Comments on: NYCM Qualifying Times for Men vs. Women

By: Robert James Reese

Robert James Reese — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:56:01 +0000

I’d agree with that. It definitely seems like there are more casual women runners out there.

By: Sarah

Sarah — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:33:29 +0000

I think that it’s the competitive aspect, or lack thereof for most women. They are trying to get more women running in the races but most women don’t care, really, how fast they go. At least, that’s been my experience.

By: Robert James Reese

Robert James Reese — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 03:08:38 +0000

It would be so interesting to see a comparison of what the human body is capable of at a certain age to the average times posted by that same age. I imagine that your theory is right and that you’d see (especially in women, but probably in men too) a significant increase in the percentage of achievement to potential after people move into their 30s.

By: Robert James Reese

Robert James Reese — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 03:05:38 +0000

You’re right, Joe, I wasn’t taking age into account. I realize my stats weren’t perfect, but I didn’t have the time to account for age as well or do a larger sampling of races.

By: Julie

Julie — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 21:46:28 +0000

Yeah, I was going to mention age. This is anecdotal, but I’ve noticed that by and large the women’s 35-39 and 40-44 AGs are the most competitive. If you really wanted to go all anal with the data analysis, you could review AGs for those qualifying patterns to see if that theory holds water.

Speaking of theories, mine is that a lot of women wake up in their 30s and 40s and realize that if they train they can run fast. Or maybe their kids are in school/grown, so they have more time to pursue running.

Anyway, this is one reason I’m happy to be moving into 45-49 in a couple of months…

So where’s the Run Up report?

By: JoeGarland

JoeGarland — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 14:01:05 +0000

Women’s qualifying times have generally been much softer than men’s. For the 2008 OT, the men’s A was 2:20 and B 2:22 and the women’s were 2:39 and 2:47. I think it’s a question of depth of field. (And men’s standards are softer than they used to be; 1984: 2:19:04. But that trend is turning.)

For NY, the standards used to be higher. When I first looked at them, in 2004, the men’s 40-49 was 1:24. It then went to 1:28 and to its current 1:30. NYRR presumably concluded it could accommodate more runners. I think in part its an effort by NYRR to promote a certain level of local runner, make life a bit easier, which may not be fair and probably is arbitrary, but which I appreciate.

But the numbers themselves are somewhat arbitrary, I agree. You have 10 year ranges so in one day I gained ten minutes of cushion. Using age-graded figures makes sense and would probably be fairer, but there’s a certain beauty in a static number. I’d go for age-graded though.

And to be clear, Robert, for those four races I think you took how many people of each sex were under the open qualifying time, without regard to age. I’m surprised that Grete was so low since it was a club race.

By: Sweet Ellipses… « Pigtails Flying

Sweet Ellipses… « Pigtails Flying — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 02:54:09 +0000

[...] like that, an awful lot… Here is a very interesting examination of how premier races set qualifying standards for women and men. The real meat is in the comments… I am pleased to announce the winnders of [...]

By: Robert James Reese

Robert James Reese — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 02:22:59 +0000

I’m starting to feel like the numbers could be rearranged to justify just about any qualifying time. There are so many different statistics to look at. I guess it is more complicated than just AG%.

By: TK

TK — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 18:13:59 +0000

This is a superfascinating post and stream of comments. Of course, for runners like me it’s just an exercise in fantasy (doubt I’ll ever be fast enough to “NYCQ”) but it’s good to know that the analysis has been done!

By: Flo

Flo — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 23:45:25 +0000

Don’t know if this helps, but Jim2, the information man extraordinaire on Runners World and of course, on his own site http://mysite.verizon.net/jim2wr/ posted an interesting table today.

Putting aside the WR holders, between the average men’s and women’s winning times in 227 US marathons run in 2008, there is a 19.5% difference in Open Class. Which means the NYC Marathon qualifying times at your age are actually more generous for men than for women! 3:23 – 19.5% = 2:43.

Here’s the thread (scroll down for the full table)
http://www.runnersworld.com/community/forums/training/marathon-race-training/gender-equivalent