Course Manager – Action Sports

About MARI Group
MARI is a global events and experiences company powering world-defining live experiences. Our portfolio of premium live properties spans sports, art, and entertainment — including the Madrid and Miami Open tennis tournaments, Frieze (a leading voice in contemporary art), and Barrett-Jackson (the premium U.S. collector car auction company). MARI also includes TodayTix Group, the global e-commerce leader for cultural experiences, connecting millions of customers with the best in live entertainment.
MARI is reshaping the live events landscape — building a growing portfolio of category-defining events and brands that set the standard for what's next, across sports, entertainment, art, and lifestyle.
At MARI, you'll work alongside people who are passionate, curious, and driven — people who believe that live experiences have the power to shape culture, and who care about the work, the mission, and each other. We welcome outstanding applicants of all backgrounds and encourage everyone to apply.

About the Role
We are seeking a meticulous, safety-first Course Manager to own the field of play across MARI's Australian running events. You will fulfil the Course Manager role at each event, taking every course from planning and permits through to a safe, compliant, and well-run field of play on event day. Your events include the Nike Melbourne Marathon Festival, the country's largest marathon festival, which draws tens of thousands of runners each October for a course that finishes with a lap of the MCG, and the Great Ocean Road Running Festival, a two-day coastal event each May between Lorne and Apollo Bay — alongside other events in MARI's growing running portfolio.
This role sits at the heart of event operations, where precision, safety, and stakeholder management are everything: agency and council permits, traffic management, course staffing and equipment, and the field-of-play design that positions aid stations, entertainment, and spectator zones. You will also plan ahead, modelling course changes and start and finish scenarios, including the alterations required to work around the Pit building redevelopment over the coming term and other external factors.
This is a full-time role and qualified candidates must be based in Melbourne.

What Success Looks Like:

• Delivering safe, compliant, precisely measured, high-quality courses with zero major safety or traffic incidents, event after event.
• Securing all permits and approvals ahead of time, with course and traffic management plans signed off well before event day.
• Meeting every course deliverable on the agreed timeframes.
• Managing the course cost base to target and meeting MARI's sustainability and landfill-diversion goals.
• Identifying and delivering opportunities to safely grow event capacity year on year.
• Building trusted relationships with councils, government agencies, suppliers, and traffic management partners.

What You'll Own:

• Start Line: You will own the start through finish, take responsibility for the set-up, working closely with the Event Services team so the experience from signing up to the finish line on the day is a great one.
• Course Direction & Field of Play: Fulfil the Course Manager role at each event, accountable for the course end-to-end, and prepare course field-of-play plans covering all event assets, including aid stations, medical, course flow, entertainment, and spectator zones.
• Course signage: Take responsibility for the look and feel of the course, from km markers to aid stations, course barriers and signage on these and working closely with the sponsor servicing team and community team to help our partners execute on the course.
• Permits & Approvals: Secure all event agency permits and attend and present plans to agencies and councils as required. Ensure all permit conditions are attended to, including resident communications and resident support.
• Traffic Management: Source and secure a suitably qualified traffic management company, manage them to prepare traffic management plans, and implement the approved plans. Ensure the consistency of plans from field of play to traffic adhere to cut off times and road re-opening times.
• Tow -Away Plans: Establish and implement course tow away plans across the event
• Course Staff & Equipment: Source, train, and implement course staff as agreed, and source, book, and implement course rental equipment as required.
• Safety, Risk & Duty of Care: Ensure all staff are appropriately trained, licensed, and skilled, with appropriate care and diligence exercised throughout, and contribute to risk and emergency planning.
• Future Course Planning: Support all future event planning and course changes, including scenarios for different start and finish lines and alterations to overcome the impacts of the Pit building redevelopment and any other future city or venue change matters.
• Cost, Sustainability & Capacity: Manage the course cost base, manage waste, meet sustainability and landfill-diversion targets and identify opportunities to manage the scale and delivery on course.
• Industry Representation: Represent MARI with professionalism and integrity across councils, agencies, suppliers, partners, and the broader events community.
• Volunteers: Work with the Community Integration Manager on volunteer placement, training and at event management on the course.

What You Bring:

• Significant experience managing courses or event operations on mass-participation or major events, ideally within running, endurance, or road-based events.
• Strong working knowledge of event permitting, with the confidence to present to councils and government agencies.
• Hands-on experience commissioning and managing traffic management companies and traffic management plans.
• Field-of-play and course design capability — placing aid stations, entertainment, spectator zones, and event infrastructure safely and effectively.
• A safety-first, duty-of-care mindset, with strong WHS, risk, and emergency-management discipline.
• A track record sourcing, training, and leading course staff and contractors.
• Commercial discipline — managing a cost base, meeting sustainability targets, and finding capacity and efficiency gains.
• Strong project management, planning, and problem-solving skills, and a calm, in-control presence under event-day pressure.
• Ability to remain adaptable and solutions-oriented when navigating complex or rapidly changing situations.
• High level of personal integrity, professionalism, and accountability.
• Relevant event, project, WHS, or traffic management qualifications and current licences as required.
• Knowledge of, experience in, or genuine interest in the running industry is desirable.

Benefits
Here are some of the Benefits and Perks offered at MARI Group:

• Superannuation match and access to a bespoke super scheme
• Paid Parental Leave
• Employee Assistance Programme
• Enhanced gyms, wellness and financial wellbeing apps access via Wellhub
• Flexible Paid Time Off

MARI believes in the power of live experiences to unite people — and we know that can only be achieved when we reflect the full diversity of the world around us. As a global company that shapes culture across sports, art, and entertainment, we are committed to fostering an inclusive workplace and to practicing anti-discrimination across race, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, and beyond. We recognise that systemic inequality and discrimination remain challenges across the events and entertainment industry, and we are dedicated to driving meaningful progress — both within our own organisation and across the wider industry we are proud to be part of.