re: Should marathons have shorter time allowed to finish?

I’ve run New York. Got in through the lottery. The year I got in, the acceptance rate to Harvard Medical School was higher than getting into the NYC marathon through the lottery. I finished in 5 hours. My understanding is that at some point the streets reopened and people still on the course had to use the sidewalks until they got into Central Park. The course is tough-having to go over 5 bridges. Also Manhattan is deceptively hilly. Walking the course isn’t what I’d call easy and 26 miles is a long way.

Walking 4 mph is not that hard.

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If Iron Man change their time from allowed from 17 hours to three days, then I could do it this weekend without training.


I highly doubt that

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Ok. Bro. Im pretty sure I could swim 2.4 miles, cycle 112 miles, and walk 26.2 miles over three days.

But I know you are an expert at everything.

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Most marathons have a 6.5 hour limit I'm pretty sure.

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The marathon I did had a set of golf carts going at around that pace. Supposedly if they caught up to you, you had to get on.

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Bert Kreischer (fat drunk comedian) finished the LA Marathon in an unofficial time of 5 hours, 33 minutes, and 33 seconds (5:33:33). [1]

The Race: LA Marathon

Time: 5:33:33 (unofficial)

Context: He ran it with little to no prior training.

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Should be a 6 hour cut off.

If only “meaningful” topics were allowed here there would be zero activity. Nobody is changing the world over here. It’s all just idle chatter.

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If you finish the Iron man really fast, and somebody else finishes it really slow, does that cheapen the experience for you?

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Well yea lol

How are you not grasping this?

When I ran the Peachtree Road Race in 1980 they were announcing the winners just as I got to the starting line. That race is much bigger now. Spent the whole race watching my feet so I wouldn’t trip over someone it was so packed.

Most of the people finishing in 10 hours are elderly, disabled, and so on. The last finisher of NYC this weekend was a 78 year old man who's completed it 43 times. A lot of the marathons have stricter cutoffs than that so if you haven't trained and don't have some kind of special permission, you're getting swept up by the course officials.

You have to remember that the goal is to make money. If you ban everyone who can't finish in under 4 hours you're losing money. There are competitive corrals if you want to be around people finishing in a certain time.

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I play golf but I dont think another player should have to give up after 100 strokes. It's not an apples to apples comparison. But i just dont get bothered by how somebody else plays or runs their race.

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They don't shut down streets and close businesses for bad golfers to hack away. And I would imagine that people walking at an elderly pace is a lot more annoying in a congested race than it is in a slotted tee time where a few groups can be allowed to play through.