Umm, OK wrote:
Peculiar Roy wrote:
This is BS. There was Columbus, Philadelphia, Chicago, etc...back in the 1980's. Heck , Greg Meyer ran his first in Detroit in 1980 and had the fastest debut marathon until Salazar broke it weeks later. You probably are clueless on him winning Chicago the next year in sub 2:11. Shorter courses?? Talk to David Katz, you sir are clueless.
If you are talking about depth, look at the results of those races and see how many guy broke 2:30 as it wasn't all NY and Boston, no way.
I agree with Roy. There were races everywhere. They wanted certified measurement. Then they could claim Boston Qualifier status. The race brochures actually said that: TAC (what USATF was called) Certified Course. Official Boston Qualifier. The local guys who won the small-time races in your area would go to Boston, but they regularly ran decent times at the races in you state. Roy points out that even stars would run less-well-known events.
'races everywhere?' Huh?
there literally wasn't a first-class marathon in the entire western region of America in the 80s.
Should I repeat that?
SF existed but it was a novelty race because hills.
CMA didn't exist. LA didn't exist.
those guys had to go to Boston or NYC to run fast. or Grandma's I guess.
That's a hundred million people with no major marathon in their state so they went to Boston or NYC.
As for certification - I'm not saying certification didn't exist. I am saying that fewer courses were certified back then. I'm sure Katz would heartily agree with that.