Richmond Marathon or NYC Marathon?

VDOT for 1:05:00 21.0975km: 74.2

Equivalent race times based on VDOT:

Marathon: 02:16:06

Half marathon: 01:04:57

15K: 00:45:12

10K: 00:29:29

5K: 00:14:11

3Mi: 00:13:39

2Mi: 00:08:48

3200m: 00:08:45

3K: 00:08:09

1Mi: 00:04:07

1600m: 00:04:05

1500m: 00:03:49

I am a bot. Info: habs.sdf.org/trackbot

Smoove wrote:

Daniels VDOT calculator agrees with him. Sound like a job for trackbot!

It's a good thing that races are run on calculators. I now have a lot of new PRs!!!!!!

Calculators are imperfect, but they are our best measuring tool.

You're the one who challenged whether they are equivalents, so I'm not sure why you're objecting to the best tool out there to make that determination.

In any event, I think it's awfully hard to dispute 1:05 is not at least the equivalent of the 1980 standard.

So the Marathon WR is 2:02:24? VDOT says it is.

Smoove wrote:

Calculators are imperfect, but they are our best measuring tool.

I'd say the best measuring tool is a race clock :)

It's off by about a second and a half per mile. I'm happy to apply that margin of error and a bit mor to the 1:05 conversion and then compare it to the 1980 qualifying standard.

Sure, race clocks are great. But they don't work for the purpose at hand. Why run the full and beat your body up when you can qualify with less stress on your body by running he half? That's the decision athletes face these days, so they elect to run the half. If we had a different system, we'd have better correlation between data sets; but to simply take the 1:05 qualifiers out of he equation isn't a reasonable approach.

In any event, you seemed to take issue with the equivalency, but haven't offered a better way of determining if they are equivalents, and now seem to be shifting your argument to something along the lines that you really need to look at marathon times only (I prefer the race clock).

Better Get Google wrote:

So the Marathon WR is 2:02:24? VDOT says it is.

You are missing the point but have provided an excellent example of how good VDOT is for comparing times at different distances. Thanks!

Adding the 1:05 qualifiers and saying they have run under 2:19 isn't a reasonable approach either.

Throw out the qualifiers and look at the actual trials. In 2016 there were 200+ qualifiers, 166 started, 108 finished, 18 under 2:20. Don't give me BS about the weather. There were a bunch of guys who ran the 1:05 time who were incapable of running a fast marathon. Thank God there was Rupp.

Angryjohnny wrote:

Better Get Google wrote:

So the Marathon WR is 2:02:24? VDOT says it is.

You are missing the point but have provided an excellent example of how good VDOT is for comparing times at different distances. Thanks!

You are conflating equivalency with prediction.

Throwing out the half qualifiers including the trials winner and silver medalist Galen Rupp is not a reasonable approach.

Smoove wrote:

Sure, race clocks are great. But they don't work for the purpose at hand.

No one has ever won a race by an equivalency calculator. Just sayin'.

We've got a group that ran certain times and we have a group that should be able to run a certain time. Proof is in the pudding, not the calculator.

See you on the roads!! (or, perhaps in your case, in the computer).

You still have not offered a real solution to try to figure out how to deal with the issue.

And ignore the weather? Conditions were similar to the temps in Boston in 1982, which created an entire chapter in the book of marathoning lore.

Did some guys run a 1:05 early in the qualifying cycle and then come in out of shape and crap the bed in bad conditions? Absolutely. But I suspect that was in part due to the simple fact that they hadn't invested a full marathon in qualifying so going for the experience and ceapping the bed want a big deal. But do you really, honestly believe that the vast majority (90%+) of those 1:05 guys couldn't have run 2:19 during the qualifying period? Because that's the real issue here. They qualified based on the existing standards and those standards drove how folks elected to qualify.

Nice sound bite, but low on substance.

And I'm happy to put my performances up against anyone's. I won't win all of the time, but I've spent enough time on the roads to know there are only a couple of dozen guys in my cohort doing what I've been doing over the last few years. You may be one of them, but you'd be one of a very few.

So I'll take my masters titles at the 5k, 10k, 15k, 10 Miler, Half Marathon and Marathon (a world major) distances and keep in writing logical reasonable posts too.

Oh, and they all line up pretty nicely on the VDOT scale, by the way.

Fixed it

Angryjohnny wrote:

Throwing out the half qualifiers including the trials winner and bronze medalist Galen Rupp is not a reasonable approach.

I'll settle this. You both are wrong. Neither side can win this argument. Can we now get it off the first page?

I will say that arguing that a gaggle of 1:05 half marathoners could have run a 2:19 but didn't and then saying that those same 1:05 guys would have run sub220 if nit for the weather but didn't is a lot of shoulda coulda wouldas for me.

Better Get Google wrote:

Throw out the qualifiers and look at the actual trials.

This would work if the trials were always run on the same course under the same conditions, but they are not. Because of the significant impact race day temperature, humidity, and course profile can have on marathon performance, comparing the actual results in just two races is not a reliable way to compare the talent of one generation to another. Comparing the pool of qualifiers tends to normalize these effects since you are pulling runners from more races, and since presumably borderline qualifiers in both generations would have sought out races with favorable conditions.

I don't fully agree with you on this, but it is a generally fair point. I allowed myself to get sucked in by the trolling. My bad.

Smoove wrote:

Nice sound bite, but low on substance.

And I'm happy to put my performances up against anyone's. I won't win all of the time, but I've spent enough time on the roads to know there are only a couple of dozen guys in my cohort doing what I've been doing over the last few years. You may be one of them, but you'd be one of a very few.

So I'll take my masters titles at the 5k, 10k, 15k, 10 Miler, Half Marathon and Marathon (a world major) distances and keep in writing logical reasonable posts too.

Oh, and they all line up pretty nicely on the VDOT scale, by the way.

Total douche move.

When you perceive yourself losing an argument, throw out the "I'm faster than you" comment.

Douchey.

Definitely a douche move, but I wasn't losing the argument. It was in response to the implication that I'm a keyboard hero. Still, pretty weak on my part I admit. I got sucked into the trolling.