The ugly side of the London Marathon 2019 #NotInclusive

18 watchers

First
Prev
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Next
Last

Surrey Phil May 2019 8:05pm, 1 May 2019 2,988 posts	0 Surrey Phil Michael Watson aside, I find it incredible that you can put on a deep-sea diver's costume, for example, and take a week to complete the course and still be an official finisher. Almost anyone can break the marathon up into chunks and do it over a number of days. Tim Peake apparantly completed the 2016 VMLM from space (according to some sources). That would have set an awkward precedent if VMLM had officially recognised it, leading to hundreds of VMLM hopefuls getting on their treadmills at 10.00 am. Sorry, just a few London Marathon gripes that needed venting. Out of interest, have any of this year's cheats been named and shamed yet, assuming there are some of course?
Homer May 2019 9:23pm, 1 May 2019 12,587 posts	0 Homer telegraph.co.uk
Wombling Plodder (Welsh Womble) May 2019 7:47am, 2 May 2019 2,642 posts	0 Wombling Plodder (Welsh Womble) More on BBC2 this morning, around 1am with Victoria Derbyshire
Fragile Do Not Bend May 2019 7:48am, 2 May 2019 4,378 posts	0 Fragile Do Not Bend It got a brief mention on BBC Breakfast too. 😀
Fragile Do Not Bend May 2019 8:00am, 2 May 2019 4,380 posts	0 Fragile Do Not Bend bbc.com
Lorraine May 2019 8:23am, 2 May 2019 1,464 posts	0 Lorraine I know the pacer. They were late in crossing the start line. This was not taken into account. She knew exactly what pace to go at and where she needed to be at certain times. She was actually told to go faster and no she was not going to slowly. She wanted to give the 7:30 runners a fantastic experience after all running is meant to be an all inclusive sport. There is a lot going on behind the scenes to make sure this doesn’t happen again. There will be a party at the back next year supporting all the slower runners. She is on Victoria Derbyshire this morning.
Albert O Balsam May 2019 11:32am, 2 May 2019 530 posts	0 Albert O Balsam Hi Surrey Phil -give a few days and I'm sure Marathon Investigations will have something marathoninvestigation.com Oh -just checked and he's started already !
larkim May 2019 11:41am, 2 May 2019 7,370 posts	0 larkim @HG - no problem with your gentle disagreements! On selfies, of course everyone has the right to do that. But IMHO a pacer should be just that - someone who is pacing evenly from A to B to achieve a specific time. Not someone stopping to take selfies! But perhaps things are different in the 17+ minute miling world of 7:30 pacing. I'm not dismissive of people for whom 7h30 to cover 26.2 miles is a big achievement (though I might personally have a view that if they trained just a little bit, many of them would find sub 6 hours being more than achievable - though of course that won't apply to all!) But the pre-race documentation was clear for all to see, with specific times at which things would shut and pavement based running was all but guaranteed for anyone looking to start at around 11am and progress at over 7hr pace.
larkim May 2019 11:49am, 2 May 2019 7,371 posts	0 larkim My main gripe is that her post makes it look as if she was hard done by - when in fact if she'd read the race booklet in advance she'd have known what was coming her way. She says:- "During mile 11 one of the course cars pulled up and a VLM rep popped out and started walking with me. She told me I'd have to up to a 7hr pace or be moved on to pavement for the rest of the race" The race booklet says:- "The Course Closed Vehicle travels at a seven-hour pace and crosses the Start Line at 11:00, moments after the final participants. If you do not stay ahead of the Course Closed Vehicle, you will be required to move onto the pavement to complete the event. Further information is available below." Putting aside the fact that they were set off at 11:04 (was that their choice, not clear from her post, but I'd say in general that a pacer can get themselves where they want to be in the pen to get themselves across the start line at the correct time), VLM officials in the race, the cleaners, the pavement running etc - were all as the race booklet described, so for her to say that it was a surprise just demonstrates her ignorance of the race booklet. Now, if her post had been 4 weeks ago and saying "VLM have asked for a 7.5 hour pacer, but I've read the booklet and it looks like it will be a poor show because we'll be on the pavements and they'll have closed down the water stations etc before we get there" I'd have a lot of sympathy. But ignornace and then complaint when VLM did what they said they were going to do doesn't sit well with me!
Fragile Do Not Bend May 2019 3:35pm, 2 May 2019 4,381 posts	0 Fragile Do Not Bend She did say somewhere that the final pen were supposed to start at about 10:48 but weren’t allowed to start until after 11am. Even if what you say about the pavement running is true, the finish line close time was 7pm so anyone on schedule to finish before that time should have access to the water stations, not have the course taken down around you to the extent that you don’t know where you should be going, and not have the timing mats removed so can’t be tracked.