+1
Bullet the Blue Sky wrote:
How about we just add cross country? I think it would be way more entertaining than the marathon. Picture how they cover the biathlon in the winter games (2-4k loop course; lots of cameras), but for runners instead of skiers.
Lydiard Cerutty wrote:
Olympic marathon should be ran like a xc country race.Have team and individual medals. And increase the number of athletes from 3 to 6.
No, this is a perfect analogy. With the current system, a country that doesn't have the depth of Kenya, but has one medal-quality contender (like Rupp, for example) has a chance to medal, as it's not unlikely that one Kenyan has a bad race. If there were 5 or 10 Kenyans entered, much less chance Rupp medals as they are not all going to have bad days. Because they still have the best runners Kenya still will probably dominate the medals but the little guy has a chance. Open up the entries and the little guy has much much less of a chance.
The option I would like to see is:
-- Every country can send a as many as 3 marathoners. Time is of no importance.
-- Countries that choose not send a runner can have any runner born in that country submit an application to run. The fastest two runners are let in.
-- Wildcard spots are created that equal the number of countries in the world--195. Runners must apply and the fastest are let in. A limit of two wildcards per country is imposed.
The marathon becomes a lot more interesting. Even the slowest runners will have fans cheering them along the way, and to the finish. The Olympic marathon becomes more of a people's race.
Counter proposal: just ditch it. I thought that was going to be what this thread was about. The marathon is the only track and field event that has managed to break free of the Olympic cage. That’s great-why try to reel it back in? There are several events annually that carry more prestige and cash incentive than the Olympic marathon.
That is how a real sport should be.
Tennis, golf, basketball, cycling, soccer, etc. are all Olympic sports now, but they also have their own events that are much more important, and everybody knows that the Olympics are a minor prize. I wish track were the same way.
Kenya and Ethiopia had 37 of the 40 fastest marathon performers on the list last year . How deep into the performers list would we have to go to get a significant number of the OG Nations represented? 98 of the fastest marathon performers All Time are from either Kenya and Ethiopia.
yust fax wrote:
Kenya and Ethiopia had 37 of the 40 fastest marathon performers on the list last year . How deep into the performers list would we have to go to get a significant number of the OG Nations represented? 98 of the fastest marathon performers All Time are from either Kenya and Ethiopia.
Japan would be a contender, in fact if you had stricter drug testing in east Africa. Chances are the actual clean world record is held by Yuta Shitara.
Other option wrote:
The option I would like to see is:
-- Every country can send a as many as 3 marathoners. Time is of no importance.
-- Countries that choose not send a runner can have any runner born in that country submit an application to run. The fastest two runners are let in.
-- Wildcard spots are created that equal the number of countries in the world--195. Runners must apply and the fastest are let in. A limit of two wildcards per country is imposed.
The marathon becomes a lot more interesting. Even the slowest runners will have fans cheering them along the way, and to the finish. The Olympic marathon becomes more of a people's race.
I'm not sure about all of this, but I agree the time standards should be dismantled. 3 runners per country could cause problems if suddenly you have a bunch of 3-5 hour marathoners in the race. But I'd like to see it tried!
I'll go one further: add 5 competitors per country, and then score the top three from each and award medals to the team.
SteelTownRunner wrote:
A position I've been thinking about that I know Toni Reavis supports is why not broaden the field for the Olympics marathon and allow countries to send 4 or 5 athletes? The track events of course are limited by track size, but part of the point of having a race on the roads is to accommodate a bigger field. The sheer glut and juxtaposition of big races on the calendar prevent any single marathon from having a deep field, and by limiting Ethiopia and Kenya to three athletes apiece, no one can make an honest claim about the depth of even the Olympics Marathon. The Majors are ultimately only a few-five athletes deep for men and women among those who legitimately stand a chance of winning - and below that they get the B tier/ national class pros trying to make a name ($$) for themselves.
Steve of LetsRun replied to me that:
. . . It's an interesting idea, but not one I see happening in the near future for a couple reasons. First, the IOC is generally looking for ways to cut or maintain the number of athletes at the Olympics, not add them. That's why there has been talking in the past about cutting certain track events. Another reason you said yourself: "By limiting Ethiopia and Kenya to three athletes apiece." I don't know if the rest of the world isn't going to support a decision that is going to turn the Olympic Marathon into the "East African Championships." But the World Championships Marathon used to have 5 people per country, so who knows, it could happen. I feel like that would be more realistic, but wouldn't exactly accomplish your goal since many of the world's best marathoners don't race Worlds.
All that said, I truly think that the London Marathon every year pretty much accomplishes what you're going for with all the world's best men and women in one place at one time. Yes, there are some that miss it to run Boston or another spring marathon, but they are in the minority and often people who wouldn't contend in London anyway. London is so deep it's actually a more competitive and harder to win marathon than the Olympics.
Toni, and I believe others, suggested (dreamt) somehow getting Boston and London to alternate recruiting top female/ male marathoners each year as way to avoid diluting the fields at the competitive ends as they generally are.
After Rio, many were excited to see top 10 beyond just the marathon winners, and nearly every conversation started "if the marathon was scored as is cross country, we'd have placed X . . ." Understandably for the reasons Steve outlined above, this isn't terribly likely to implement in the Olympics, especially when we inexplicably haven't seen x country raced in those games in years, but, and this would add athletes to transport, clothe, transport, etc, can we hope to see a couple more athletes added to the WC and see x country style scoring added? This could also be a matter of if you build it they will come.
LetsRun: "Where ... Dreams Become Reality" - Let's make this happen.
How to even begin approaching making this suggestion is above my pay grade, but I thought I'd pass along the sentiment.
2008: A Kenyan and a East European won
2012: A Ugandan and an Ethiopian Won
2018: 2 Kenyans won
It's pretty much an East African championship anyways. Good luck to any country that wants to take down the 3 best from Uganda, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Kenya. Seriously. It can happen, but it's going to be rare.
Many interesting ideas here but let me share a reality check-
When a city wins the bid to host the Olympic Games they sign an agreement to provide "x" number of beds for the athletes and team officials. Then the IOC goes back to each of the international sports federations and gives them an allocations of how many beds they are allowed to have. Then the sports federations develop a qualification system that can not exceed that number. ...this is very difficult to do. Plus with new sports added, the IOC is always looking to trim the quotas for many of the other sports.
Therefore the idea of adding large numbers of athletes who are not already competing in some other events is probably a non starter
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