Sydney marathon becomes world's 7th "major"

Abbot is just a sponsor. They make their money selling pharmaceuticals. Sponsoring marathons is a marketing expense for them.

Congratulations to long time race director Wayne Larden (affectionately known as Lard Arse) himself a former accomplished distance runner.

This event has no trouble attracting runners in Australia and from Asia, let's face it a weekend or longer stay in Sydney and the general area has got to leave places like Chicago, Boston, New York, etc for dead.

Exactly this, if they want a fast time course it’s Chicago, if not pick Boston or New York. The US does not need three

what are the qualifications to be considered a "major"?

assuming a certain level of prize money has to be distributed, it seems like a good thing for the sport to have more rather than less majors

i dream of a world where there are 100 majors each with a purse exceeding over $1M and it leads to the creation of a super duper major that has a purse exceeding $50M or something ridiculous like that

Valencia, Rotterdam and Amsterdam marathon are delivering fast times year after year. People who wants to run fast times are going there.

Abbott is headquartered in Chicago, USA. As the major sponsor, it makes sense that three of the majors would be in the USA. Chicago being the fastest, Boston with the most tradition and NYC with the largest (maybe London is larger now).

I would like to know what is the criteria and 'entry fee' to be a major. I thought some requirements are certain size of fields, some type of fairness getting in and gender equality, a specific amount of prize money. Probably others.

Sydney will get all those that have the six and now want the 'new and improved' 7th medal and wheel (or whatever it is called). I think it will eventually be turned into a belt that looks like one of those boxing championship belts.

I think it is a good thing they are adding though. As being in the southern hemisphere, it fills a dead-space in the marathon calendar.

I disagree with you. Australia is not close to Asia. Flights to Sydney from Seoul or Tokyo are 10 hours, not cheap, and Australia is not a popular destination for Asians to visit. Sydney is a fantastic marathon for Australians so congrats to them but not ideal for most of the world.

This just popped into my head. To make these races more meaningful, it'd be cool if they added total WMM points on a two year rolling tally instead of the one year tally. And once per year there is a rotating version of the race that is at an elevated level with all of the top 10 people in the rankings, and to get them there each WMM race has to contribute to boost the prize money. They would all get their turn to host that elevated version of the race every several years. Right now it's just based off the races in that year, and no one really does more than two of them, and they're split up amongst a few fall races and a few spring races, so they don't all race each other at any point.

They deliver fast times because they are fast courses. Tola was Olympic champ, his 2:04 course record at New York last year proved he was possibly the best in the world even though on paper it was slower than a bunch of people from those fast courses. You shouldn't have to have a pancake course to be a WMM.

And really, people are going to those fast courses to get a fast time, because the WMM races don't accept any east africans unless they have a top PR. A 2:08 Kenyan isn't going to be accepted into the New York marathon unless they have something like a 58 flat half marathon to make up for it. So they go to a fast course to get a 2:05 PR so they can get into the WMM races. Even Kiptum had to jump through those hoops, running 2:01 at Valencia and then getting access to the WMM races. Kipchoge as well, debuting in Hamburg instead of a WMM.

I bet Sydney is a real nice place...... if you have lots of money.

One could say all these "Six Star Finishers" go home DEVASTATED!!!!!!

Then again, they'll just pony up the money to go to Australia and run the marathon so they get both a Sydney Marathon finisher medal and a 7th star medal.

They are like little kids with their mentality. "Everyone! Look at me! Look at me! I'm so great, I did all the world marathon majors. I did great, right? RIGHT? Please tell me I did great"

Asians flock to Australia for all types of tourism.

Gold Coast marathon is also very popular with loads of runners from Asia.

Ideally there would be a major on every populated continent.

Having run both, Way better atmosphere in Valencia and its not even close

Didn’t the prize $ for WMM get slashed from 500k -> 250k -> 50k for winners too? I think coming in 5th gets you something like a measly 5k.

I’d love to see a competitor series that dishes out a lot of $ like Grand Slam Track. Given WMM only started in 2006 it’s not the craziest idea.

Getting a six star medal is not an athletic accomplishment, it's a logistal and financial accomplishment.

I may need to be corrected but only top 5 get prize money?

The 6 Star Abbott Medals passed out are immediately obsolete pieces of garbage. I will flaunt my 7 star medal in your face.

They're historical artifacts now

They’re getting their moneys worth anyways being out on each course for 6-7 hours 🫠