sport events evidently have an impact on the environment. If they are taking place in naturally protected areas this impact is even greater. By taking ’Le Grand Raid Réunion’, an international ultramarathon annually organized in the heart of an UNESCO World Natural Heritage site, as a case study, this paper concentrates on assessing the ecological impact of an outdoor sports event in a protected natural site. On the basis of datasets taken from official logistics lists and from a survey conducted among all event participants the analysis embraces ecological and carbon event footprinting. Measuring those two indicators allows identifying the specific event-related ecological impacts, including diverse variables caused by the athletes, the spectators, and the related organizational requirements. The results of the study thereby have the ability to strongly influence the future event policy and to function as a model for the assessment of the ecological impact of other outdoor sports events.

Highlights

IntroductionAlmost 5000 athletes running three days long through a naturally protected area: environmentalists might argue that this is unportable
Almost 5000 athletes running three days long through a naturally protected area: environmentalists might argue that this is unportable. It happens though each year anew in the frame of the ultramarathon race ‘Grand Raid’, the most popular sporting event of the French overseas department of Reunion Island
The impact of the sections ‘assets’, ‘consumables’, and ‘food and drink’ respectively remained under 1 %; ‘freight transport’ and ‘utilities’ were respectively accounted with 0%, as they made less than 0.1 % of the total footprint

Summary

Introduction

Almost 5000 athletes running three days long through a naturally protected area: environmentalists might argue that this is unportable It happens though each year anew in the frame of the ultramarathon race ‘Grand Raid’, the most popular sporting event of the French overseas department of Reunion Island. 18–32): Greenpeace, for instance, was already founded 18 years earlier, and UNESCO assigned its first list of world heritage sites at the end of the 1970s [2,3]. Those first initiatives did, not lead to strict consequences in the event management as is increasingly the case nowadays. No possible host city for the Olympic Games like for other mega sporting events, too, can nowadays apply without an elaborated concept of sustainable event organization

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