Chicago Marathon Travesty

In case you haven't already heard, the Chicago Marathon ran into problems yesterday. It was unseasonably warm. Depending on who you talk to or what you read (try Chicago Tribune), you may think the decision to reroute runners and not allow them to finish was a bad decision or a good one.

If you go and read Slowtwitch, you will observe some truly elitist perspectives on who should be "allowed" to run a marathon and such. To the people who say that anything over 4 hours is "easy to train for and anyone can do it," I have 2 words for you: FUCK OFF. While I do believe that almost anyone with reasonable health and enough determination can finish a marathon (or an Ironman, for that matter), not all of us are gifted enough to have the natural speed or mechanics or whatever it takes to go fast. Am I in favor of time cutoffs? Yes. 17 hours is good enough for me for Ironman. If there comes a time when I can't do that, then I am done. If they make the time cutoff less (some international races already do this), then I am bound by whatever constraints are placed, and I can choose not to enter any particular race. For an open marathon, I think 6 hours is a reasonable cutoff (that's a little faster than 15mpm). There is just so much planning and support necessary to put on these big events that some semblance of control needs to be exercised. It no longer matters to me why people choose to do these events--in the end, moving around for whatever reason seems to be reason enough!

But I disagree with some of the Slowtwitch posters that the bulk of the people entered in Chicago Marathon were not trained. There really aren't that many crazy people who would show up for a marathon never having run at least 15 miles in training. Do I think there are people entering marathons and Ironmans who do not train adequately for the distance? Yes. This is no different than the rest of life--there people who take jobs they are underqualified for, people who become parents who have no business doing so, and so on. We're human beings, and all of us do stupid things at one time or another.

It gets a bit complicated, though, when you have thousands of people in an event, most of whom are trusting the Race Director to have enough support on the course to get them through. It's one thing to do a self-supported event. I've run a marathon and done an Ironman that way. Would I want to do that with 30,000 of my closest friends? No. It's just very hard to manage. But if I show up for an event that I've paid for with the expectation that it will provide for my basic fluid and nutritional needs, then I expect that to happen, under whatever weather conditions exists. At IM Wisconsin 2005, I chose to pull myself out upon learning the bike aid stations were out of Gatorade. I could have continued, and I did my share of belly aching afterwards, because I felt the RD failed to meet my expectations. I wasn't undertrained--I just went in with the expectation that I could obtain enough nutrition for me to safely continue. I was bitter about it for some time, but it's in the past now, and I've lived to race another day.

Everyone, including the RD, knew how hot it was projected to be yesterday (and there was even a statement about it on the marathon website several days in advance). I have no idea how difficult it would be for an RD to order enough fluid and have it available on course to support 40,000 hot runners. Those of us who have done Ironman or even shorter triathlons know about running in the heat. We expect to have water to douse our heads, ice to put into our hats, and a buffet table laden with many choices to nourish ourselves. But there aren't 40,000 of us, or even the 30,000 (reports say 10,000 chose not to start at all yesterday). So the logistics are very different.

Could the RD have acquired and stocked enough water and Gatorade for all the runners given the heat conditions? I don't know. Was the decision to stop the race for some runners the right thing to do? If the RD knew they were out of supplies, then I suppose so. Sure there are some people who can (and did) make do by purchasing (or begging for) supplies so they could finish, but the longer you are out there, the more difficult it becomes to manage thousands of people.

I am very sorry for the man who died, and for all the runners who were hospitalized. I do not pass judgment on their fitness to complete a marathon.

I am sorry for runners who were denied their first or their 20th marathon finish.

I am sorry for the RD having to make tough decisions on a tough day.

There are going to be a lot of "what ifs" and finger pointing. It is, after all the City of Chicago. But sometimes things don't go the way we want, and we just need to move on.