" It truly pains me not to be able to give her this opportunity"
And they have to go out of their way to show they're in charge, so they can be twats about it.
The best outcome for USATF would be the disbanding of the organization and the dispersal of its officers unarmed into various war zones in the Middle East.
Compact Bus Dealership Special wrote:
" It truly pains me not to be able to give her this opportunity"
And they have to go out of their way to show they're in charge, so they can be twats about it.
The best outcome for USATF would be the disbanding of the organization and the dispersal of its officers unarmed into various war zones in the Middle East.
I would say the best way for USATF is to not do the OTC and go by a ranking system. Let’s face it, US marathon runners are mediocre. We had a fluke bronze medal in 2016 under a questionable runner with a questionable coach. Toss the darn race.
colorunner123 wrote:
http://citiusmag.com/erin-gregoire-2020-us-olympic-marathon-trials-appeal/This is pretty ridiculous. The woman's name is Erin Gregoire. She ran 2:42:55 at the Chevron Houston Marathon on Jan. 19. That was her chip time. But she was forced to run from Corral B, so her gun time was only 2:54:54. Apparently, she won't be allowed to run the trials. Here's the statement from the USATF:
“Erin’s differential for the gun time is too much of a gap for us to overcome. It truly pains me not to be able to give her this opportunity but we can not deviate from our selection procedures by that much. All of the appeals that have been granted were under a 10 second differential from the 2:45:00 gun time...”
Knowing she was going to have a big differential from the start, why would her and coach risk it and have her race there anyway? Not that smart to assume they could rely on an appeal.
I'm Elite! wrote:
username0 wrote:
Houston allows 10k times of sub 52 min or thereabouts to get into A corral.
What? Are you telling me I'm considered elite? 10k in sub 52min should be easy for anyone not fat.
You have to listen to their Haku Support service bots. I can totally see (based on what happened to me as a male hobbyjogger) how a sub elite female who hadn’t raced in awhile could have issue digging up record since they won’t even take a 17min local 5k as proof of 52min 10k or sub 4hr marathon ability. 10K is not exactly an easily found race distance on the weekend calendar esp when you’re looking for something to hop into last minute, and most serious runners don’t usually have time last minute to go find and enter the local city’s Rock NRoll series 10k/ Half Marathon / Marathon for a dance along the course, stay at hotel 3 day weekend festival
Trollminator wrote:
...
Knowing she was going to have a big differential from the start, why would her and coach risk it and have her race there anyway? Not that smart to assume they could rely on an appeal.
There's no differential. Wave #2 at Boston has separate gun times. They don't list as 20 minutes differential. Separate race.
I'm with Wejo on this. She should get in on appeal.
Then don't wait until the last minute. This is running's equivalent of a weed-out section college course. If you're going to have a real standard then attrition will be a fact to cope with. Thank you for playing, please feel free to try again next time.
What?
It is actually hard to run fast from Corral B - so her time worth more than 2:42:00.
I know this from my personal experience, as I am the official 3:00 pacer starting in Corral B at this year's Houston marathon (1/19/2020).
If she does not get accepted, I truly feel sorry for her.
FengYun wrote:
What?
It is actually hard to run fast from Corral B - so her time worth more than 2:42:00.
I know this from my personal experience, as I am the official 3:00 pacer starting in Corral B at this year's Houston marathon (1/19/2020).
If she does not get accepted, I truly feel sorry for her.
I agree. holding 6:10s (solo?)and passing lots of 6:40s-8:00 pace runners.
FengYun wrote:
What?
It is actually hard to run fast from Corral B - so her time worth more than 2:42:00.
I know this from my personal experience, as I am the official 3:00 pacer starting in Corral B at this year's Houston marathon (1/19/2020).
If she does not get accepted, I truly feel sorry for her.
If true, you should try and contact her to corroborate her account of how she was disadvantaged by starting there. I am not sure what evidence is accepted, but it certainly can't hurt. I think the fact that Boston has a precedent of considering the 2nd wave a different race, this should be the backbone of her argument. As someone pointed out, the 2nd wave runners are going from the gun time from the first wave. If the Males started later and didn't have this time tacked on, then any OTQ's coming from males from that 2nd wave should be invalid based on the logic of the USATF. As other have noted, they seem to completely f**k up publicly every time they have a chance to build any type of good will or show they are for the athletes. Complete trash if she doesn't get it.
Snowflake Elite wrote:
Then don't wait until the last minute. This is running's equivalent of a weed-out section college course. If you're going to have a real standard then attrition will be a fact to cope with. Thank you for playing, please feel free to try again next time.
15-20 years ago, long-time runners have told me, when the marathon clock hit 4 hours, race officials were getting ready to take timing equipment down. Now 4 hours is the median finishing time in the US, and you need sub4hr proof via 10k/half/marathon only (no exceptions, unless you're elite) to get into the A corral so as not to have to start 13mins later with 4hr+ marathoners. It's not the way I would do things, but the rules are the rules. Haku Support reminds me of my high school administrator
MikeMach1977 wrote:
FengYun wrote:
What?
It is actually hard to run fast from Corral B - so her time worth more than 2:42:00.
I know this from my personal experience, as I am the official 3:00 pacer starting in Corral B at this year's Houston marathon (1/19/2020).
If she does not get accepted, I truly feel sorry for her.
If true, you should try and contact her to corroborate her account of how she was disadvantaged by starting there. I am not sure what evidence is accepted, but it certainly can't hurt. I think the fact that Boston has a precedent of considering the 2nd wave a different race, this should be the backbone of her argument. As someone pointed out, the 2nd wave runners are going from the gun time from the first wave. If the Males started later and didn't have this time tacked on, then any OTQ's coming from males from that 2nd wave should be invalid based on the logic of the USATF. As other have noted, they seem to completely f**k up publicly every time they have a chance to build any type of good will or show they are for the athletes. Complete trash if she doesn't get it.
That’s not USATF logic, that’s Houston logic. They are the ones who don’t have a separate gun time for subsequent corrals. Not USATFs call.
Not An Expert wrote:
Races with multiple waves (New York, Boston, etc) have a gun at the beginning of each wave, basically making each wave its own race within the larger event. Houston is a rolling start, placing athletes in corrals and then compressing them all so that there is no gap (or gun) between the last runner in the first corral and the first runner in the next corral. As such, this runner's gun time is correct and technically her official time. However, since chip timing has become ubiquitous, no one has ever faulted anyone for claiming a chip time as a PR. It's only when it is used for qualification purposes that it becomes controversial.
You are wrong. The officials held the B corral back for 12 minutes.
The B corral was walked up to the start after the A group was completely cleared.
so she has a nice PR now, continues to train, runs the next standard when it's lowered to under 2"40 , hit's that legitimately and is in the trials at only age 26.... no big deal!
I believe Houston did the right move here, you can't budge for everyone....this women knew before hand that it went off gun time, why not run a time before and get a half in so you can get pushed up into the A corral?How hard would that have been?
I must say though... What's one more ? There's already 400(?) women!
The petition included track times and Strava information. As someone else said she could've jogged a half and gotten into the A coral.
I love the posts that want USATF or Houston to bend the rules for one runner who couldn't manage to take the simple step of getting herself into A corral even when she had an OTQ on the line. She had every opportunity to get into A corral but she didn't take it. She knew the rules about gun time and still didn't make the effort.
Now you want USATF to bend their rules because the runner didn't do what she should have? This has nothing to do with USATF or Houston. It has everything to do with the runner and her coach not taking a super easy step that would have ensured a better chance of qualifying. Go do a training run at a certified race to get your A corral time and submit it by the deadline. Easy.
I support the USATF decision 100%. It's not their job to clean up an athlete's mistake.
*stipe wrote:
She petitioned to be included in the A coral and Houston refused. What more could she do? And it wasn't as if she qualified by 2 seconds. She was clearly under the standard.
What could she do? Hmmm there is probably a marathon every week in this country. Choose one that puts you on starting line. Also how could she have no q. Times and be that fast?
It seems like you're saying there should have been a second gun. I don't necessarily agree or disagree with that. I'm saying there wasn't a second gun.
I misspoke about the compression. You're right, there was an athletes with disabilities start (visually impaired, maybe?) between Corral A and Corral B, and so there was a time gap there between Corral A's final starter and Corral B's first starter. It wasn't 12 minutes, though, and saying Corral B was held back 12 minutes is misleading. They started pretty quickly after the AWD start, which started pretty quickly after Corral A cleared. Corral B started a total of around 12 minutes behind when the first Corral A athletes started. If there had been no gaps surrounding the AWD start, it's likely that would have been 2-4 minutes less than that.
Could Houston change their start sequence next year so they have separate guns for the different waves? Sure, it seems from the outside like it would make sense. But regardless of what may or may not make sense in the future, there was only one gun this year.
You can still make a case that USATF should grant this athlete a waiver, but that the chip/gun differential wasn't large can't be a part of that argument.
(Apologies for this pedantic side conversation, everyone!)
Interesting that the Houston Marathon lists a 7:13 start time for corral B. Seems to me that, like others have said, that constitutes a separate gun time. Corral C starts at 7:29.
Perhaps someone at the USATF does not understand how Houston uses corrals as waves and not traditional corrals.
Surely someone who ran an OTQ from Wave 2 in Boston would be granted a slot at the Trials.
I've run Houston many times. You don't "petition" to be in A corral in Houston You just submit a qualifying time for a marathon, half or 10k by the end of November. Don't have a qualifying time? Go run one before the deadline. An athlete of her caliber could knock out an easy training run at a certified race and submit it. Easy.
Houston has corrals, not waves. There's no second gun and no separate gun time. If she wasn't sure about that she could have asked. In November. When she registered.
Stop trying to make the argument that USATF should find some magical way to clean up the athlete's mistake. Not their job and not right for all the people who followed the rules and qualified under them.
She screwed up and now she's whining that the governing body should fix it for her. Give me a break, folks...
ladiesruntex wrote:
I love the posts that want USATF or Houston to bend the rules for one runner who couldn't manage to take the simple step of getting herself into A corral even when she had an OTQ on the line. She had every opportunity to get into A corral but she didn't take it. She knew the rules about gun time and still didn't make the effort.
Now you want USATF to bend their rules because the runner didn't do what she should have? This has nothing to do with USATF or Houston. It has everything to do with the runner and her coach not taking a super easy step that would have ensured a better chance of qualifying. Go do a training run at a certified race to get your A corral time and submit it by the deadline. Easy.
I support the USATF decision 100%. It's not their job to clean up an athlete's mistake.
Agree 100 percent: Bad job by the coach and runner: Unless there are extraordinary circumstances preventing her from running till the last minute, and or getting into the A corral, then I say the USATF decision is harsh but correct. There were other marathons in the country that day (plus 2 years) and prior including CIM she could and should have run IF getting to Atlanta was her goal . However and a big one, is if there was truly another "gun" or horn before her b corral start, I would be open to letting her in. If not, sorry. No go!