Say you picked 100 random guys off the street and told them to run 5km. Everyone has to run solo without knowing the other guys times so it prevents people from giving up. Fastest guy wins a new car. What would be the median finish time for 5km? What would be the likely top and bottom quartiles?
I'd say the median would be about 33-34 minutes. Top quartile around 29 minutes, bottom quartile 49 minutes.
My guess...
25th - 23:30
50th - 26:30
75th - 31:00
My guess:
Median: 31:11
Top quartile: 26:00
Bottom quartile: 37:00
The median would probably fall somewhere around the 33-35 minute mark - True 'Average' would probably be far slower as I'd say 1/3 of adult men (USA) could not actually run that distance without stopping/walking/quitting, period. So with 33 DNFs I'm not sure how this will sway the average but it doesn't look pretty.
If the sample size is, lets say, any US Male 15 to 70 years old, that means the average person in this group is about 37 years old and weighs 200 lbs. Let's say 10 out of our 100 men run for recreational and/or competitive reasons (this may be generous) - comparing 5k finishing times for ParkRun (the category we can place these guys in) the average is 34 min for a 5km.
If I had to guess, the 1st place "winning" time would be in the ballpark of 22 mins. considering 18 min can win some hobby jogger 5k races and that implies an extreme selection bias of far less than 1% of overall pop.
HareBall wrote:
The median would probably fall somewhere around the 33-35 minute mark - True 'Average' would probably be far slower as I'd say 1/3 of adult men (USA) could not actually run that distance without stopping/walking/quitting, period. So with 33 DNFs I'm not sure how this will sway the average but it doesn't look pretty.
There is simply no way that 2/3 of American men aged 30 could run 5K without stopping.
I doubt if 2/3 could run 500m without stopping.
Everyone has right idea, but I think it would be slower than 33 minutes. If the majority were never runners to begin with, aside from likely not being in shape, the bigger issue is that they will have no idea how to pace themselves and are guaranteed to go too hard in the beginning and be reduced to walking. I'm thinking more like 37 minutes...paced like so:
First 200 meters in 45 seconds
Second 200 meters in 60 seconds
Next 1200 meters about 8 minutes
Remainder of the race (3400 meters) walking or near walking
Hahahahaha!
100 random guys. Random. Do you know what that means? 2 or3 would run under 23:30, not 25 guys.
The median would be 45 minutes because more than 1/2 would walk most of it or DNF.
How fast do those fat people scooters go?
predict the time wrote:
Hahahahaha!
100 random guys. Random. Do you know what that means? 2 or3 would run under 23:30, not 25 guys.
The median would be 45 minutes because more than 1/2 would walk most of it or DNF.
Yes. 23:30 gets you top 3 at a lot of smaller races where people actually planned and wanted to run.
I do think at age 30 a reasonable number of people could probably walk/run some 13-14 min miles.
*Top 3 for 30-39 age group, that is.
CKidd wrote:
predict the time wrote:
Hahahahaha!
100 random guys. Random. Do you know what that means? 2 or3 would run under 23:30, not 25 guys.
The median would be 45 minutes because more than 1/2 would walk most of it or DNF.
Yes. 23:30 gets you top 3 at a lot of smaller races where people actually planned and wanted to run.
I do think at age 30 a reasonable number of people could probably walk/run some 13-14 min miles.
I made the mistake in my own head of assigning an age range of something like 20-50 year old adults. I guess if it is all males of any age then my predictions are optimistic. Others make some good points that as well so perhaps I am optimistic even assuming 20-50.
predict the time wrote:
Hahahahaha!
100 random guys. Random. Do you know what that means? 2 or3 would run under 23:30, not 25 guys.
The median would be 45 minutes because more than 1/2 would walk most of it or DNF.
No, at least a few would run 15:00. Who doesn't want a new car?
15:00 per mile?
Maybe 1 of the 100 could actually run 5K without stopping. That one person might run 30 minutes.
Probably 70-80 percent would DNF, most would walk most of the way, finishing in about 50 minutes.