What caused you to DNF a race?

I stupidly decided to run a 5K at altitude while visiting family. I went out way to hard in the first mile and cratered hard. I think it was the effort.

My marathon PR is from altitude thought. (I live at Sea Level.)

Only one DNF in my life. Shakeout run the day before the race I took a fall and broke 2 ribs (didn't know it at the time). Felt some chest soreness during race warmup, but wasn't too bad. Started the race the next day, and very quickly realized something was very wrong and breathing hurt terribly.

Got X-rays a few days later and confirmed broken ribs.

Twice DNF. Pulled a hamstring in a 400m race. In a 800m race, spiked in the Achilles, fell and then stepped on and spiked in my arm. Down, bleeding and in pain.

Chicago Marathon 1991. I went there with the intentions of breaking 2:20 and qualify for the 1992 trails . Everything was going really good. Well trained and ready to go. A group of five was right on pace mile after mile. At about mile 16 the weather conditions started getting bad. The last six miles were going to be facing a head wind. I was starting to feel like I couldn't stay with the five anymore. I thought should I gamble and go for it or just DNF and try again later. We passed the host hotel at mile 20 and it was a light snow. Of the four guys left two went sub 2:20 and two went 2:22. I would have to wait till Vegas in 1992 to get my sub 2:20. That was a fun time with Coach Squires rooting for me and celebrating afterwards. Sad time knowing my grandfather had just been killed by a teenage driver while he was riding his bike in Florida.

After the Chicago Marathon had a party at Excalibur for the elite runners. My roommate was an Olympic silver medalist from New Zealand brought in for the Rogaine 5K. He also DNF .At the party the elite race director ( Catherine maybe ) asked the bartender if we had paid our tab. She gave us a really great package for the race and we thought we were about to get thrown out for our poor performance. Turned out she was sweet on another kiwi in the group so she paid our tab and out we went. She was bringing us to another bar but we ditched her because Massage girl Angela had a beautiful french nanny for me. Yes that Angela that got thrown out of the 1992 Olympic trials for letting Victor Sailor's friends sleep in the Massage room. The nanny didn't speak much English and tells me something like we sleep together but only as friends. I wish I had more friends like that for the night. Kiwi's and I almost missed our flights home.

I once signed up to pace for a small town marathon. I was assigned the 3:30 group because I had run a 3:04 PR 3 months beforehand. Problem was 2 months before I had some runners knee and got very busy at work and just stopped running completely.

I had given no notice so I showed up to the race, got my sign, my pacer shirt and instructions. The directive was if you’re having a bad day for some reason, it happens, throw your sign out and turn your pacer shirt inside out so no one is confused.

I started the race with a group of 12-15 people seeking a 3:30 marathon. My splits were perfect, every split was within 5 seconds of 8:00. My knee started bothering me around 10 miles as I expected it would. We went through the half perfect about 30 second under pace. At mile 14 there was a med tent and some port-o-potties.

I told my group I had to hit the bathroom, just keep on trucking, I ducked in the bathroom snapped my sign I half and turned my shirt inside out, then got a ride back to the start and drove home before anyone had finished.

No DNF’s.

#hobbyjoggerstrong

have never DNF'd - i ain't no beyotch

Marathoners and ultra people think the only thing that shuts the body down is glucose depletion. World class 800m runners have DNF'ed more than once due to cardiovascular drift. I never DNF'ed a track race but I have set 440 yard person best on first lap of one mile race twice which made me ineffective past 550 yards. I have seen high school 200 yard high school free style swimmers DNF a couple of times after setting 100 yard freestyle person best first 100 yard split. I DNF'ed a Marathon once. Tried to race through an injury. Decided at about 10K not worth it.

My only DNF was a half marathon. My fitness was questionable and my glute (which I'd already had issues with) started flaring up around the halfway mark.

I almost dropped out of a 10k a few years before. My seed time was in the back 1/3 of the fast heat at a competitive meet, then the race went out fast. I went through the 5k in last or 2nd to last about 10 secs slower than my 5k PR. Very soon, I'd gotten dropped along with one other guy. When I lost contact with him around 7-8k, I looked at a teammate, shook my head, and started to step off the track. He said "NO, YOU FINISH THIS!" and I did. It was pretty bad, but I'm glad I didn't drop.