2021 Boston Marathon cutoff predictions

joay11 wrote:

Disko Eric wrote:

Instagram is full of people complaining about that. “If I had known I would have ran/trained harder.”

Yeah right. Sure you would have.

If you had specific goal of qualifying Boston, no more, no less; Why kill yourself trying to shave another minute or two? I suspect you guys are still at a PR age, not me

Incidentally, 6 weeks before that (Sept 9th, 2018), ran a a BQ-9:23 on a warmer day, so yeah, I wish I did run a little harder in Oct 2018

Because it’s a race, puss.

John Macardle wrote:

I have ZERO sympathy for someone who claimed to have coasted in the last 10k of their marathon.

I sort of do. There's no need to trash yourself when you're running 40 minutes slower than your PB and 5 minutes faster than you foreseeably need to.

I never understood the mentality of "if I had only known what I needed I would have trained harder!" I just always assume that you are trying to optimize your training to run your fastest possible time - whatever that may be.

There's also no reason to coast to the finish either. If you're on a massive PB, you're going to be trashed anyway.

The real reason you would coast is to play it safe, which makes retroactively assuming you could have succeeded by pushing it obnoxious. On this thread or some other, I saw a person saying basically, "ugh, missed it by 60 seconds, just because I was coasting at the end to avoid cramping!" They chose to pack it in and play it safe, but now that this turned out poorly, they just assume that if they had known and gone for it, it would have worked out. But it might not have! And they knew that, because they coasted to avoid that risk!

Runner1018 wrote:

I never understood the mentality of "if I had only known what I needed I would have trained harder!" I just always assume that you are trying to optimize your training to run your fastest possible time - whatever that may be.

I don't do it often but there are times I don't run all out or train the maximum possible. Here is one example. I typically only run one marathon a year and requalify at Boston. In 2012 I thought I could run a BQ -20 but with the heat I missed by a few minutes. So I decided to run an early September marathon to get my BQ for 2013. I decided that I wasn't going to kill myself training for a PR in the summer heat. I trained less than normal and on race day my goal was to simply run every mile under 8 (my BQ was 3:35 at the time). I was feeling (relatively) good and did push the last 3 miles and got a BQ of about -11. It was the least training I have done since I started my Boston streak in 2007. It turned out to be my only negative split marathon. Who knows how much faster I would have run if I started faster or if I would have died at the end instead. But the bottom line is that I trained enough for my goal. My goal was not a PR or age group record. It was just get into Boston 2013. With more training over the winter, in Boston I ran about 8 minutes faster.

Hardloper wrote:

John Macardle wrote:

I have ZERO sympathy for someone who claimed to have coasted in the last 10k of their marathon.

I sort of do. There's no need to trash yourself when you're running 40 minutes slower than your PB and 5 minutes faster than you foreseeably need to.

That you give up in races where you aren’t going to approach your PR explains why you are slow.

coastersgtfo wrote:

There's also no reason to coast to the finish either. If you're on a massive PB, you're going to be trashed anyway.

He wasn't on a massive PB, he was running ~33 minutes slower than his PB. There was no foreseeable reason to trash his legs just to prove he's a tough guy.

If you'd have run 2018 you'd understand why the over BQ rates.

BQ-20 wrote:

If you'd have run 2018 you'd understand why the over BQ rates.

i was there and eked out a BQ

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Posters in one the Boston Marathon Facebook groups are reporting they or someone they know received an invitation to the 2021 Boston Marathon since they just missed the cutoff and now the BAA is opening up more spots for qualifiers. Month ago the BAA stated they would not increase the field size for 2021 so I assume these new spots are coming from charity runner allocation. Many charities have been asking for runners to apply in this group and elsewhere or the past many months. Some charities even have lower goal thresholds this year. Some prior year charity runners said they chose not run this year for one of several reasons:

1) too small of a window this year to reach goal

2) too difficult to a to obtain donations during the summer

3) uncertainty once again of whether or not the race will take place this year

Will runners who have been training for other fall races not be interested in running Boston?

Will runners who have not been training for a marathon for the last month or two be interested in running Boston with inadequate training?

So the cutoff was 7:47. What will the cutoff be?

Huh? People are going back into lockdown. You couldn’t even eat at a restaurant in Boston til spring. Now you think they’re letting more people in the race? *Gullible*

Disko Eric wrote:

Huh? People are going back into lockdown. You couldn’t even eat at a restaurant in Boston til spring. Now you think they’re letting more people in the race? *Gullible*

I did not say the BAA or 8 communities were letting in more than the 20,000 cap limit previously announced. I suspect they did not reach the 20,000 limit due to lower than expected number of charity runners or other runners. Race bibs are also given out to other groups than just qualifiers and charity runners.

They are inviting qualified runners who just missed the 7:47 cutoff. So far I read reports of invitations being sent to runners who missed the cutoff by 3, 4, and 6 seconds.

In addition to the Facebook group discussion I also found the following discussion on Reddit.

New Cutoff wrote:

Disko Eric wrote:

Huh? People are going back into lockdown. You couldn’t even eat at a restaurant in Boston til spring. Now you think they’re letting more people in the race? *Gullible*

I did not say the BAA or 8 communities were letting in more than the 20,000 cap limit previously announced. I suspect they did not reach the 20,000 limit due to lower than expected number of charity runners or other runners. Race bibs are also given out to other groups than just qualifiers and charity runners.

They are inviting qualified runners who just missed the 7:47 cutoff. So far I read reports of invitations being sent to runners who missed the cutoff by 3, 4, and 6 seconds.

In addition to the Facebook group discussion I also found the following discussion on Reddit.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AdvancedRunning/comments/oxxty0/boston_marathon_invite/

Copy/paste is easy. This is all fake unless you can link to that Facebook page and a screenshot of the email. Otherwise this is just a prank. Personally I highly doubt the charity spots weren’t filled and I highly doubt they’re adding more people. I am surprised the virtual didn’t sell out.

Exactly. More likely that 2021 goes virtual than anything.