Brand associations: Their contribution to the decision to participate in mountain running events

In the last two decades, mountain running sports events have acquired a particular dynamic and strong presence in the field of Greek amateur sports. The purpose of this paper was a) to investigate the associations arising from participation in a small-scale mountain running sports event and b) to investigate the role played by the associations, which originate from an event, in making the decision to repeat the participation to her. One hundred and seventy-four runners who took part in the Artemissio mountain running event participated in the study. The questionnaire they were asked to complete is an adaptation of the Team Association Scale by Gladden & Funk (2002) as it was applied to the field of mountain running events in Greece by Polatidou (2015). The results revealed six association factors: event personality, event staff, escape, identification – socialization, elite athletes, and event history. Associations stemming from the event contributed positively to the prediction of the intention to repeat participation in the event (R2 =.48, F=25.58, p<.000). The factors History of the organization (t=3.88, p<.000, 32% of the variability), Escape (t=3.29, p<.005, 26% of the variability) and Personality of the organization (t=2.17, p< .05, 19% of the variability.) In conclusion, the associations that arise from participating in an event can shape participants' behavior toward it.