Why is the hobbyjogging cohort so full of desperate and angry entitlement to run Boston?! Every single year there is a whining controversy from some too-slow folks about how they should be "able to run Boston", able to "have their results recognized at Boston" "considered just as impressive as people who run Boston" "able to buy the same Tracksmith t-shirt as people who run Boston" like seriously people CHILL
-
102
-
Ok hear me out. If you have a thing named Qualifying time then you need to honor that time and admit everyone that qualified for the race. Otherwise my second best solution to this constant annoyance of cut-off times is to just put everyone who qualifies into a lottery. Still high chances to get in but its random so the ones close to the qualifying time also have a chance.
614 -
Ruxton Towers XC wrote:
.... Maybe they could sell BQ t-shirts for anyone who hits the time cut-off?
...
These exist, apparently:
21 -
11
-
Knobs Sizzler wrote:
…
And therein lies the problem with what Kofuzi is suggesting—people want BQ to mean something to them and to others, but if Boston is perceived as being easy(ier) to get into, it loses its cache (to the people who care about what BQ means in the first place). It's naive to think that the interest in Boston is about running the particular course, about being part of the particular marathon. For probably 99% it's about the perceived cache/"meaning" that running Boston holds.
All of this is silly. …
Of course having a BQ does not confer a greater degree of worth upon a human being. Knowing the difference between “cachet” and “cache,” however …
60 -
Jogger262 wrote:
Jogger262 wrote:
I’ll just say, the male in his late 30s has it the toughest, but it’s still not that hard with the right training.
Six downvotes against the late 30s male being the hardest or not being that hard with the right training?
I didn’t mean to say it’s easy, because it is definitely not. It’s just not unreachable or OTQ hard is what I meant to say. And it’s probably hardest for the 34 year old male. I’ve slowed a decent amount, but not by 20 minutes in the last 12 years (I’m 46). Maybe it will be closer to even when I’m 49, but I’m guessing still easier than 2:54 at age 34.
I'm not sure I agree it's hardest for the male in his 30s. First of all, you underestimate the impact of pregnancy on women. As a mom of three kids, I can tell you that pregnancy was EXTREMELY disruptive to my running. Moms who run Boston while pregnant get lots of attention, but most of us are barely able to run at all during pregnancy, and it's very difficult to train properly while nursing a baby and coming back from childbirth. If you birth two or three kids, it's hard to string together a consistent period of training, which many people need to qualify.
Second, I've been plagued by injuries since getting "old" - and I'm only in my 40s. I'm sure it's even worse for runners in the 50s and 60s and older. In fact, I suspect the hardest age group to qualify for Boston is 80 and over, and the second hardest is 75-79. The vast majority of people's bodies will not hold up to running a marathon at any pace after age 70.
70% of women over 80 have clinical osteoporosis, and of people who meet that clinical definition, 50% have suffered at least one bone fracture. One year mortality at 80-89 for a broken hip is 40%! And old men have plenty of their own problems (including osteoporosis). There's no way you can convince me it's harder to run 2:55 as a 34 year old male than 5:20 as an 85 year old women, or even an 80 year old woman, or 4:50 as an 80 year old man.
165 -
Up the price to cover needed revenues and cut out the charity runners and other wanna-be's (dignitaries and celebrities). I'm sure the charity runners would continue to contribute to these charities without a BM Medal carrot. Keep qualifying times as they are and just limit participation to 30k. Simple
43 -
arunnerinwa wrote:
Jogger262 wrote:
Six downvotes against the late 30s male being the hardest or not being that hard with the right training?
I didn’t mean to say it’s easy, because it is definitely not. It’s just not unreachable or OTQ hard is what I meant to say. And it’s probably hardest for the 34 year old male. I’ve slowed a decent amount, but not by 20 minutes in the last 12 years (I’m 46). Maybe it will be closer to even when I’m 49, but I’m guessing still easier than 2:54 at age 34.
I'm not sure I agree it's hardest for the male in his 30s. First of all, you underestimate the impact of pregnancy on women. As a mom of three kids, I can tell you that pregnancy was EXTREMELY disruptive to my running. Moms who run Boston while pregnant get lots of attention, but most of us are barely able to run at all during pregnancy, and it's very difficult to train properly while nursing a baby and coming back from childbirth. If you birth two or three kids, it's hard to string together a consistent period of training, which many people need to qualify.
Second, I've been plagued by injuries since getting "old" - and I'm only in my 40s. I'm sure it's even worse for runners in the 50s and 60s and older. In fact, I suspect the hardest age group to qualify for Boston is 80 and over, and the second hardest is 75-79. The vast majority of people's bodies will not hold up to running a marathon at any pace after age 70.
70% of women over 80 have clinical osteoporosis, and of people who meet that clinical definition, 50% have suffered at least one bone fracture. One year mortality at 80-89 for a broken hip is 40%! And old men have plenty of their own problems (including osteoporosis). There's no way you can convince me it's harder to run 2:55 as a 34 year old male than 5:20 as an 85 year old women, or even an 80 year old woman, or 4:50 as an 80 year old man.
In fact, the hardest age group is definitely 80+ women. There was ONE finisher in this age group in 2024. ONE. Yes, you can argue lack of interest, but I don't buy it. If 80-year-old women could run marathons, they would.
The one 80+ year old women came nowhere near re-qualifying, so I wonder if she qualified in the first place, or got her entry some other way.
The WORLD RECORD for 85 year old women in the marathon is 5:14, so an 85 year old woman would have to run 6 minutes off the world record to qualify, which is kind of absurd. By contrast, the WR for men is 3:56 for men, so a man would have a comfy 24 minute margin on the WR for qualifying. (/sarcasm: clearly qualifying as an 80+ male is also really hard)
160 -
The elect wrote:
Knobs Sizzler wrote:
…
And therein lies the problem with what Kofuzi is suggesting—people want BQ to mean something to them and to others, but if Boston is perceived as being easy(ier) to get into, it loses its cache (to the people who care about what BQ means in the first place). It's naive to think that the interest in Boston is about running the particular course, about being part of the particular marathon. For probably 99% it's about the perceived cache/"meaning" that running Boston holds.
All of this is silly. …
Of course having a BQ does not confer a greater degree of worth upon a human being. Knowing the difference between “cachet” and “cache,” however …
Lol. Keep pointing out typos on the internet. Amazing work.
210 -
Jogger262 wrote:
Jogger262 wrote:
I’ll just say, the male in his late 30s has it the toughest, but it’s still not that hard with the right training.
Six downvotes against the late 30s male being the hardest or not being that hard with the right training?
I didn’t mean to say it’s easy, because it is definitely not. It’s just not unreachable or OTQ hard is what I meant to say. And it’s probably hardest for the 34 year old male. I’ve slowed a decent amount, but not by 20 minutes in the last 12 years (I’m 46). Maybe it will be closer to even when I’m 49, but I’m guessing still easier than 2:54 at age 34.
I had no problem with what you said, though I think the issue others may be taking is to label the task as challenging but do-able, which is the perspective of a lifelong serious runner, and/or one who was competitively faster as a youth and never lost a significant amount of that natural speed.
Such people take for granted how do-able the task is, whereas for most people who were never competitive in school the task is akin to climbing a cliff with your bare hands without any climber training. It's actually unworkably impossible for most of the world.
To that point, yes being able to BQ is an accomplishment and should be seen as such. But it's not the accomplishment that saving money and paying off a huge debt is. For most being able to BQ is simply unattainable due to their physical limitations.
As someone earlier said, if you have the ability to run fast enough that BQ is not a big deal, don't take your running speed and ability for granted. What you can do is not a given for most people. In fact, most will never be able to run for distance that fast.
50 -
There clearly is a better way to admit Boston entrants.
1) Change the qualifying times to hard times. If you hit the time, you are 100% in period. Doing what they do now is absurd.
That is a no-brainer. The other option would be to get rid of all charity runners but that's not going to happen as it's politically incorrect.
Question, when you run Boston do they differentiated the bibs? Like if you are running, do you know if the person net to you is a charity runner or a qualifier?
1017 -
rojo wrote:
There clearly is a better way to admit Boston entrants.
1) Change the qualifying times to hard times. If you hit the time, you are 100% in period. Doing what they do now is absurd.
That is a no-brainer. The other option would be to get rid of all charity runners but that's not going to happen as it's politically incorrect.
Question, when you run Boston do they differentiated the bibs? Like if you are running, do you know if the person net to you is a charity runner or a qualifier?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought bibs are assigned numerically by time. So those next to me ran comparable qualifying times. It's my understanding charity are in the last wave, right?
80 -
For those who don't click links, the post reads: "We should celebrate the pursuit and achievement of things that are valuable to us. For me, qualifying for the Boston Marathon (and beating the BAA's cutoff) was a 4-year quest of dedication and sacrifice. And I wouldn't want it any other way-because without the hard work, running Boston wouldn't mean everything it does."
Boston satirist and likely Tracksmith sponsored athlete Serious Runner posted a differing view than Kofuzi on social.
91 -
rojo wrote:
There clearly is a better way to admit Boston entrants.
1) Change the qualifying times to hard times. If you hit the time, you are 100% in period. Doing what they do now is absurd.
That is a no-brainer. The other option would be to get rid of all charity runners but that's not going to happen as it's politically incorrect.
Question, when you run Boston do they differentiated the bibs? Like if you are running, do you know if the person net to you is a charity runner or a qualifier?
You never disappoint with your terrible writing.
160 -
WordofKo wrote:
rojo wrote:
There clearly is a better way to admit Boston entrants.
1) Change the qualifying times to hard times. If you hit the time, you are 100% in period. Doing what they do now is absurd.
That is a no-brainer. The other option would be to get rid of all charity runners but that's not going to happen as it's politically incorrect.
Question, when you run Boston do they differentiated the bibs? Like if you are running, do you know if the person net to you is a charity runner or a qualifier?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought bibs are assigned numerically by time. So those next to me ran comparable qualifying times. It's my understanding charity are in the last wave, right?
Yeah: "All runners are numbered according to qualifying times, facilitating a start and pace comparable to others with similar qualifying times. Runners should line up in the wave and corral they have been assigned."
As for charity, I'm not sure. Others here might be more familiar.
10 -
rojo wrote:
There clearly is a better way to admit Boston entrants.
1) Change the qualifying times to hard times. If you hit the time, you are 100% in period. Doing what they do now is absurd.
That is a no-brainer. The other option would be to get rid of all charity runners but that's not going to happen as it's politically incorrect.
Question, when you run Boston do they differentiated the bibs? Like if you are running, do you know if the person net to you is a charity runner or a qualifier?
I think the few people who complain about not being able to get in are far outweighed by the people who are happy to be able to say "I qualified for Boston", regardless of ever intending to run Boston. If you lower the standards too much you are going to cut out thousands of people who get to brag about their "BQ".
The current system isn't even a little complicated. (1) Here is the time you need to run in order to be able to throw your hat in the ring; (2) The fastest people from the group (that show an actual interest in running Boston) will get to run Boston. Seems not only simple but fair.
A person thinking that if you run a certain time they should be guaranteed an entry is just so childish. But downhill races, but charity bibs, but they've run it before and this is my first time.... do you hear yourselves? It's embarrassing. Last year the cut off was 5:30, if you didn't think you'd need to be a lot faster than that this year that's on you. Oh and guess what - not everyone who wants to do something is able to do that thing. That's life. Grow up.
135 -
WordofKo wrote:
For those who don't click links, the post reads: "We should celebrate the pursuit and achievement of things that are valuable to us. For me, qualifying for the Boston Marathon (and beating the BAA's cutoff) was a 4-year quest of dedication and sacrifice. And I wouldn't want it any other way-because without the hard work, running Boston wouldn't mean everything it does."
Boston satirist and likely Tracksmith sponsored athlete Serious Runner posted a differing view than Kofuzi on social.
Couldn't agree more. For some runners qualifying for Boston is a cakewalk; and for some its a couple of years in the making.
21 -
rojo wrote:
There clearly is a better way to admit Boston entrants.
1) Change the qualifying times to hard times. If you hit the time, you are 100% in period. Doing what they do now is absurd.
That is a no-brainer. The other option would be to get rid of all charity runners but that's not going to happen as it's politically incorrect.
Question, when you run Boston do they differentiated the bibs? Like if you are running, do you know if the person net to you is a charity runner or a qualifier?
Seriously, are you retarded? I knew you grew up with a silver spoon in your mouth, isolated from us plebeians, but do you really not see the value of charities?
Almost $72,000,000 was raised earlier this year! Do you not think this is a good thing?
Keep thinking trickle down economics will help the entire country the same way your trust fund trickled down from your parents to you.
1110 -
ROJO POST OF THE DAY!
As a TON great post by our intellectual and well respected great leader here: https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=13038559&page=2#post-51
102 -
The only charity that should be allowed is inheritance.
121
What People Are Talking About On LetsRun
No top threads at the moment. Check back soon.