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8 Feb
11:18am, 8 Feb 2025
7,449 posts
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Blister
I've been running for nearly 21 years now and in that time I've completed nearly 300 races. Mostly track races these days, but I do like to compete in XC and occasionally a road race. I've never 'competed' in a virtual race and in fact, I'd never heard of them before 2020. They made sense during lockdown, but I've noticed there are still a lot of them around - I keep getting them advertised to me on Instagram. I've never had the desire to enter one, especially with the (often extortionate) prices they charge. The only thing that does seem to stand it is they often give you a unique and really cool-looking medal.
Has anyone here done one? What do you think of them? Are they worth the money?
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8 Feb
11:28am, 8 Feb 2025
62,200 posts
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EvilPixie
I did for the cool medal in lockdown but wouldn’t now
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8 Feb
11:43am, 8 Feb 2025
3,770 posts
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Muttley
I do like a medal (as per my forum name!) but these virtual events leave me cold. Basically you're just buying a gong. I suppose if you actually do the distance in your own way it's still an achievement (and that might matter to some folk depending on their circumstances), but I prefer real races.
But each to their own, I won't badmouth those who like these events.
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8 Feb
11:48am, 8 Feb 2025
3,410 posts
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Jen HB
There's a local company I've used in the past which does virtual 'races' and also total distance for the month/year. They are very reasonably priced and a good chunk goes to the named charity for that medal.
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8 Feb
1:12pm, 8 Feb 2025
4,527 posts
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Big_G
I did a virtual New York Marathon in 2023, which guaranteed me an entry into 2024s in person race, and that is the only reason I entered it. There was a local marathon on the day of the virtual event, so I did the distance at that event.
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8 Feb
1:18pm, 8 Feb 2025
6,142 posts
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Shades
Never done a virtual race. IMHO they're just training runs.
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8 Feb
1:45pm, 8 Feb 2025
17,978 posts
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jennywren
I did Lands End to John o’Groats in 2020 but I wouldn’t do anything like it again. I suppose it got me out during lockdown and it was quite fun at first but got tedious after a while
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8 Feb
1:51pm, 8 Feb 2025
16,506 posts
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Ally-C
Don’t really care about medals I’ve got boxes full of them.
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8 Feb
1:57pm, 8 Feb 2025
73,665 posts
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Velociraptor
I did a few in 2020 - a SWCP challenge that quite a lot of Fetchies joined so there was an online social/competitive element, the Virtual VMLM (my best ever London Marathon experience) and a Centurion one with a charity connection that caught my attention. And I've done some of the mile and 4k virtual races that Fetchies have listed in the past few years (there's also a monthly virtual 5k). I can't imagine paying to do a virtual race or wanting a medal for it now.
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8 Feb
2:12pm, 8 Feb 2025
798 posts
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Runningbauble21
I've done one before, it was one of those run the distance ones. Paid my money and then realised I could just upload a load of previous training runs from strava so from entry to completion took me about 2 minutes 😂 Then I realised I'd just purchased a completely meaningless medal and never entered one again.
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The virtual mile thread
Feb 2025