Marathon "selfies" causing injuries (Read 418 times)

And that's exactly why I take my race selfies beforehand.

Have never seen that in a race.

I did almost get run over by a buck during the WhistleStop marathon one year. (The deer kind, not the legal tender sort)

Something similar happened to me several weeks ago. I love running at night, in the dark and I was running through a thickly wooded area and passed a house with a security light. When the light came on, I heard a bunch of trampling behind me. As I turned, I suddenly saw four doe sprint passed me. I could have reached out and touched them. Afterwards, my wife asked what took me so long, and I replied, "well, it's not like I can out run a deer or anything..." Now, can you imagine THAT selfie, (with the four deer in the background, trying to catch up)???

 

Heh...I thought the same thing.  I'm guessing folks taking selfies are not there to race.  Fortunately the closer you are to the front of the field, the less of an issue this becomes.

I don't treat every race as an "A" race.  I'm not looking to PR every race I enter.

In my most recent race that I referred to earlier, it was a last minute decision to enter the race.  I treated the race as a "C" race.

I was doing a half marathon, and my last 2 cold weather half marathons were 1:50:00's (entered as "B" type races).  I was hoping to do 1:55:00 or thereabout.  I took pictures along the way and wanted to enjoy my race in Hawaii.  I ended out finishing in 1:43:00, and was only 80 seconds off my PR.

In training for my first marathon so I can't speak from experience, but I don't think I'd want to carry a bulky and heavy smart phone on a marathon. Too much of a pain. Reminds my of that Jim Carrey comedy movie where they do jogging photography.

 

I carry a slim non-bulky iphone at large marathon and half marathons, mostly to coordinate with people at the end. It sits in my waist pocket the entire race but I have found it essential to communicate with friends and family at the finish.

I once spent an hour shivering in the cold at where I thought our meeting place was before my husband who was bringing me warm dry clothes figured out where I was. Another time I ended up in the medical tent briefly and it would have been useful to have a phone to let me family know where I was. I was sure glad I had it with me at Boston when I was stopped at mile 25.5 with hundreds of other runners. I was able to let my family know I was okay and learn that they were all right and I lent it to several other runners who did not have phones.

I noticed many runners stopping along the route to take selfies and pictures of the scenery at the New York City marathon. Most of them were international runners. They stopped on the side of the course at the bridges and did not cause any problems as far as I could tell.

So a ban on cell phones doesn't make sense to me, but selfies while running seems like a recipe for trouble.

For an additional $50 I will also update to their FB or twitter accounts.

I was looking at a few web sites for trail runs in Europe.  For several of them, there is a mandatory gear check, and a working cell phone is required.

As far as danger, I ran a 10-mile race a year or so ago and there was a lady yacking away on her cell phone.  It was fairly crowded so dozens of people nearby had to listen to her unending stream of drivel.  I was afraid somebody was going to actually do what I was merely fantasizing about and beat the living crap out of her.

As in so many other aspects of life, a little consideration for others and some common sense could solve the problem for all.

Nope.  In this case, nature must take its course.

 

Nope.  In this case, nature must take its course.

Yeah!!! Darwin FTW!!

Oh, wait, no!!! Let it become a massive trend!!! less competition XD