Boston not counting as a WR is one reason our sport is in the shitter

I think people just want to believe that the Boston Marathon is somehow the greatest marathon on the planet and are willing to conveniently forget about the ridiculous tailwind the length of the course in order to do that.

Get over it.

If it was a marathon in Europe or Asia, nobody would want it to stand.

I have no problem with it not counting although I will reiterate that marathoning fast is pretty much all about getting lucky with weather. I am just pointing out that when our sport finally can generate some excitement from the masses, really get people interested in running it is ruined because of rules. Like it or not, Boston is THE marathon for people living in the US. When's the last time a WR was set on US soil? Khannouchi in Chicago?

haha YO wrote:

I have no problem with it not counting although I will reiterate that marathoning fast is pretty much all about getting lucky with weather. I am just pointing out that when our sport finally can generate some excitement from the masses, really get people interested in running it is ruined because of rules. Like it or not, Boston is THE marathon for people living in the US. When's the last time a WR was set on US soil? Khannouchi in Chicago?

So you want a few fake records to make people feel good about themselves and their country?

Fair enough. If a nation is insecure to go with that, who am I to argue?

Do those same people not like the fact that a world record in swimming has to be set in a pool and not swimming downstream in a river? Idiots.

haha YO wrote:

You have no idea how many people who are usually not running fans are actually talking about running this week, going on and on about the record. You have no idea how much it turns them off to running when you have to say "Well it doesn't count because some people came up with some rules that make it inelgible, there was a tailwind, it drops some (despite Boston being well known to Joe Average for Heartbreak Hill)" Call it the record. Part of marathoning is about getting lucky with conditions. Geb set his record with damn good pacing and perfectly cool weather, you gotta get lucky.

trollism wrote:

So you want a few fake records to make people feel good about themselves and their country?

Fair enough. If a nation is insecure to go with that, who am I to argue?

You are missing the point. People are interested in running right now, I can tell you that by overhearing conversations at airports while traveling, work conversations and the general trend with sports media. That is never a bad thing. That interest goes down when you have to explain about the technicalities of why a course doesn't count for WR purposes, espescially when that course is as historic and well known as Boston.

Why are you doing any explaining at all? Why don't you just say, "yeah, that shit was fast."

Sounds to me like you are interrupting the conversation and being a total killjoy. It isn't that they lose interest in running, they just don't want to be around you.

Yes, and everyone who registered for the Boston Marathon months ago knew that there would be a tailwind.

Good strategy!

It's possible that the "controversy" about the record may be the ONLY reason the general population and media are even discussing it.

The reason it is not counting is because it is a point to point course. We all know this, we knew this before it was run, so did the people running the race.

It isn't anything new.

Why would they change the rules just because some guys got a lucky tailwind? It's STILL a point to point course with an elevation drop.

I have yet to read about any rules covering tailwinds during marathons, and I've never heard of winds being monitored during one to validate a record.

However, if you look at the application below for recognition for a race time with the USATF, it specifies that the course can drop no more than 1 meter per km and the start to finish separation can be no more than 30% of the race distance.

For Boston the drop is about 3 meter per km, and obviously Hopkinton and Boston are more than 8 miles apart, which violates the USATF's rules.

We need to get off the tailwind crap, though, because it doesn't come into play with Marathon records.

http://www.usatf.org/statistics/records/forms/USATFApplicationForRecord_RoadRace.pdf

In swimming there are no provisions to the type of suit you wear...

This is road racing. It is not track and especially not indoor track. Weather conditions are part of the game. Thats how records get set- in perfect conditions. And my favorite part about all this is before Monday I never heard people talking about the net downhill as an explanation that Boston is "easy". The Boston marathon is a harder course than Chicago, London, Berlin, and all the other time trial marathons. Until Monday it was more common for people to make time allowances for the course. "Oh I ran 2:39 at Boston but its a hard course so at Chicago I think I can go 2:36" or something like that.

It is bad for our sport when we now have to distinguish between the 2:03:59 as the "WR" and the 2:03:02 as the "fastest marathon ever". In explaining to people who ask me about it, the underlying theme in their responses is "thats retarded" and it is.

You can say what you want and although I am technically wrong I will say the WR is Mutai's 2:03:02 and the AR is Ryan's 2:04:58.

It was a perfect fluke day, once in every 50 years. I don't think it would be good for the marathon WR or AR to last 20-30 years like these records might if they were recognized.

It's not retarted.

Without these rules, we could have courses that start on top of a mountain and end at the beach.

Or we could have courses that are flat but ALWAYS with a strong tailwind because they are point to point. For example, I was on vacation at a beach town and I ran every day for a week up and down the beach. The tailwind was sick as I ran northbound. Every single day. The wind direction never changed. It gave me a 5% advantage with tailwind and a 5% disadvantage against the wind (for a total difference of 10%). I thought, "Wow, they could put on a FAST marathon here. If only point to point courses were allowed."

Those damn rules spoil everything, I'm going to write to the MLB - why shouldn't I be able to use a corked bat and hit 95 home runs in a season!

to: think about it a bit - you're kidding, right?

Here's just one of many news stories you can find about regulations on swimsuits.

http://www.fox43.com/news/wpmt-amnews-swimsuits-rome-7-23--09,0,2125967.story

Also, it's pretty hard not to agree with trollism here. When I see somebody saying that the excitement "is ruined because of rules. Like it or not, Boston is THE marathon for people living in the US," I really feel like that person is basically saying that the US has an inferiority complex and should have the rules changed to make it easier for our races.

Sure, people in the US want this to be the record. Many people in the US also have huge issues with feelings of entitlement. It doesn't meant that we should allow the record just to satisfy these feelings of entitlement, which are so clearly expressed by haha yo's post.

I'm sure they took your points into consideration when they were designing the Boston course in the late 1800's.

"In just over 110 years, we're going look like geniuses!"

Give it a couple more days and your average Joe/Jane will completely forget about it. It's funny how when the media brings up some "hot" news item how everyone is an expert. Take, for instance, the BP oil spill. People went on and on about how the engineers should do this or that to fix the leak. Never mind that the those offering criticism don't know the first thing about drilling for oil in the middle of the ocean. It's really laughable.

It makes sense that there are rules set up that define what courses can be considered 'legitimate' courses and what can't. And, to be honest, distance running has the least amount of rules out there. Look at football, basketball, baseball, hockey, soccer, etc. they all have a ridiculous amount of nit-picky rules.

Contrversity wrote:

It's not retarted.

Without these rules, we could have courses that start on top of a mountain and end at the beach.

Or we could have courses that are flat but ALWAYS with a strong tailwind because they are point to point. For example, I was on vacation at a beach town and I ran every day for a week up and down the beach. The tailwind was sick as I ran northbound. Every single day. The wind direction never changed. It gave me a 5% advantage with tailwind and a 5% disadvantage against the wind (for a total difference of 10%). I thought, "Wow, they could put on a FAST marathon here. If only point to point courses were allowed."

Since wind isn't a consideration with invalidating marathon records, a fast course could be set up following the rules of keeping the start and end points within 30% of the total distance by running with a tailwind for 17 miles, turning around and finishing against the wind for the last 9.2.