You must have meant, "public schooled in bubble wrap." By any measure, the home schooled as a group are better educated and have better reasoning skills when they enter college. Just sayin.'
You must have meant, "public schooled in bubble wrap." By any measure, the home schooled as a group are better educated and have better reasoning skills when they enter college. Just sayin.'
belial wrote:
It's human nature to want to tell a story about how true grit won the day. It didn't. It never does at this level of competition. Nearly every elite endurance athlete pushes their body to its physical limits in the course of running a race. (Unless they decide to cut their losses because a good placement is unlikely -- this is arguably unfortunate, and we could in theory punish athletes for this where it hurts most, in their wallets, but there isn't really a sustained effort to do that so that's the way it is.)
There's no evidence for the statement that athletes push to physical limits every race.
There's tons of evidence in the lit that seemingly hard 'limits' are often easily pushed past in the right situations.
Heck, Alex Hutchinson wrote a whole book on this.
It's definitely possible that those who could endure the additional, non-standard pain of brutally cold and wet conditions did better. Hard to say one way or another but I favor the grit idea. Those who trained in sub-standard weather often/had a ton of race experience seemed to do better.
Well, indeed, there isn't any real evidence. The claim itself is somewhat vague and ill-defined. I was opining a general attitude about being able to tolerate pain being what separates the winners from the losers. People like to imagine that they won a race because they were just mentally tougher, but it's just a pleasant fiction. Some other guy lost to them that probably felt more pain because a) he pushed himself just like they did, and b) he bonked and crashed.
So, the whole pain thing was just a minor digression and not central to my main point: pain tolerance didn't win the day, stockier althetes who had low expectations, and thus less to lose by going for it, won the day. But, yeah, some people have higher pain tolerance; some people don't feel as much pain (indeed, due to genetic conditions, some people cannot even experience pain -- although I'm not sure how that relates to fatigue).
No, I do not think the prestige of the event took a hit because of who won it.
It actually kind of added a little something.
You've seen movies where a strange weather event happens and changes a game into a big upset.
This is going to be a classic.
But yes, in general the unpredictable weather at Boston and the fact that it isn't record eligible affects who runs and therefore the prestige on the world stage.
Still big in America, though.
To the original point, I'm surprised so many people disagree with OP. Perhaps prestige is not necessarily the right word. But just look at the elite fields for Boston vs London, just one week apart. And take into account the fact that the Boston winner takes home almost $100k more than the London winner. Which race do the elites want to do more? The answer right now is obviously London and it hasn't even been close the last 5+ years. Boston hasn't been won in a respectable time (respectable for WMM) in years (not counting the wind-aided year). You could argue that Boston is more of a "race," where time doesn't matter and it's just about winning, but the reality is the elites would rather be in a different race even if it means less money. Isn't that what prestige means?
I think Boston should lose its WMM status in the next few years. There are so many more races that are more competitive than it now
Also rules out all these "elites" you can't even finish the race because of the weather. Lmfao dropping out instead of swallowing their pride. Cowardly
Cowards wrote:
Also rules out all these "elites" you can't even finish the race because of the weather. Lmfao dropping out instead of swallowing their pride. Cowardly
The good news, thank God, is they won't receive their participation medal which is why real men run races. No bragging around the water cooler for those cowards. If they bought jackets they should have to return them as Boston jackets are for heroes only, and heroes finish. This all makes me so proud of my 5 hour marathon and what I was able to achieve, way more than these cowardly so called "elites". I showed them true grit and I've got the medal to prove it.
This year's Boston probably shows what happens when proper drug testing is enforced at a major marathon. London on the other hand ...
Boston has pretty much conceded defeat to London by trying to assemble all the top US runners to the detriment of the international field. When you look at the list of all the E. Africans that dropped out, the first thing that you notice is just how few were in the race compared to other marathon majors. So, this year's event was pretty embarrassing in that the elite field was so thin that you have sub-elite women in top spots and an unseeded women's runner finish fifth.
SorryToSay wrote:
I say yes. Well done to Desi and Yuki, of course. Great athletes. But they have no business winning a major marathon. Both men’s and women’s top-10s were filled with C-level athletes. Most of the top Africans and even some Americans dropped out. Next year, do you think top athletes are going to be lining up to come to Boston? I do not. It’s already a low-preference choice for Africans, and it potentially became even more so today.
Yuki's time was impressive given the conditions, Desi's was slow.
Elites don’t get to pick what makes them elite or what makes them prestigious. The fans and other observers do, and the fans recognize the Boston Marathon as the Apex of road running.
Ummm, Roy, is it? Not sure if you looked at your weather report, but there was a hurricane in Boston yesterday. ... this might have something to do with the ‘slower field’ and the Africans dropping out right and left.
https://www.bostonmagazine.com/health/2018/04/13/elite-athletes-boston-marathon-2018/
You might ought to do a little research before taking the shine from amazing athletes that laced up and ran 26.2 miles to finish in an unprecedented manner, ahead of some of the best in the world.
This ‘unseeded’ woman you refer to, her name is Jessica. And she happened to run an amazing race, that is why her name appears fifth on the leaderboard. It would do you well to stick to the adage, speak only when your words improve upon silence. In other words, shut the f$@k up!
Funny I just glanced at the article regarding the results and saw 2.15 and thought wow that must be close to an unofficial womens WR and they must have had a huge tailwind again. I read more and realise it was freezing and thats why the mens winning time was slow relative to other major marathons or even Boston in previous years.
crosscounts wrote:
Don't blame Boston because the elites don't know how to run in the cold.
Boston showed us that if/when Germany ever goes back to it's racist ways, they will not be able to import African to use as slave soldiers to invade Russia in the winter. They will be dropping like flies. The world never has to worry about a Kenyan marathon runner blitzkrieg.
So that's one less thing to worry about.
Where do I click 'like' for this post?
Boston hasn't been run in a respectable time because they don't employ pacers. It is a race. It requires both tactical skills and running speed/endurance. Paced races are boring and remove most of the tactical skill.
portsea57 wrote:
2:39 wrote:
It will be funny watching Keitany and Dibaba run 25 minutes faster than Linden on Sunday.
It would have been funny seeing Keitany and Dibaba running in Boston and dropping out or finishing in a distressed state.
Possibly for Keitany. Dibaba is one tough and smart runner and she has run under stress before; she is called Baby-faced Destroyer (and she likes it) for good reason.
Precious Roy wrote:
Boston has pretty much conceded defeat to London by trying to assemble all the top US runners to the detriment of the international field.
Yes, how ridiculous that an American race would try to assemble the top US runners. What ARE they thinking?
Boston history just got a boost. People will remember and talk about it for years to come, adding to the prestige.
badge of honor wrote:
Cowards wrote:
Also rules out all these "elites" you can't even finish the race because of the weather. Lmfao dropping out instead of swallowing their pride. Cowardly
The good news, thank God, is they won't receive their participation medal which is why real men run races. No bragging around the water cooler for those cowards. If they bought jackets they should have to return them as Boston jackets are for heroes only, and heroes finish. This all makes me so proud of my 5 hour marathon and what I was able to achieve, way more than these cowardly so called "elites". I showed them true grit and I've got the medal to prove it.
Last I checked 5 hours places higher than DNF. It's embarrassing to be a "professional" and not finish. Should be ashamed of themselves. Only exception is unless you are physically unable to. Name one other sport where "professionals" can voluntarily stop mid-contest because they're getting whooped. I'll wait...... I'll wait.................................I'll wait...... oh right it doesn't happen.
Harambe wrote:
Today was about pain tolerance.
Modern marathons do everything to make it as painless as possible. Flat courses. Good weather. pacers, etc.
The most blue-collar runners who are used to GRIT and PAIN every day won.
Not elite training camps, not fancy altitude chateaus, not designer drugs, just RAW GRIT.
Boston is an A+ marathon because you can't be SOFT and take the W
GRIT and PAIN tolerance had nothing to do with it, athletes with more suitable bio-chem higher BMI faired better.