Lake Biwa, Dubai prove the Olympic marathon is pointless

If Japan had a distance running league it would be the equivalent of the NBA G league. Lot of good athletes but nothing great or on a world class level except for an anomaly or two.

I agree to some extent that if more East Africans were allowed in a global championship, someone from "the field" (i.e., not the people selected by the Olympic Committees) would podium and possible win. However, the IOC has a long term objective of shrinking track and field athlete numbers so the Olympics are probably not the best venue for a "best in the World" race.

Also, I think big money needs to be involved so athletes make it a priority to run in the race. Maybe the World Marathon Majors can rotate a "single race" Global Championships among its members or the World Champs can reincorporate the World Cup (as it was until about ten years ago) and have teams of 7 per country and financial incentives to be on the team.

Keep it simple. January 1 of an Olympic year is the cutoff date for performances. Each IOC member nation is permitted a single entry for the marathon regardless of time. Beyond those designated entries, the top 100 performances from January 1, 2023 to January 1, 2024 on World Athletics approved/certified courses (to eliminate people putting up times at a downhill Revel marathon type race) are invited to race at the Olympic marathon.

If that means 30 Kenyans, 25 Ethiopians, 20 Japanese, 15 Ugandans, and 60-70 other assorted runners, then so be it. A 2:11 American dude that got a lucky 3rd place on Trials day should not get a spot when scads of 2:03-2:08 men from other nations are sitting on the sidelines. The rest of the world needs to step up their game.

Japan has had a bunch of crazy fast races in recent years, putting huge numbers of people under 2:10 for marathon and under 62 for half marathon. But they are irrelevant at world marathon majors, world championships, and olympics. Why is this? The U.S. has had multiple top 10 world marathon major performers the past several years. Japan doesn't seem to have many more considering the massive depth they seem to have.

The Olympics is a business venture as much as anything these days. Having widespread interest is fundamental to the business model. It's not really about developing the most fair process to award athletic greatness.

You could probably find similar instances in other sports where one country (or a few) totally dominate. Isn't swimming limited to 2 per country? So conceivably you have the 3rd best in the world excluded.

Let's see the TV ratings and advertising revenue you'd get from a race with 30 Kenyans, 25 Ethiopians, 20 Japanese, and 60-70 others, most of whom will be non factors for top places. A big reason why the World Cross Country Championship happens half as often as it once did is that much of the world lost interest when 35 of the first 30 placers were East Africans. Letsrun posters would watch but not many average sports fans, ones who watch the Olympics to see how their country's "team" does are going to hang around the TV for a couple hours if they can't even pronounce the names of the first couple dozen runners.

This is not a new issue. The US has 400 meter runners who won't even get to the finals of our trials who'd be shoo ins for the Games if they were Swedes or Colombians. And distance races in the Olympics are different from a race like Lake Biwa. There's a very good chance that none of those guys would run as fast in an Olympic race as they did at Lake Biwa.

Great idea because an Olympic field of 99% East Africans would be a huge success on TV

I propose an Olympics with 5,000 athletes. Each country would be allotted a number of athletes in proportion to their share of world population. Here are the counts for the top 15 most populous countries:

China 895, India 875, United States 211, Indonesia 173, Pakistan 144, Brazil 136, Nigeria 135, Bangladesh 109, Russia 94, Mexico 82, Japan 80, Philippines 70, Ethiopia 70, DR Congo 68, Egypt 65

I think what you really mean is "highly contrived"

Lake Biwa, Dubai definitely prove one thing. The winners there can't even get on the podium in the Olympics.

It is Lake Biwa and Dubai circus-fests that are irrelevant.

How much does an Olympic medal mean when the best athletes aren't there.

So Kipchoge is not the best marathoner?

They are irrelevant so far wrote:

Japan has had a bunch of crazy fast races in recent years, putting huge numbers of people under 2:10 for marathon and under 62 for half marathon. But they are irrelevant at world marathon majors, world championships, and olympics. Why is this? The U.S. has had multiple top 10 world marathon major performers the past several years. Japan doesn't seem to have many more considering the massive depth they seem to have.

Well, big part of the reason is that they have their own marathon system/winter season with Fukuoka, Lake Biwa and Beppo Oita/Nagoya and Osaka for the women all being popular choices, so aren't really dependent on majors. That being said I actually don't think they did bad the last years, actually there were countless top 10 finishes at WMM. Placing at Olympics and World champs might have been a problem since Mizuki Noguchi's olympic title in 2004, but there were also good placements, especially Kentaro Nakamoto is known for multiple top 10 finishes. Also I think the current generation is stronger than many of those who qualified few years ago, guys like olympic qualifiers Nakamura, Hattori and Osako are actually known for being able to race well and not just hanging on for fast times.

A time-based qualifier or a top 5 finish (or similar) in a world marathon major over the preceding two years or whatever would be a great standard. But the Olympics will never do it because the nation v. nation narrative is the driving force of the Games.

World Athletics needs to take a risk and pull the marathon from the World Champs and hold a marathon championship in the even-numbered year between Summer Olympics. No cap on runners per country. Hold the marathon championship at a WMM. The current World Champs marathon is always in the hot months and basically becomes of a contest of who doesn't pass out from running in 80-degree weather. Plus, the best runners never show for the World Champs because they know it's more of a career risk than getting an appearance fee and bigger prize money at a WMM.

No one cares or remembers who won lake biwa or Dubai marathon. Olympic Champs are remembered forever as legends.

OP makes a fair point but I don't think the Olympics should be changed. The Olympics are an international event. Various countries dominate different sports. If the Olympics admitted athletes purely based on world rankings, there wouldn't be much in the way of international competition. Also, it is interesting to see how the pressure affects athletes from a country that is typically dominant in a sport. The E. Africans have caved pretty hard in distance running, allowing other nations to sneak on to the podium.

On the other hand, there should be an international championship that is purely based on who is the best in the world. If I had Emirati money, I would hold a World Marathon/track Championship on the year between the WCs. Bring in the top 200 marathoners. Pay the winner $1 mil and have big money for top 50. Everyone else gets solid appearance fees. That would be an event worth watching.

Bad, unoriginal argument that misunderstands the point of the Olympics.

steve. the. addict... wrote:

No one cares or remembers who won lake biwa or Dubai marathon. Olympic Champs are remembered forever as legends.

This.

steve. the. addict... wrote:

If Japan had a distance running league it would be the equivalent of the NBA G league. Lot of good athletes but nothing great or on a world class level except for an anomaly or two.

Pretty much this. Men's Marathon medal contenders from Japan - ZERO. Men's Marathon medal contenders from the US - 1. 1>0