The Goldrush multisport race and The Prospector MTB Stage Race have been put on ice for 2025 due to low registrations.

Dare2Sweat events company director Neil Gellatly, which organises The Goldrush, said multisport was on the decline, and going ahead [they] would have ‘’lost a hell of a lot more money’’, so he was pulling the pin now.

He first made the announcement on The Goldrush Facebook page on November 11 stating entries were fewer than a quarter of the acceptable entry target needed to be viable. 

“The Goldrush event will be shelved for now, at least until inflation comes in check and the economy is in a healthy state again. 

''It is also clearly apparent I will need to further re-invent the event to appeal to a greater market audience in order to attract the interest of a wider population,” he said.

Both The Goldrush and The Prospector were supported by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Enterprise (MBIE) regional events promotion fund, and recipients announced by Minister of Tourism Matt Doocey early in August.

The Goldrush was funded $22,900 and The Prospector $10,000 by MBIE. 

Neil said he was working through a process with MBIE where he was showing them all his expenditure and it was not yet clear what next steps were.

The Prospector co-owner James Williamson (Jimmy) said they did not end up taking up the MBIE funding for 2025 as the wording changed at the last minute during the application process and events had to spend money first on marketing before getting a portion of that

back from the fund. 

In a Vincent Community Board (VCB) meeting in April, annual promotion grants for 2024 - 2025 allocated $10,000 to The Goldrush for event promotion, signage, marshals and local staff costs.

Neil said the funding from VCB had to be paid back. He confirmed entry fees had been refunded back to athletes last week.

“Including insurance money, donation and merchants fees. They’ve got every cent back.”

In August Neil told The Central App his business had invested $150,000 - $160,000 in The Goldrush and he estimated the economic impact over the three days of entrants, support crew and visitors coming and spending in Central could be in the vicinity of $700,000 -

$800,000.

Both events were planned for March 2025. The Goldrush two day event involved trail running, kayaking, swimming and mountain biking and was planned for Otago anniversary weekend (March 22-23).

Organisers had overhauled the event since it was last held in 2014. 

The Prospector MTB Stage Race, started in 2021 and was a three day cross country mountain bike race held in Alexandra and Earnscleugh, which usually attracted about 200-300 riders from across New Zealand and Australia.

Directors Phil Oliver, James Williamson and Lisa Hoskin sent an email out on October 30 stating entries were down by roughly 60 per cent and with heavy hearts had made the “difficult decision to postpone the upcoming [event] to be held March 7-9, [2025]”.   

The current tough economic environment, increasing costs across the board, a battle with inflation, and a drop in funding available to events in Central paired with low entries were reasons for the postponement.

“We have loved hosting you all at The Prospector over the years and realise that it has become a favourite event on many rider’s calendars, so there will be some disappointment out there. 

“You can trust that we will be taking the opportunity to use the time and space to go back to the drawing board and come up with a way to keep the event going in the future.”

James said people who entered The Prospector had been contacted and money refunded.

Both Neil and James agreed in tight economic times running events do better than bike events, as a pair of shoes was all people needed.

The pair both said they were hoping to have new different event offerings once the economic conditions improved.

Read more: New Central events supported by funding

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