Organisers of the biggest ever sporting event to come to Pembrokeshire have hit back at criticism this week.

County Councillor Michael Williams, who represents the Tenby North ward on Pembrokeshire County Council, fired a broadside at one of the race director's of next Sunday's Ironman Wales, claiming there has been a lack of consultation with members of the public and local businesses over road closures and restrictions.

In an email sent to Matthew Evans this week, Clr. Williams says: "Many people are extremely concerned about the restrictions being placed upon them and deserve far better consultation.

"Even this late, I would urge you to engage more effectively with the community. The event will have enormous economic benefits for the area, but many are going to be seriously inconvenienced and deserve better."

Detailed response

When contacted by the Observer, Mr. Evans said: "Clr. Williams has had a detailed response from us and been invited numerous times to meet and discuss the event, but has never taken up the offer.

"Since the public meeting in Tenby, we have run six-page information adverts in the Tenby Observer per week, five this week and a bumper section next week. We also have four pages in the Western Telegraph.

"Pembrokeshire County Council have detailed information on their site, as we do on the Ironman Wales site. "

Mr. Evans continued: "Local businesses that are part of Pembrokeshire tourism have been invited to meetings for the past 18 months and they were also invited to the public meetings, two of which have been held in Tenby.

"Every house and business will have a flyer delivered by Royal Mail in race week to double check they are aware of the race and make provisions should they want to. Door drops have been done once already.

"I and the team visited businesses on the bike course personally with the public meeting documents. We spoke to those people that were there; if they were out we left the letter with contact details.

"Radio Pembrokeshire are running 10 commercials per day and also editorial on the race and have also placed information on their site.

"Yellow signs are up on all roads communicating times and direction of closure, with contact details for further information. Also the De Valence has large detailed maps.

"Communication has been very thorough for the past few weeks, but also it is a two-way thing.

"We do have to rely on people looking at the papers, tuning into the local radio or visiting the relevant websites to find out information. To have individual conversations with every resident and business on a face-to-face level is almost impossible, and Clr. Williams knows that.

"It would be great to have Clr. Williams with the team and helping to develop this opportunity for Pembrokeshire, as other councillors have for their areas.

"These councillors have been present in meetings with the local council, teamed up and created a day for the community. Maybe an opportunity to try and raise money for the skate park here in Tenby?

"Narberth already has banners flying over their streets welcoming athletes, Lydstep will have bouncy castles, as will Jameston, Angle, Pembroke, Lamphey, Carew, Narberth and Wisemans Bridge. Carew is having battle re-enactments and a street party. Wisemans Bridge has a family fun day, while Saundersfoot met recently to put their day together.

Host town

"As a host town, it would be fantastic to see Clr. Williams embrace the event and raise money for local funds; it would certainly seem a missed opportunity to ignore it.

"It is a great shame he has closed the museum for the day as there is access and it would surely be one of the main tourist attractions in the town on that day, especially as the run will not pass there until 1.30 pm approximately, but that is up to them.

"If Clr. Williams does have a communication platform that we have not yet utilised and feel it would benefit the local community, I have asked him to let me know, but he has never replied."

Mr. Evans added: "Yes, I would love to have had the course signed off six months ago and been able to sit down and engage in deep communication, but this is the first year and it has taken a great deal of time with all concerned to develop the race course.

"The police and local authority have had to do a huge amount of work with ourselves and they have been fantastic in attitude and detailed in their approach.

"Once sign-off was given and only then, we were able to come to the communities and deliver accurate information, in the forms we have above. But this does take time to do properly. We are building a race to take on the best events in the world, we have worldwide TV coverage and a balance has to be made between community, athletes and how we depict Pembrokeshire to the rest of the world.

"So in an ideal world, yes, I too would have liked more time, but when you have the facts, it is slightly different."

Huge opportunity for Pembs.

Mr. Evans concluded: "This is a huge opportunity for Pembrokeshire, an opportunity that any other area of Wales would give a great deal to have, especially out of season.

"You cannot help but notice the amount of cyclists on the roads for the past 12 months - people travelling down to train on the course, stay locally and generate much-needed income for the area.

"Ironman Wales is bringing almost 1,500 athletes from 43 countries and thousands of more supporters.

"I personally met with three people from Japan and two from Germany who have been here since last Wednesday. I know I can be passionate, maybe over-passionate about Pembrokeshire, but I have always believed we can deliver a world class product and this is evidence of that.

"We need those locally with the passion, drive and enthusiasm to make the area the best it can be, because there will always be those that simply feed off complaining about everything and we end up with an empty town.

"One of our biggest exports here is talent, youngsters moving away due to lack of opportunities. Well hopefully this can be the start of a new way; it's not going to be easy, but the rewards will be incredible if we do it right.

"This race course will develop over the next few years and in year two we will have 12 months for dialogue on a much more intimate level, to improve the course and athlete's experience every year."