Forums >Racing>What proportion of runners qualify for Boston?
The Irreverent Reverend
I was trying to explain the significance of Boston to a non-runner. He asked me how many marathoners qualify - not necessarily run the race, but are fast enough to qualify - for Boston each year. Do any of you know this? Is it 10% of marathoners? More? Less?
Thanks.
Husband. Father of three. Lutheran pastor. National Guardsman. Runner. Political junkie. Baseball fan.
My guess would be less than 10%,
But I feel that the percentage that could qualify is far greater.
If you really want the answer you could look up the results from a few marathons by AG, count the qualifiers compared to finishers and have a "close enough" answer.
I bet less than 10%.
Make something up that sounds impressive, but I don't think there's a "right" answer. Just sound authoritative. Add a decimal. Like, "oh, yeah, Bob, I checked, and according to World Marathon dB, it was 5.7% from 2000-2010."
Come all you no-hopers, you jokers and roguesWe're on the road to nowhere, let's find out where it goes
10% is a very good guess. This article is a couple years old but it used a sampling of 22 US marathons covering 108,000 finishers, or about 15% of all US marathon finishers. It's probably a decent enough sample size.
It shows that in 2012 the percentage of marathoners who qualified for Boston was 9.13%.
Runners run
Are some runners counted twice in this sample?
I gotta believe some runners are counted multiple times. There's probably a maniac or two who are counted 22 (or 21) times.
delicate flower
Which puts me in the 90.87% majority. Hmph.
<3
+1
Who wants to be a ten-percenter anyway?
Dave
It puts me in the 99.9% majority who didn't even run a marathon in 2012. Well, not a certified one anyway.
ultramarathon/triathlete
The correct answer: 100%
Everyone else is not a real runner.
(I kid, I kid!)
HTFU? Why not!
USATF Coach
Empire Tri Club CoachGatorade Endurance Team
#artbydmcbride
Some runners don't even run marathons at all!
No more marathons
If you take the results for Boston out, which by definition are repeats, the percent goes down to 8%.
Boston 2014 - a 33 year journey
Lordy, I hope there are tapes.
He's a leaker!
Super Pro Lurker
Not necessarily: I qualified to run Boston by running Boston. So theoretically I could keep running it each year without running another marathon as long as I continued to qualify.
Plus the sample only covers 15% of US marathons so most of the people who were qualified and qualified again at Boston probably ran their original qualifier at a race that's not captured in the sample. They would not be counted twice "by definition."
But we're way down in the weeds now.
With all this math we still have not significantly improved upon the original 10% guess.