EarthLink Business hosts the B.A.A.’s website in its secure Marlborough data center, as well as provides a 20MB Private network for voice, MPLS and data.

1. CASE STUDY Boston Athletic Association
Boston Marathon Keeps Pace with RecordSetting Web Traffic
“
“
Boston Athletic Association Partners with EarthLink for Uptime,
Peace of Mind Before, During Race Day
EarthLink is a great partner to have our back with web traffic on race
day. When we get 10 million site visits in the span of a day, we have great
peace of mind knowing that we have ample data storage and servers in
our arsenal. We know we can provide a good web experience to the many
people who may only visit us a few minutes each year
– T.K. Skenderian
Marketing and Sponsorship Manager, Boston Athletic Association
Leading up to the world’s most
famous marathon and on race day,
the Boston Athletic Association
(B.A.A) needs a reliable, capable
IT infrastructure to support the
massive planning effort and
hundreds of thousands of website
visitors who track runners in near
real time.
Solution
EarthLink Business hosts the
B.A.A.’s website in its secure
Marlborough data center, as
well as provides a 20MB Private
network for voice, MPLS and data.
Results
•
Uptime —B.A.A. has the
reliable, rock-solid site hosting
to support one million visitors
and 12 million page views – or
more – on race day.
•
Faster Performance —
MPLS boosts application
performance and enables
them to prioritize voice
traffic, improving employee
productivity by ensuring
staff can communicate
efficiently leading up to
and during races.
Business Challenges
Every April, runners from every state and 90 countries converge in Boston to
run the world’s most prestigious marathon – the only one in the world where
runners must qualify to participate. To get here, they’ve spent months, if not years,
preparing, counting the miles, their split times, their calories and their heart rates.
For the race organizers, just as much goes into planning the massive event each
year. It takes major coordination for Boston Athletic Association (B.A.A.), the cities
along the course, law enforcement, vendors and other agencies to pull off
a smooth race.
While some things have remained the same since the Boston Marathon was
first run in 1897, the technology required to make it all happen has changed
dramatically. These days, runners sign up online, and are tracked with timing
chips. On race day, the media and runners’ friends and family members can
follow their progress on the B.A.A. website, where they can also watch a
leaderboard and Twitter stream. For one of the world’s most data-driven
sporting events, uptime is not optional.
“With thousands of runners and hundreds of thousands of spectators, access
to data is critical to allowing us to track all of our runners and manage all of the
information flow required to support this event,” said T.K. Skenderian, marketing
and sponsorship manager, Boston Athletic Association. “It’s not like a basketball
game, where you can see everything. People are dependent on our site to know
when a loved one will run by.”
The Solution
As the Boston Marathon’s longtime, official data center provider, EarthLink
provides the reliable, secure infrastructure that enables the B.A.A. to manage this
iconic event seamlessly online. EarthLink Business hosts the B.A.A.’s website,
where thousands of runners register for the marathon, as well as a 5K, 10K and
half marathon each year.
The B.A.A’s infrastructure is housed in EarthLink’s state-of-the-art, fully
redundant SSAE 16 compliant data center in nearby Marlborough with a 99.999%
uptime guarantee. There, the runners’ stats and registration information are
stored securely in the cloud, and event organizers, runners, spectators and
worldwide media view it in near real time on the company’s website.
getinfo@earthlinkbusiness.com | www.earthlinkbusiness.com
Boston Athletic Association Case Study 2013
© 2013 EarthLink, Inc. Trademarks are property of their respective owners. All rights reserved. 1074-07913
Challenges

2. CASE STUDY Boston Athletic Association
Why B.A.A. Selected
EarthLink Business
With one million site visitors and
12 million page views on Boston
Marathon race day, the Boston
Athletic Association must ensure
that its site remains accessible
at all times. EarthLink’s data
center in nearby Marlborough
provides the reliable, secure
infrastructure to handle traffic
spikes, while a 20MB MPLS
network keeps daily operations
moving quickly.
“It’s a huge undertaking each
“Thanks to EarthLink, our event organizers and 26,895 participating runners know
they have safe and convenient access to a high-performance website that has the
information they need both before and on race day,” Skenderian said.
The B.A.A. staff also rely on EarthLink Business for business-critical voice
and data networking for its corporate offices in Boston and Hopkinton. The
organization was initially on a T1 point-to-point network between offices.
However, with 100-year-old copper wiring in Boston’s Back Bay, the B.A.A.
experienced weather-related reliability issues.
“Our network has to operate seamlessly,” Skenderian said. “We need it for
everything we do.”
Recently, the organization upgraded to fiber to address their infrastructure issues.
The EarthLink team worked with the B.A.A. to design the network for optimal
performance. The network is configured with 20M internet at both locations and
a 2M MPLS connection, with QoS, between offices with voice traffic form both
offices going through Boston. This provides, the B.A.A. improved performance,
minimizing delay and jitter, and eliminating the additional bandwidth demands
placed on the host in order to support all network traffic.
year to put on New England’s
biggest sporting event.
EarthLink provides ample
With the upgraded network, the organization has the reliable backbone it needs
for day-to-day operations and critical race-day communications.
and reliable data storage and
of massive traffic that race day
brings,” Skenderian said.
“It’s nice to know that in EarthLink we have a partner right in this area,” Skenderian
said. “All of our communications run as seamlessly as turning on the lights, and
that’s why we continue to partner with them.”
Positioned for the Future
With its website hosted in EarthLink’s data center, the B.A.A. has the bandwidth it
needs for traffic surges leading up to and during races. Last year, more than one
million people tracked runners online on the day of the marathon, racking
up 12 million page views.
“EarthLink is a great partner to have our back with web traffic on race day,”
Skenderian said. “The peace of mind is huge that we have ample data storage
and ample servers in our arsenal. If we get 100 million site visits, we can provide
a good experience to people who may only visit us a couple of minutes a year.”
The B.A.A. staff has seen performance improve with the move to an MPLS
network. The organization no longer suffers from outages and can send large
files without issue. The strength of its infrastructure means staff can focus on
the marathon, not the IT infrastructure, keeping planning and event coordination
on track.
“Working with EarthLink is a pleasure, and it’s a terrific partnership,” Skenderian
said. “My team and I are confident that, when the world is looking at us, we are
confident that we can deliver a good web experience.”
getinfo@earthlinkbusiness.com | www.earthlinkbusiness.com
Boston Athletic Association Case Study 2013
© 2013 EarthLink, Inc. Trademarks are property of their respective owners. All rights reserved. 1074-07913
servers to handle the onslaught