Women's Marathon rules change

healdgator wrote:

As for the robot, if all the competitors are allowed to use a robot, I don't see how it is any different than have a human pacer. In both cases, the competitor isn't actually setting his or her own pace. Someone or something is doing it for him/her. If you are going to allow that, why is it important that the pacer be worse? That doesn't make any sense at all.

Because under the current rules (men paced by men; women paced by women), a World Record run will require that the competitor run a significant portion of the race on his or her own. Pacers can only get you so far, because they can't handle the pace for the full distance. If you allow males to pace females, the male pacer can stay with the runner for the full distance, whereas a male going for a WR will never have that luxury. Hence, there's a discrepancy that the IAAF rectified.

Why is that concept so hard to grasp?

You guys seem to have exhausted this topic so I'm going to change it slightly. What I want to know is why Radcliffe's incredible world record time (2:15:25) was set way back in 2003 and is still SOOO far ahead of anything done by her or anyone else before or since. That's weird, isn't it? On the men's side, times keep getting lower and lower and whatever you think about the Boston times from this year, it seems to be a given that the marathon world record time will come down again soon. But nobody is seriously challenging a mark that has stood for so long on the women's side. Why not? The world record times moved progressively down from 2:30 down to 2:18 from 1980 to 1993 and then BAM it drops another 3 minutes in back to back marathons by Radcliffe (Fall 2002, Spring 2003). Since then? Hasn't been touched. Is the explanation that she is a once in a century athlete who was that far ahead of all of her peers before or since for a short period of time? Is it PEDs? I don't believe there has ever been a hint of evidence of PEDs and Radcliffe but just statistically the performance jumps out to the point of looking like a very great baseball player suddenly hitting 73 HRs. It seems very strange that with so many times falling in the sport, that one is not being touched and it has been around fo 8 years.

Dave-O wrote:

healdgator wrote:

As for the robot, if all the competitors are allowed to use a robot, I don't see how it is any different than have a human pacer. In both cases, the competitor isn't actually setting his or her own pace. Someone or something is doing it for him/her. If you are going to allow that, why is it important that the pacer be worse? That doesn't make any sense at all.

Because under the current rules (men paced by men; women paced by women), a World Record run will require that the competitor run a significant portion of the race on his or her own. Pacers can only get you so far, because they can't handle the pace for the full distance. If you allow males to pace females, the male pacer can stay with the runner for the full distance, whereas a male going for a WR will never have that luxury. Hence, there's a discrepancy that the IAAF rectified.

Why is that concept so hard to grasp?

I grasp your concept, it's just wrong. The women's record has NOTHING to do with the men's record, and vice versa. Nothing. They are completely independent of one another.

What portion of the race does a competitor have to run on his or her own? I missed that part of the new rule.

What if it is a female robot?

healdgator wrote:What if it is a female robot?

You win.

Now you're just being obtuse. You know exactly how the rabbit/pacer system works. The pacer is out there for no more than 3/4 of the race. It's a standard practice and an unwritten rule. You get help, but you have to finish the job yourself or gut it out against any other competitor that manages to stay with you.

I think the rule is dumb in all facets, but I understand it. And there is absolutely no correlation between the men's and women's records here at all. Just the fact that a woman can be paced from start to finish by a man. For example, it would be akin to having one guy pace you for the first half of the race, then drop out, and then have a 2nd guy jump in and finish the race with you. Does that seem fair?

mul21 wrote:Now you're just being obtuse. You know exactly how the rabbit/pacer system works. The pacer is out there for no more than 3/4 of the race. It's a standard practice and an unwritten rule. You get help, but you have to finish the job yourself or gut it out against any other competitor that manages to stay with you.

I think the rule is dumb in all facets, but I understand it. And there is absolutely no correlation between the men's and women's records here at all. Just the fact that a woman can be paced from start to finish by a man. For example, it would be akin to having one guy pace you for the first half of the race, then drop out, and then have a 2nd guy jump in and finish the race with you. Does that seem fair?

I don't know who this is directed to, but I'll respond.

First, unwritten rules are ridiculous. If it's rule, it's written. Those other "traditions" aren't rules. Also, it's clearly not standard practice or they wouldn't change the rule. Women have been running and setting records in mixed races for years. This is a change. Not a codification of some standard practice.

As for your hypothetical, I don't know if multiple pacers have been allowed or not. I would doubt it. If they haven't, then it probably shouldn't be allowed. That said, I don't much care. (Not that I really care about this new rule either. What can I say? I'm bored.) Pacer or not, the competitor is doing the actual running. If there is real angst about pacing in the running community, they should do away with it altogether. These half measures don't make any sense to me.

Where is Gloria Steinem when you need her? (Or Oprah?)

Michele "1L" Keane wrote:Where is Gloria Steinem when you need her? (Or Oprah?)

I was thinking the same thing. I bet the retroactive record change would not stand up to a legal challenge. If it did, it should also pave the way to eliminate all the swimsuit records, the East German records from the 1970's and 1980's, and probably Flo Jo's record.



I could see it now. NO woman who has nails longer than 1/8" qualifies for any records due to their performance enhancing effect. I mean they were kinda of like a rowing scull or Oscar Pistorius's 'legs'.

stupid, stupid, stupid....nuf said.

My favorite picture of the day. With Nike and Nike Running on board now, do you think they'll back down?

Perfect! And awesome.