They announced the chang back in November.
No, they made a post or 2.
A post in not an announcement.
Posts are a conversation amongst a group.
An announcement is when you grab everyone attention and make sure everyone hears you.
@everyone is an announcement.
Highlight posts are an announcement.
Inviting the group to the event page is an announcement.
Pulling the e-mails from the previous rider registrations and doing an e-blast is an announcement.
Instead of deleting the Jan dates, it could have been edited, with BIG IT'S BEEN MOVED / CANCELED, ADJUST YOUR PLANS!
The top search for Daytona Freeride 2025 shows Jan dates because Google has the original deleted post indexed.
There's not even a post made here on X-h2o.com, which is a major part of how the event grew before Facebook. I guarantee you would have stickied the post front and center if they had asked.
It's nice that the change was posted in November.
I booked my hotel and had all my plans finalized in October.
The current event group was created Nov 2, so people couldn't have been apart of it prior to the potential change.
I checked in early November, I saw the post about the change in April. That post did not say it was about 2025. I thought since dates for 2025 were posted, that was a 2026 change. I also saw the follow up that April went over poorly and they were figuring out options. I thought those options were for 2026.
I don't use Facebook routinely. I have to go looking for information when it is not announced / pushed to notifications.
My Highlights notifications are on for the Daytona group. That feature wasn't used to announce a change. It should have been.
I only found out because I went to find out how to pay my rider fees. Even then, it was clear as mud, with no clear statement that the previously announced dates were canceled.
If you look at the group page history, you will see numerous posts in Nov and Dec of people clearly expressing they are confused.
The About page for the freeride still has 2023 dates as of last week.
It's okay to post the event dates because people are looking for them. It is necessary to announce a change to the event dates, because why would people be looking for it?
The event hosts have the greatest amount of support I can offer, I greatly appreciate all they have done over the years, but they posted dates and did an inadequate job notifying people of the change. I'm sorry, but that is not really up for debate. It's simply what happened. It's okay. People make mistakes. I am not mad. I understand the bullpoop the hosts have to deal with for permits, access, hotels, etc, etc. All is forgiven. But when people are unaware of the change, that is 100% on the event hosts, and telling people that it was 'announced' is not entirely accurate, and it's definitely not taking accountability.
