SS Debates: Mumbai Marathon 2013 screening out first timers - Justified?

“The 10th edition of the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon will be open to runners who had participated in two previous marathons organized by Association of International Marathons and Distant Races (AIMS). There will be 250 places in the full marathon and 1000 in the half reserved for women. Applicants who don’t fall under the quota can avail of the spots allotted to the NGs registered with United Way of Mumbai, the official charity partner.”

To sum up, the race is closed to first timers unless they pay extra for a NGO sponsored spot or if they fall in the women’s reserved slot. Is that fair? It must be or it wouldn’t be done, right? Here are two point of views on that:

Siddarth: The Mumbai Marathon is one of the richest races in Asia. The participants numbered over 38800 last year. This time around that number might be lessened.

Zeba: Apart from being the richest, it is also the most competitive race in Asia, with participation from some of the most elite National and International athletes. Not only that, the meet also serves as a benchmark event for qualifications to other major International marathons like Boston Marathon and New York Marathon.

Siddarth: Be that as it may, it has also been one of the races which show that Indians are willing to go out in good numbers and run marathons as one. While it serves an important purpose from a competitive standpoint for our athletes to qualify, it is a race of the people and now that seems to be changing. Have you heard the latest? You need to have a certificate from a AIMS race to participate! That rules out first timers. Oh wait, no they can still participate, provided they buy the higher priced running slots from NGOs! Or if they are among the lucky women who have 250 slots reserved in the full marathon and 1000 in the half. Talk about reverse discrimination.

Zeba: As organizers of the largest athletic event in the country, it is only fair that the number of participants in the full and half marathon categories are restricted. We Indians, and especially us Mumbaikars, are a bunch of over enthusiastic people who are looking for every opportunity to come out on the streets and be a part of a mega event that also gives us a chance to hob nob with the rich and the famous. Nothing wrong with that, but just imagine the chaos on the streets had the marathon been open to the 1 billion plus population of our country! Having said that, the 10 km run is open for the general public. That qualifies for a distance run.

Siddarth: 10k is so not a distance run if you want to run a marathon.

Zeba: By limiting the entries to people who have competed in the 24 months preceding the marathon not only are we ensuring the highest level of competition, but are also providing the existing participants with a much better race experience. I suggest you visit the AIMS website to check if 10 km is a distance run or not. But that’s not the point.

Siddarth: Ok, of the 1895 runners who participated in the full marathon last year, 66.9% of those finished the race. Total 1442 finishers. I was one of them. I didn’t have a certificate before. Only 16.2% of the total runners in the open category finished in under 4 hours. I finished in 3:31. If there was such a restriction, I would not have been able to participate without shelling out a couple grand to the NGOs. I enquired last year with the NGOs, some were selling at 4-8k with a few weeks to go for the race. Which is what bothers me about it. It’s a transparent money grab by the NGOs, even if they are raising money for charity. This doesn’t justify the means. If the point of this restriction is to ensure higher level of competition, then the NGO’s shouldn’t be holding spots in the first place.

They have been squatting on the race spots for years and auctioning them off. It sounds low to accuse NGOs of this and what is happening here is a good middle ground to allow the race to be more open, but it would be fair if this had happened to open up a restricted race to the public, instead of doing it as a consolation to the public. While the NGO’s serve a great cause, something like a marathon does too. It allows you to push your limits and know that there aren’t any limits. I was among the top 200 finishers including the elite. Last marathon I had run was the Airtel Kolkata Marathon which didn’t award a certificate for my 4:30 finish at that time. While I can luckily afford to buy a spot from an NGO, there are a lot of kids who are underprivileged and want to participate in something like this. The door is effectively shut for them.

Zeba: If you think about it, this step from the organizer’s point of view, works exceptionally well with the NGO’s. It provides the much needed boost to the corporate sector to raise funds for the various charities that there are. Say there is an athlete who is exceptionally talented and, for whatever reason, has not been able to fulfill the criteria for participation in the full or half marathons. It provides the corporates with an excellent opportunity to sponsor such an athlete and raise awareness about a particular NGO thereby contributing to the funds of the same.

Siddarth: Yes, but it leaves out those who aren’t exceptionally talented but want to run to push their limits and for the realization that if they can do a distance like 42.195 km in under 4 hours, there isn’t much they shouldn’t be able to do in life. I’m by no means opposed to the NGO’s making whatever they can, but this race ought not to be used for such.

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What do you think? Is this step by the organizers justified?

(For past reference:)http://runinfinity.com/race/mumbai-marathon/statistics