TCS New York City Marathon Sponsor Activation Snapshot: Tata Consulting Services, Airbnb & United

The TCS New York City Marathon is the premier event of New York Road Runners (NYRR) and claims to be the largest marathon in the world.

Now in its 40^th year, it was first run in 1970 with just 127 entrants and 55 finishers, the 2016 edition held on Sunday 6 November featured 50,000 runners from 125 different nations.

Tata Consultancy Services, the premier partner of New York Road Runners and title sponsor of the TCS New York City Marathon, joined with the event’s foundation partners Airbnb, ASICS and United Airlines, plus a group of new sponsors for 2016 including brands such as Fitbit, Michelob Ultra, Chiquita Banana and Headspace to bring a range of innovative and immersive activities to the running community around the event.

Whilst these activations were diverse in tactical approach and creative activation, most of them shared one thing in common – a good cause.

‘Our TCS New York City Marathon partners are an integral part of the race week and race day experience,’ said New York Road Runners’’ head of business development and strategic partnerships Sarah Cummins.

‘Together with our partners, the TCS New York City Marathon continues to be a trailblazer in creating new technology applications and event activations for runners, spectators and viewers, and we’re excited to bring millions of people together on such an inspirational day.’

The key partner activations this year included:

Tata Consultancy Services

IT services and consulting outfit Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), the Premier Partner and Youth/Community Partner of NYRR and the title sponsor of the TCS New York City Marathon and Official Youth, ran a multi-phased activation programme.

New York City is all set to host the world’s most prestigious endurance running event @nycmarathon on Sunday, November 6. #TCSNYCMarathon pic.twitter.com/99SDSbNZPd

— TCS (@TCS_News) November 4, 2016

Perhaps the most innovative strand took place during the race as TCS outfit several competitors – from professional runners, elite wheelchair athletes and amateurs – with wearable technology that collected and collated biometric data to track their performance in real-time.

The data points ranged from heart rate, breathing rate, cadence, and pace, to the relative conditions of the course and the real-time environmental conditions like elevation, grade, and weather.

This data was featured in the official race broadcast: it compared results with the aim of showcasing the effect of the race on the athletes’ performances.

TCS also ‘developed’ and ‘powered’ the official marathon mobile app: which included features such as: live on-map tracking of up to 20 runners, the ability to locate and unlock Smile Markers (map-pin-shaped markers stationed across the coursed highlighting interesting facts about the city and the race), an interactive expo map, a race predictor and a 2017 entry sweepstakes.

The official race app is available for free and can be downloaded either at the iTunes Store or at Google Play.

#TCSNYCMarathon app is available to download in the Google Play store (https://t.co/5fjt0Z9w9y) & iTunes (https://t.co/xrPPmpUnkz) pic.twitter.com/lBXAB9lnt2

— TCS (@TCS) November 4, 2016

TCS also once again backed the ‘TCS goIT Marathon App Contest & Awards Presentation’ – which took place at The TCS New York City Marathon Pavilion on 4 November.

Four goIT finalists from New York City schools presented a fitness app that they themselves created to a panel of three judges – Yogesh Anand (TCS global head of strategic relationships), Michael Capiraso (NYRR president and CEO) and Tish Hamilton (executive editor of Runner’s World Magazine).

Congratulations to Woodrow Wilson Middle School in Edison, NJ, for winning the #goIT app competition today. #TCSNYCMarathon pic.twitter.com/QzV9cRFT5r

— TCS North America (@tcs_na) November 4, 2016

One of the prizes for the competition winners was the chance to hold the finish line tape for the marathon winners.

What a proud moment for the #goIT #tcsnycmarathon winners from @WWMSEdison to hold the tape for @tcs_na marathon winners pic.twitter.com/rF3Su7f7J4

— Balaji Ganapathy (@musafirbala) November 6, 2016

TCS also offered large-scale augmented reality of the race course: featuring a custom table outfitted with tablets allowing runners and fans to experience course elevation changes, mile markers, fluid stations, points of interest, and ‘TCS Runfographics’ (http://www.tcsnycmarathon.org/tcs-runfographics).

Runners and fans alike can also explore the marathon via a virtual reality through a TCS developed immersive VR experience.

Airbnb

Airbnb, a foundation partner of NYRR and the official community and hospitality partner of the NYC Marathon, supports NYRR’s events right through the year, but its activations around the marathon itself focus on ‘The Airbnb Run Hub’.

The Airbnb Run Hub, at the 2016 TCS New York City Marathon Pavilion, offers local hospitality and the opportunity to connect with other runners and visitors in the Run Hub space.

Plus, this branded space offered runners and visitors free lockers to use during ‘final pre-race shakeout runs’.

We trained hard. We raced hard. Now? Let's celebrate extra hard. Congratulations, #TCSNYCMarathon runners!#RunWithMeNYC pic.twitter.com/jdZQ1QNvC4

— Airbnb (@Airbnb) November 7, 2016

Plus, of course, the brand’s core site’s special NYC section helped out of town runners find the best spaces to stay during the TCS New York City Marathon.

United Airlines

United Airlines, a NYRR Foundation Partner for 20 years, is the official airline of the TCS New York City Marathon.

It’s 2016 activation included a stand at the ‘ TCS New York City Marathon Health and Wellness Expo’ that showcased the United Polaris business class experience and it also ran a session to ‘highlight the power of sleep in athletic performance in partnership’ with Meb Keflezighi.

This included a virtual reality United Polaris experience and a chance to enter the airline’s competition offering the winner a trip on United Polaris to a global dream run destination with curated runner’s gear.

United Airlines also returned as the presenting sponsor of the TCS New York City Marathon Opening Ceremony Presented by United Airlines on 4 November.

It was a beautiful night at the Marathon Opening Ceremony presented by @united! Who's ready for Sunday? #TCSNYCMarathon pic.twitter.com/pSkfXiXggL

— TCS NYC Marathon (@nycmarathon) November 4, 2016

Another activation strand saw the airline also gave away airline luggage ‘NYC Marathon Finisher’ tags.

@united is giving away #nycmarathon bag tags at LGA tonight 26.2 @runnerizer #mpperks pic.twitter.com/xViiUqVKhF

— Top Travelista (@TopTravelista) November 6, 2016

Asics & Foot Locker

Fellow sponsors Asics and Foot Locker linked on the ‘Real Lives. Real Runners’ campaigns (see case study), while Foot Locker also ran ‘Five Borough Challenge’ (see case study) and Asics also activated its ‘Extra Mile’ initiative too (see case study).

Links

TCS New York City Marathon Web:

www.tcsnycmarathon.org.

TCS New York City Marathon Twitter:

https://twitter.com/nycmarathon

TCS New York City Marathon Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/nycmarathon

TCS New York City Marathon Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/nycmarathon/

TCS New York City Marathon YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/user/nyrrvideo

NYC Marathon Crowdrise: