A Record Year for RRTC!
This summary is based on the course list as it existed on February 28, 2007. It was assumed that most of the year 2006 courses had been received, although a few are likely still enroute to Course Registrar Stu Riegel. Here is how we did last year:
Most active certifier: Tom McBrayer – 120 (111 in 2005)
Most active measurer: John Ferguson, with 37 (28 in 2005)
Most active state: Texas, with 164 courses certified (146 in 2005)
Measurers active in 2006: 276 (254 in 2005)
State with most active measurers: New York - 26 (24 in 2005)
Courses certified in 2006: 1428 (1385 in 2005) All time record!
New measurers in 2006: 56 (42 in 2005)
LENGTHS OF COURSES CERTIFIED IN 2006
Length Number Percent
5 km 729 51.1
10 km 154 10.8
Half Marathon 111 7.8
Calibration 87 6.1
Marathon 77 5.4
8 km 45 3.2
5 miles 34 2.4
10 miles 32 2.2
1 mile 27 1.9
4 miles 21 1.5
15 km 16 1.1
Other 95 6.7
Total 1428 100
A note on how the information was compiled: The course list was downloaded from the USATF web site just after Stu’s February 28 list posting, and used without any editing, and massaged using the various sorting and table-making capabilities of Microsoft Excel. Thus, several distances listed on the same certificate will each count as a separate course. Mike Wickiser noticed this in a past year, saying:
“I differ from your calculation for most active certifier. While Tom McBrayer certified 132 distances, 20 of those were dual distance certs. Jay Wight issued 124 measurement certificates. Going over the list, it appears about 12 of Jay's certs could have been combined (same race name with 5k/10k distances). This brings Jay & Tom into a dead heat with 112 each.” This same sort of thing will probably be present in this year’s review. With a world full of injustice, you might as well get your share from your friends.
In this summary only the surnames of measurers are used. Thus those who share a surname will move higher on the list than those who do not. Using first names or initials would partially rectify this, but at present I do not know how to do it. The course list exists for analysis should anyone seek to do this.
Calibration courses count as much as full-length race courses. Should they be included? How about giving more credit for marathons than 5 km courses? Lots of things are possible.
Also, as in any large database, the course list contains errors. They are constantly being found and corrected, but any errors in the listing will find their way into the yearly summary.
So, what you see is almost, but not quite, completely accurate…………………….Pete Riegel
There are two more pages too detailed to present here. The complete report may be downloaded from
2006 RRTC Stats
Click on 2006RRTCStatisticalSummary.pdf