Your race seems to cross the worlds of elite races where swag/accommodations are top notch, and the grass roots feel of trail and ultra races, where cost is kept low and volunteerism heavy.
I think you nailed it. Many on the PPM Board are also trying to get the best of both worlds, to find that balance between running a top notch race while trying to keep costs low (hard to believe at $150, but when you see the line of 15 passenger vans down Manitou ave at 4:30am on Saturday morning you know where a lot of that money is going.)
We keep making improvements (how many other races have timing locations at 12,000ft?), tweaking things, and soliciting feedback to make sure that we are not overlooking some big issues. Some things, like the swag, puts us in a bit of a bind in that what one person loves another will hate. But there have been clear changes over the past few years, both for the elite runners (prize money bounties for CR's) and middle of the pack runner (the constant tweaks to actually slow down registration to avoid turning it into a de facto lottery, or splits at noname, barr camp, and a-frame).
I hope that this doesn't create at atmosphere where doublers are seen as bad citizens, and that we continue to be allowed the option.
That would be the goal with the new policy; to make folks think about it but otherwise still permit them to do so. After all, I fully intend to double this year too (baring any injuries that would knock me out of the PPM). What started as a misunderstanding between friends took on a life of its own, and it was time to try and slow it down a bit. Of course, I think if they held the PPM on Saturday and the PPM on Sunday, the number of doublers would drop like a rock. :-)
--john