The hardest problem for new mayoral candidates isn’t policy—it’s being known. Challenging an incumbent like Mayor Mark Sutcliffe, with built-in name recognition and a donor base already warmed up, means the usual tools don’t move the needle. Ads help. Endorsements help. But what actually evens a brutally uneven playing field is a ferocious ground game. Look at New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani: polling at 1 per cent in early 2025, virtually unknown, yet able to knock off former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo by sheer force of door-knockers and phone calls. Tens of thousands of volunteers. Millions of voter contacts. That’s not vibes—that’s math. If Alex Lawson or Neil Saravanamuttoo or Councilor Jeff Leiper want an upset in Ottawa this October, they’ll need a volunteer operation on a scale this city has never seen. A thousand supporters won’t do it. They will each need multiples of this number, fanning out in 24 wards. Their volunteers should be tripping over each other by June. Beating Mark Sutcliffe won’t happen on Instagram or in Ottawa Citizen op-eds or in candidate debates. It happens at the door. Without a massive volunteer machine, this race ends early. No machine, no moment, no upset.