Forums >General Running>Chattanooga Marathon - Short Course
I ran the Chattanooga Marathon on Sunday, March 6, as part of my 50 states quest. I had my Garmin and it had me hitting the miles slightly before the actual mile markers for the first five miles. This is expected behavior since we can seldom run the tangents. However, after an out and back segment I came to the six mile mark when my Garmin was only showing 5.5 miles. The mile marks after that maintained about the same discrepancy, so it appears only the sixth mile was off. On Tuesday I downloaded the USATF certification map for the course and compared it to my Garmin track and found that the turnaround for the course was at 49th Street instead of 51st Street. This was the only part of the course where there was an out and back with a turnaround.
On Wednesday a couple of local media outlets were reporting that the race was acknowledging that the turnaround point had been misplaced due to human error and the marathon course was actually 0.28 miles short. The half marathon that was run on a different course was not impacted. Apparently this came to light to the race director on Sunday evening but there still has been no official notification to the marathoners.
This was the first time the Chattanooga Marathon was run. However, there is a marathon in the fall with a companion half marathon (put on by a different organization) that had problems with the half marathon being short by about a half mile last fall. This turnaround was the only turnaround on the entire course. Given a turnaround being set improperly would have a high impact on the course distance, I would have thought it would have been carefully checked, especially given the bad feelings left by the short course for the half last fall. I am also surprised that a turnaround can be off by two city blocks.
What is most surprising is the lack of communication from the Chattanooga Marathon on this issue. I realize that they are trying to determine what to do (adjust times, communicate with Boston about BQs, etc), but there has been no real acknowledgement of the error days later (none on Facebook, event web site, or personal email). I suspect they only came out to the local media because the media called them.
an amazing likeness
It happens.
I've personally been in races with bad courses from (1) human error at turnaround cone or turn too early direction by the course workers (as you note here), (2) courses that were just wrong distance due to RD incompetence, (3) a case where some runners were sent one way until another course worker corrected it, and the remaining runners ran the planned course.
I've heard of it being done, but never experienced a case where they did some form of time adjustment.
One race where the 1st 100 or so runners were misdirected and we shorted the course, the RD was adamant post-race that nothing was wrong, even going as far on the race's facebook page to tell runners reporting the problem they were no welcome back to the race. He had a pretty solid hissy about it, insisting nothing was wrong until he finally looked at the course tracks logged by a slew of runners and admitted the problem. That was entertaining.
Stuff happens, sorry to hear it hit you in a state destination race. Bummer.
mta: I think the reality is the only thing the RD can do is (1) apologize and be transparent about what happened, and (2) offer discounted entry for the race next year, or another race she/he/they promote.
Acceptable at a dance, invaluable in a shipwreck.
I absolutely agree that it happens and I probably would not posted if there had been some acknowledgement to the marathoners by the race organization by now (on Facebook, event website, or email blast). Leaving us without information leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I am also bothered by the following:
There were issues with the length of a different course last fall in Chattanooga and the Chattanooga organizers played it up in their pre-event publicity they were taking extra measures to make sure there was no a repeat. Yes I know you can never eliminate all possible human error.
The marathon course had only one turnaround, so some extra attention could have been applied to make sure that was right.
The course was USATF certified. The certification map is available online and clearly shows where the turnaround was to be. Not all courses are certified, so when you advertise certified I have a higher expectation the course will be the required length with the short course prevention factor. Yes I know that even with certification, the race organization is still dependent on the course being properly set on race day.
I have been a race director for smaller and shorter races and know that you are at the mercy of your volunteers. I know as a race director I always traveled the length of the race course on race morning to make sure the main course markings were in the right place and that no one had tampered with them.
Yes it happened and I will move on, but some communication from the race organization to the marathoners would help me to move on.
Course layout is 100% on the RD. That's one you don't leave to volunteers. You mark it yourself and you check it twice. Pretty much period.
It's a bummer but hey. Before you invest a training cycle on a marathon you have to do you your homework on the race, who is behind it, what's their track record, etc. That is if you care about little things like an accurate course, scoring, and timing. You know, the absolute must have's of a road race.
Runners run
2011 Green Bay Cellcom Marathon course was long due to a misplaced turn. "Official" times were adjusted to reflect the extra distance.
There are so many things that are out of the control of the RD. The course shouldn't be one of them.
not bad for mile 25
2011 Green Bay Cellcom Marathon course was long due to a misplaced turn. "Official" times were adjusted to reflect the extra distance. There are so many things that are out of the control of the RD. The course shouldn't be one of them.
Adjusting time due to a short course is more fraught than a long course - it's easier to go short than too long. In this case especially, I would not expect Boston to make allowances.
In this case especially, I would not expect Boston to make allowances.
I suspected that...and in this case the course was over a qtr mile short.
Yes, this sucks and I agree with you. I once ran a race where the course was certified but the markings were off and there were hardly any course monitors so people got off track/lost and ran way longer than necessary. Not too bad unless you were trying to get a PR. Argh. Certification is only as good if the course is marked and monitored. The RD never apologized or even acknowledged the error.
I discovered afterwards that many people used social media like facebook to create negative comments. You can also check out marathonguide.com and voice comments there. Runners will stop showing up if a race is not managed well or has too much negative publicity associated with it.
"Shut up Legs!" Jens Voigt
There was a marathon in Alaska last year that had a similar problem, the course was certified but some volunteers were misplaced and directed the runners to turn too soon and it left the course almost a mile short. I think that Boston allowed people to qualify from that race by prorating their times. Here is an article on the race https://www.adn.com/article/20150819/boston-marathon-will-honor-adjusted-big-wild-life-times
I watched that facebook meltdown in real time. It was a case study in what not to do.
And then there was the Misdirection in Manchvegas.
Okay, almost a full mile short, and Boston accepted it. I guess I'm wrong about that.
delicate flower
I was checking out the event's facebook page and they don't respond to anything...no response to questions or comments about anything pre or post race. I hate organizations that have a FB page and just post shit without actively engaging their customers or responding to their comments.
<3
The Chattanooga Sports Committee, organizers of the Chattanooga Marathon, finally sent an email late yesterday apologizing for the short course. I responded to their email asking whether there would be a refund or partial refund. The response was that they would meet to consider that next week. I am not holding my breath on a refund.
While I understand that mistakes do occur, I am more irritated by their lack of communication about what happened. They knew about it Sunday afternoon, but the first official acknowledgement to the marathoners was the email late on Friday. They made a statement to the press on Tuesday when they were called by local media outlets asking about runner complaints online. I think they were only prodded to send the email when they saw the amount of negative publicity continuing to grow in various media outlets and on Facebook.
Sorry to hear you were victim of this. I was part of the pace team.. I just helped for the half, now I'm thankful for it. My friends were pretty pissed about the full, around here it was a surprisingly big news story. Because it happened so early, all of the pace team had to adjust and I think for the most part they compensated but I'm sure it bummed them out. We had been talking about it as soon as the race was over but I knew it hit the news when people at work started asking me about it..
Just ran a 5k today and people asked me if I ran the full and were gossiping about it. I'm sure the race committee people are laying low due to the overwhelming response that happened back in the fall half marathon (which is still a big gossip point..), what's not comforting is these 2 races have 2 separate running clubs coordinating them so now we don't know if we can ever trust these people.
I just wanted to clarify that the organization that put on the Chattanooga Marathon was the Chattanooga Sports Committee which I understand is part of the Convention and Visitors Bureau. The Chattanooga Track Club did provide support for the Chattanooga Marathon, but this was primarily in obtaining and ccordinating volunteers. The Chattanooga Track Club puts on the Chickamauga Battlefield Marathon just across the state line in Georgia in the fall. This is a well organized marathon and has had no problems.