Arien O’Connell, fastest runner in Nike Marathon declared “a” winner.
Last Sunday was the day for the womans Nike marathon. Arien O’Connell ran the fastest time at 2 hours 55 minutes, however she was not declared “the” winner. She was contacted today (Wednesday) to be declared “a” winner, because she was not in the elite category which was given a 20 minute head start.
I’m a little confused on how I read the article, not sure if it meant she wasn’t considered the winner because she had 20 minutes on the other category, or if because she started 20 minutes behind others? If she started 20 minutes behind another category and she run the fastest, I do not see why she would not be declared the winner. However, even if she had started 20 minutes ahead of others, if she ran it the fastest in 2 hours 55 minutes, and the fastest in the other category was 3 hours and 6 minutes, shouldn’t she have still been declared the winner with the fastest time?
I believe this is the same marathon Kina Grannis ran in to support the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (LLS). You can read the post here.
October 25th, 2008 at 2:51 pm
The “elite” runners all ran together and started 20 minutes ahead. They did this so that the media could easily track the top contenders and so that each of these elite runners could know who else was gaining on them, etc. Arien ran a faster race because the computer chip in her shoe recorded that the time from the time she crossed the starting line to the time she crossed the finish line was shorter than the woman who finished first. The woman who finished first had started 20 minutes before Arien did, so she finished well ahead of Arien, but her time (according to to the computer chip in her shoe) was not as fast. The issue is a problem because Nora (the woman who finished first) didn’t know that Arien was running faster than she was, since Arien had started later and therefore was well behind her. Nora couldn’t speed up her race to account for the fact that Arien was behind her. Arien, however, hadn’t been told that she was fast enough to be an “elite” runner for this race, so there was no way that she could have been given the chance to start with the other fastest women runners 20 minutes ahead of time.
October 25th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
Thank you for the comment, I can see how things got confusing. I guess now she knows she can rank with the elites for the next time, but at least in the end she was noticed.