Boston Marathon 2021...what are the odds it even happens?

NERunner53 wrote:

Idk what some of you want. I wouldn't vote for an elected official who supports 30k people getting together and traveling from all over the world at this current point in time. This isn't about COVID fear and virtue signaling. Social distance measures and protocols have saved lives and have prevented people from catching the virus. We still don't know the long term effects of the virus on endurance athletes. We can put our selfish pursuits on hold while things stabilize. Find smaller races with local fields and good safety plans.

By September the elderly will have had access to vaccines for almost 9 months, and vaccines will (hopefully) have been widely available to the general public for 3-6 months. We know the vaccines reduce infection dramatically, and reduce severity of illness for the ~5% that still get infected. After the natural summer drop in cases combined with widespread vaccine availability, community covid levels should be extremely low.

That seems more than safe enough for me.

The Unkle wrote:

Alexi Santana wrote:

A month ago it looked promising that we would hit herd immunity around September - however with the new strain of COVID it will likely take longer since a more transmissible virus means a higher % needed to reach herd immunity.

Is it possible they run the race with the requirement that participants are all vaccinated? I think that will become the norm in 2021 for various activities - and it seems to make sense here.

Until the next new strain.

Or until someone with the vaccine gets Covid and dies. Then there will be mass panic and lockdown/masks despite the fact that even with a flu vaccine people can still catch it and potentially die. We will never be 'safe' again.

You won't get an answer wrote:

The Unkle wrote:

Until the next new strain.

Or until someone with the vaccine gets Covid and dies. Then there will be mass panic and lockdown/masks despite the fact that even with a flu vaccine people can still catch it and potentially die. We will never be 'safe' again.

Hopeful that people will understand it's a 90% effective vaccine, meaning 10% are still susceptible. Realistically though you are correct, there will be anecdotal stories on the news of people getting the vaccine and then falling ill, whilst the millions who don't get sick will go unnoticed.

A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.

This year? 100-1.

I would be extremely shocked if Boston happens this year (from what I heard they are targeting October because Labor Day weekend could potentially coincide with college students coming back to school). As other posters have stated that live in the Boston area, I don't think the public in this area would accept the decision to hold the race in October, even if everyone was vaccinated. A lady ripped into to me when I was running a minimum of 30 ft away from her outside (this was not in Boston but in Medford which is like 10 miles north of Boston) because I did not have my gaiter up (I generally will put it up when I cannot socially distance running by people but leave it down otherwise). I can't envision a scenario where all the towns will buy into being able to have Boston in October (at least in it's current mass participation state). Remember also, road races of any size CANNOT begin in Massachusetts until Stage 4 (the "new normal") after vaccines have fully been distributed AND numbers are way down. We were in Stage 3 step 2 I believe before Thanksgiving but since Thanksgiving and Christmas we have been rolled back to a modified Stage 3 Step 1 and the city of Boston is in a modified Stage 2. This means MAX outdoor events are capped at 25 in Boston and 50 in the state. Or maybe it's 10 in Boston and 25 in the state I don't even know for sure. All I do know is CURRENTLY if you take 1 step outside of Massachusetts for one second (besides going to a grocery store, work, or religious service) you are supposed to quarantine until you have a negative test or like 10 days of quarantine at home.

I don't see it happening this fall in the traditional 30,000+ person event. Even if numbers start to go down a lot and vaccinations pick up in the spring/summer, I don't think it's enough time to plan the logistics of it all.

I also don't know how much it affects the planning process, but Boston now has an acting mayor, as Marty Walsh is headed to Washington to be Biden's Labor Secretary. I have to imagine Kim Janey, the acting mayor, will air on the side of caution in terms of potentially hosting a super spreader event.

All that being said, I think April 2022 is a full go.

No to mass participation and spectators. Maybe have 50 elites run 20 times around Boston Common and call it the Boston Marathon, but it will not be the marathon we know and love, not this year anyway.

Brian MF Sell wrote:

I have to imagine Kim Janey, the acting mayor, will err on the side of caution in terms of potentially hosting a super spreader event.

FIFY

What a weird-ass comment.

Alexi Santana wrote:

A month ago it looked promising that we would hit herd immunity around September - however with the new strain of COVID it will likely take longer since a more transmissible virus means a higher % needed to reach herd immunity.

Is it possible they run the race with the requirement that participants are all vaccinated? I think that will become the norm in 2021 for various activities - and it seems to make sense here.

Where is this propaganda about a "new strain" coming from? This is all clickbait. Media companies love the headline because it drives traffic. It's a non story.

mathematics wrote:

Hopeful that people will understand it's a 90% effective vaccine, meaning 10% are still susceptible. Realistically though you are correct, there will be anecdotal stories on the news of people getting the vaccine and then falling ill, whilst the millions who don't get sick will go unnoticed.

A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.

But that 10% (more like 5%) is far less likely to develop severe illness. And with natural summer decrease in cases combined with increasing levels of vaccinated people, there's going to be far less virus floating around to be exposed to, far less likelihood of getting infected if you are exposed, and far less likelihood of developing severe illness if you are infected.

Those three factors are going to make the world a lot safer by summer. Safe enough for me to go back to normal life, that's for sure.

Living in Western Europe.

I received a mail from a local tour operator that I can book a trip to Berlin for the local marathon.

And I'm confident that it will take place.

By summer, all health workers and every 60+ person will be vaccinated. So why wouldn't it take place ?

It can be organized like before, or the ''Covid way'', without crowds and with face masks at the start and the finish, but I'm confident it will go on.

Berlin is Sep 26.

The Unkle wrote:

Next to zero.

Looks like the plan is to drag this lockdown attack on us through the end if 2021

Hey Unkle, where do you live? Have you actually been "locked down" in your life? Unable to leave your home? If you live in the US, then the answer is no. The careful people are not the ones prolonging the crisis; the mask deniers are.

Your rhetoric -- and the refusal to take precautions like wearing a mask and avoiding contact with people -- is what is "dragging out" the COVID crisis. You have do be naive and willfully ignorant to blame some lockdown conspiracy for the problem. Instead, you and others who think like you need to look in the mirror -- the end to the crisis is in your hands.

Snowflakes Melt in Masks wrote:

The Unkle wrote:

Next to zero.

Looks like the plan is to drag this lockdown attack on us through the end if 2021

Hey Unkle, where do you live? Have you actually been "locked down" in your life? Unable to leave your home? If you live in the US, then the answer is no. The careful people are not the ones prolonging the crisis; the mask deniers are.

Your rhetoric -- and the refusal to take precautions like wearing a mask and avoiding contact with people -- is what is "dragging out" the COVID crisis. You have do be naive and willfully ignorant to blame some lockdown conspiracy for the problem. Instead, you and others who think like you need to look in the mirror -- the end to the crisis is in your hands.

Please. MA, one of the most careful, most masked, most taking-this-seriously states for the past 10 months, now has one of the highest per-capita Covid rates in the country. The virus does what it does, and all the non-pharmaceutical human intervention in the world isn't going to stop it. The only thing that was ever make a dent in this is vaccination.

What is the qualifying window for the April 2022 race? Does anyone know yet? Would someone need to have run a qualifying time by September 2021 to be eligible?

Do people think you'll have to run a lot under the qualification times because the race wasn't held last year, or will less people register because of COVID?

Just looking to run Boston sometime in my lifetime and thinking I could run the time by this summer, which would put 2022 as the earliest Boston race date.

My source is analysis from Tomas Pueyo that he shared on his Twitter. For what it's worth, over the course of COVID he has done the best job of predicting what will happen of anyone I have seen - most just say in hindsight that something was predictable or that people should have approached a situation differently. Look back at his articles "Why You Must Act Now" and "The Hammer and the Dance" and you can see his analysis from last spring holds up very well to what actually happened. This is why I put a lot of stock into what he is saying and don't believe he is ever being too dramatic - even when his predictions aren't promising.

virtual fall 2021, maybe an elite, along the charles loop race for elites but no mass participation event

in-person April 2022

case closed

Oh I know it will be safe enough but that doesn't mean it will be presented as being safe enough.