Marathon entry fee should be based on seed time

I like this idea.

I mentioned something similar in the "NYC $255" thread. You wouldn't necessarily need a different price for every time bracket, but say 4 hours and slower is one price. This price is also for people with no prior marathon/half record. Then 3:30-3:49 is less, 3:00-3:29 is less than that and so on. Of course you'd factor in age and gender. I think this would be a good incentive for people to take the race seriously and train well for it.

How about charging something like 50 cents per minute you're out on the course? So something like:

2:30 marathoner = $75

3:00 marathoner = $100

5:00 marathoner = $150

6:30 marathoner = $195

People can pay like $200 up front, (6:30 marathon + $5 processing fee) and then have their money refunded after the race is finalized.

It would be awesome when the idiots who brag about how they worked twice as hard as the 2:30 marathoners have to admit to paying twice as much for their efforts too.

Yeah, but idea this won't sit well with the fanny-packers who would prefer that you continue to subsidize their all-day plods.

i was actually thinking of this while running a half on new year's day. i paid $75 and ended up running 75:20, so about $1/min of running. that got me thinking about people who take much longer to complete the event - they are paying less per minute, but using more resources. so i guess they're getting "more for their money" in some respects. it has bothered me that i pay the same for a race as someone who uses twice the resources i do.

i like the idea of paying full price to get in, then getting a refund after. it would certainly make the last couple of miles of a marathon real interesting! how hard would you push yourself to save $10?

Why? The business model seems to be working well for people who put on marathons now.

running is better wrote:

. that got me thinking about people who take much longer to complete the event - they are paying less per minute, but using more resources. so i guess they're getting "more for their money" in some respects. it has bothered me that i pay the same for a race as someone who uses twice the resources i do.

I am not sure I agree 100% with this statement. If you finish before the others you get to consume more of the post race food and beverages.

Then prices would have to go up. If a flat $255 per person brings in say 10 million then with your scheme the top bracket will have to pay way more than $255.

Marathon entry fees ARE based on seed time.

If you're a <= 2:06 marathoner, you get PAID tens/hundreds of thousands of dollars. The lighter your skin, the bigger bonus you might get.

If you're a <= 2:25 marathoner, you often don't pay and get some extra special treatment.

For 2:30 - 6:30, you pay the full price. To them, there's no difference in cost/benefit between the two. Sure, it theoretically costs more to leave the course open for 10 hours than 3, but whether you run it in 2:45 or 4:45, they still have to leave it open for 10 hours. Encouraging some people to save a dime by running faster isn't going to change that. Typical Letsrun egos.

den bosch wrote:

Marathon entry fees ARE based on seed time.

If you're a <= 2:06 marathoner, you get PAID tens/hundreds of thousands of dollars. The lighter your skin, the bigger bonus you might get.

If you're a <= 2:25 marathoner, you often don't pay and get some extra special treatment.

For 2:30 - 6:30, you pay the full price. To them, there's no difference in cost/benefit between the two. Sure, it theoretically costs more to leave the course open for 10 hours than 3, but whether you run it in 2:45 or 4:45, they still have to leave it open for 10 hours. Encouraging some people to save a dime by running faster isn't going to change that. Typical Letsrun egos.

Excellent point! All the 2:30-3:30 marathoners on here that think they're more special than the 6:00 marathoner need to realize they... aren't.

running is better wrote:

i like the idea of paying full price to get in, then getting a refund after. it would certainly make the last couple of miles of a marathon real interesting! how hard would you push yourself to save $10?

I'll tell you what, I've been in a few marathons with bad weather (hot) and in those last few miles when I was doing the death-march and wishing someone would shoot me and put me out of my misery, the was NOTHING that could have made me push myself to run harder.

But the truth is, although marathons are growing in size, marathon runners as a whole do not seem to be getting faster (isn't the average time like 4:45? I know that's because of all the first-timers, but still) and the "average" marathoner would never agree to paying more because they're out there longer.