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Competing marathons

As happens every few years, the Chicago and Twin Cities marathons will be on the same weekend this year. And again, some people make comments like this:

Twin Cities and Chicago marathons
are both scheduled for Oct 7 .... What's up with that? Is this a one time deal, or are
they planning on going head-to-head every year?

I just don't get why this is an issue. For sure, they're in the same region of the country, they're always around the same time of year, they certainly compete for the affections of runners from Wisconsin, and you have to enter insanely early for both. But even when they're three weeks apart (like in 2006) I can guarantee you the number of people who ran both (or even thought of running both) is trivially small.

Just by being held in the same month Twin Cities and Chicago are competing. After that it scarcely matters whether they're on the same weekend or not.

On the topic of Twin Cities I'll make a prediction. There will be few Americans up the front of the marathon. If you're on the verge of qualifying for the Olympic Trials (2:47 or 2:22) you don't choose the course with the 150 foot climb at mile 20, you go to Chicago and hope for a calm day. On the other side of the ledger, men who have already qualified for the Olympic trials won't be running a marathon one month out. My brave prediction is that a Kenyan or Russian will win.

Posted by eroberts at February 20, 2007 9:34 AM