S3E6: 4 Things Every Runner Must Do This Summer

[lips smack] Um, the first thing that, um, I want to come back to, and I addressed it, I think it was back in season one, was race distance, race distances as far as looking at our GPS data versus looking at maybe the fancy schmancy website that the race has that says how long the race is.

If it's a marathon, we understand it's supposed to be, uh, um, 42.195, technically, kilometers or 26.2 miles, right? One of the things that I still am seeing is some people talking about watch time versus the actual race time, talking about, "Well, I think the course was long," right? People saying, well, um, some people said the course was long, and I ask, "Well, has the race actually announced that the course was long? Has the race had to come back and sheepishly admit that they messed things up maybe in the days prior to formally setting the course up?" Sometimes those things can happen.

It is extremely rare.

When a course is USA Track & Field certified, there are certain protocols that must be adhered to in measuring that course and then remeasuring that course, then having it officially certified by USA Track & Field such that there is, um, some consistency between races so that you can accurately then use them for Boston Marathon qualifying.

Um, if it's USATF certified, and it is a USA Track & Field sanctioned race, then it could be used for record ratification, for qualifying for US Olympic trials, global championships, things like that.

World ranking points, um, obviously are contingent on you running on courses that, um, comport with world athletic standards, and, um, part of those standards are accurately measured courses.

I know it sounds like a well duh, right? And so many times I'll have people come to me and say, "Hey, that course was long," or, "That 10K was long," or, "That half marathon, marathon was long." And they'll say, "Well, I ran, for instance, 26.47 miles." And what I'll usually say is, "No, actually, I don't think that the course was .27 long.

It's just that that's the way it goes." Um, uh, really quickly, to certify a course, um, there are certain standards that need to be adhered to, and USA Track & Field requires you, uh, to actually file a formal registration request, right? And then USA Track & Field has actual course measurers, people who are trained to know exactly how to measure a course and get the course certified, right? And they'll send, um, one of those individuals out.

You pay a fee, um, if you are trying to get your course, uh, USATF certified.

They'll come out, they'll measure the course, and then there's certain paperwork, um, that's gonna be on file so that you can then go look up course certifications, and there'll be a number or a code assigned, uh, that will, uh, uh, correspond with your course.

How is this done? Well, there's something called a Jones counter, okay? And it's actually put on the front wheel, all right, of a bicycle, okay? And it's calibrated on a 300 to anywhere, uh, up to a 500-meter course.

And this 300 to 500-meter course is laid out in a straight line, and it's actually measured with a metal tape, metal tape measure, okay? And then it's calibrated with a Jones cou- uh, counter on the front bike to, uh, of your bike to make sure that if you're riding in a straight line, you are at exactly 300 meters or at exactly 400 or 500 meters as matches the measured out, laid out course that was measured with a metal tape.

Once that's calibrated, and you know that you're, um, able to measure things accurately with your, uh, uh, bicycle, all right? Then that is what is used to actually measure courses.

Now, here's the trick though.

When courses are measured, you don't swing wide around the turns.

You don't swing wide around large arcs and curves in the courses.

Um, you, um, if you're the measurer, okay, the measurer will measure the course within 12 inches of a curve or a corner, corner or, uh, 30 centimeters, okay? And so you can imagine it, um, if you're watching on video.

You can see my hands about 12 inches apart here, okay? Um, that's really, really close to the edge of a curve.

That's really, really close to the edge of a corner.

Well, you can imagine that at almost no point, almost no point during a race are you gonna run within eight- nine, 12 inches of a curb, well, mainly because that's pretty close, and a lot of times people are scared they might even clip their foot on it.

But pragmatically, if you're running three, four, five abreast, especially if you're in the early stages of the Berlin Marathon, London Marathon, New York City Marathon, um, you might be swinging eight feet, right? So eight times the distance from the, uh, curb where the course is measured might be where you're actually running, swinging wide around a, a, a 90-degree right-hand turn, right? Where a long arcing turn on a road, you might not be, quote, running the tangents if you're running down the middle of the road instead of running within about 12 inches or 30 centimeters of the edge of the road.

So here's what happens.

It adds a few inches, maybe a couple of meters here, maybe a couple of meters there, maybe five t- meters, eight, 10 meters, you know, for a long arcing turn if you are swinging wide.

Have you ever watched a track meet? And you've got eight lanes, up to nine lanes on a typical track, and let's say they're running the 400-meter dash.

And as you can see, they use, quote, staggered starts, right? Uh, the second lane starts, quote, unquote, ahead of the person in the first lane visually, but the distance they're actually gonna run is gonna be identical, right? So you can imagine that when you are running wide around turns and everything's measured as if you're in the first lane of the track, but you are running, okay, maybe a certain distance away from a curve or a turn where you're running in the equivalent maybe of the fourth lane of the track.