Race Monitoring Protocol

The COURSE certification is valid regardless of what happens during the race. We don't certify races.

Mark, I agree. But WHY do we certify courses? Not, I think, just to have a certified course, but to help ensure that runners have a correctly measured course to run. So to the extent that race managers don't pay attention to key details, they are not only cheating the runners, but also making our efforts that much less meaningful.

But anyway, I would really like to hear from you and other measurers on the questions I posed. I'm curious to know whether it's a widespread problem or perhaps more the exception than the rule.

First, I agree with Mark.

I know this has happened to some courses I measured, but there is little we can do.

Maybe the measurer should charge an extra fee to be there on race day to make sure the course is run as Certified(only kidding).

Actually a few events do pay me to do just that (Marine Corps Marathon has done this for about 30 years). The marines always have the manpower and organization to fix anything that needs to be fixed. Not always true with other events, and there's a limit to how much I want to drag heavy cones around by myself if they're not right!

Bob and I are hired by another mega-race in D.C. every year to ensure course layout is performed properly, according to Bob's excellent certification map. It is never completely right until we step in. We always need to schlep around a lot of cones in the early morning hours, correcting the configuration. The Ops director of this race just knows the course will be laid out as certified only if Bob and I are on site to make adjustments, despite dozens of course layout volunteers out there, and he knows we'll earn our stipend every race day. We wish there were more like him.

In my experience, few race organizers and course layout staff understand that going around a traffic circle, for instance, on the side it was measured, is not the same as just going around it any old way. They don't understand how laying out cones to allow runners to take the tangent instead of causing them to run to the "wrong" side or down the middle of the road matters.

I understand Bob's frustration about races taking the trouble to certify and then do a sloppy or downright incompetent job of course layout. Especially when we measurers hear about it from participants in a screwed-up event, those participants not grasping that they did not run the course as measured. I hate to seem as though I am discriminating when I say it matters more in some races than others, but I suspect most of us agree, if only in private. Duane includes a disclaimer on all his maps that the course is valid only if laid out properly. A good CYA practice, I suppose. But does doing this actually result in fewer shoddy layouts on certified courses?

My hope is that, when the race director or course director sees that on the map, it encourages them to take more care to set out the course properly. It also alerts runners who look at the map that the race is responsible for setting the course out properly.

The New York Road Runners are very good about making sure their courses are set up as measured. To that end someone from their events staff usually accompanies Dave Katz and I when we do a measurement. It's extremely crucial in Central Park races since the lane restrictions may vary from race to race and even within the same event.

I am glad to hear that, having done a validation ride in the 90's that resulted in record claims being rejected-- exactly because the lane restrictions in Central Park were not really enforced.

I suspect that a locally-based organization like NYRRC is more likely to get these things right than a nationally based operation. One thing I've noticed about some of the out-of-town races is an obsession with detailed plans for the start-finish area, where all the tents and trucks will be, with local measurers more or less expected to measure the course to fit into those plans. It would be good if organizers were willing to pay detailed attention to the course, even if it may be rare to find folks willing to follow you and David around in the middle of the night!

There's a race local to me that I measured and certified a few years back at the request of the RD. Every year he sends out one of his volunteers to mark the course which is done using a truck, ignores my marks which are still there. The truck marking always comes out short and different from year to year. Makes me wonder why I was asked to measure it in the first place, but all the runners are pleased with their fast times!

Are they mis-marking the Start, Finish, or some curves on the course? Seems like the truck folks would have the certification map, and use it. But, some people just do what they have always done, without regard to if it is correct, or not.