Fast Running Blog

I was talking to a girl friend of mine (girl that's a friend, mind), and she asked me why the top runners list was just guys. So I looked it over and told her that there were no age or sex criteria on it... but then I notice that it did say "men" at the top.

So we were curious who the top female runners are on this blog. It would help out specifically for some of my girl friends (girls that are friends, mind) that are looking for some inspiration or training advice from some of the top women athletes we have.

Graig:

I do not think we have 10 women yet who have even finished a marathon. I hope this will change after St. George. I'll make a list of women then.

Wow- I didn't realize that the women marathon pool was that small on this site. I made the assumption that since the Provo 1/2 Marathon has twice as many women participants as men, this site would have at least as many women as men and most would have completed marathons. I'll recruit some more to start up some blogs. :)

Thanks for the interest and reply.

To encourage the currently blogging women to try running a marathon, and to encourage non-blogging women to sign up I added the current top 3 condition/course profile adjusted women marathon performers lists at

http://fastrunningblog.com/top_runners.php

I hope to be seriously updating it after St. George.

We really need to recruit some more women, eh?  Still only 4 women.  Hmmm. 

I noticed you updated the women's list after the weekend, at least partially. What about maaron? Negative-splitting Chicago should be worth some serious points on the Sasha-O-Meter.

I have no idea what her Chicago run is worth exactly. It would probably put her in 4th place. At this point, I am just going to wait until her next marathon, which she would probably do under 3:30, and will be hands down better performance.

I guess I'll finally pipe in, although Sasha won't let me put the apostrophe in my username. :(
My suggestion is that at this point, every girl on the blog who has run a marathon should be on the Top Runners list. Who's to say what a qualified cutoff time is? (I guess Sasha!) To me finishing is good. There should be the same amount of girls/guys on the list and since there probably aren't 12 girls on the blog who have run a marathon, every girl that has should be on there. So Maaron, Christi, Sarah, etc. Just my two cents (and that's about all it's worth!).

If I let anybody in at the time the field is not very deep, once we start getting a lot of people on the blog, I would have to kick some people off. I do not want to have to do that. So for now I am leaning for sub 2:30 for men (general standard for comp entries), and 3:40 for women (Boston Qualifier for women under 35). I think it is more than generous in the direction of making it easier for women. Men would have to run 40 minutes faster than their Boston Qualifier standard to make the list, while women just have to meet the standard. Also, men would have to run 1 hour and 10 minutes faster than women to make the list, while the difference in the world record between men and women is only 11 minutes, and on average, a major marathon male winner is  usually 15-20 minutes ahead of the female winner with the prize money structure usually being the same for both genders.