BrRnR wrote:
DenverRunner wrote:Yeah that was lovely, but not surprising. I especially like the line about "time doesn't matter." If that's the case then why even bother giving out chips, starting at a certain time, printing results, giving splits, etc.
What a joke.
I've followed this thread from the start, and I've gone back and forth in how I feel about it. I don't run marathons anymore, so it's nothing personal to me, but after reading the SF article, I'm starting to agree with you, DenverRunner. What a joke indeed.
Those are the exact type of people I'm talking about. They couldn't give two shits about actually trying to improve their performance. Why even do it then?
You get guys on here like Keith Stone who want to belittle people like myself that feel that it is disrespectful to the sport to approach a marathon that way. All they have to criticize people like myself is that we're "elitist" because we run faster times than others. I don't really care about the times. I've coached several female runners who it will take a monumental effort and a good day for them to break four hours. That's fine. They bust thier asses for months on end trying for their best performance possible. At least they don't disrespect the sport with some cavalier attitude toward what they are doing. But apparently its cool to gab with your friends and take a "relaxing vacation" to run a marathon. What a bunch of bull.
Of course RDs like Keith love that population because it generates more revenue. IMO RDs that cater to these people disrespect the sport. I couldn't care less about generating revenue, and I really wouldn't care if half of the 300+ marathons went away because they didn't cater to the types that are profiled in that article. There are a great deal of marathons that have been around before that, and if they get back to catering to serious runners at the expense of some of these other ones dying, so be it. Boston has survived for 112 years.
Marathoning is a sport, or at least it used to be. If you want to have a feel good relaxing vaction marathon, go for it. If time doesn't matter, then forget the chips and results and just run your recreational race. I'm perfectly fine with that. See how many runners show up and I guaruntee that a "race" like that wouldn't last long.
These marathons need the serious runners more than they think.
NOTE TO BASHERS: Notice that I do not equate serious runners with times. Take that argument and go somewhere elose with it.