I usually reserve these deep dives for the Majors and a handful of other really big races. While Grandma’s Marathon is a big race, it’s not that big. But there were a few things that made this year’s race particularly interesting. It’s the 50th anniversary of the race, and it sold out in less than … Read more
The Boston Marathon Cutoff Time Tracker tracks the net change in Boston qualifiers from year to year and that is the main variable used to determine the projected cutoff time. But not all BQ’s are necessarily equal. Only some of those runners will actually apply to run Boston – and that conversion rate of qualifier … Read more
The Presidential Fitness Test is a core memory for many Americans, especially if you’re a millenial or Gen X. For decades, we participated in an annual ritual that included, among other things, a mile run. The standardized test was phased out in the 2010’s, but it’s been back in the news since the president announced … Read more
This is another project that’s been on my to do list for too long. Back in early 2024, I built an age grade calculator that calculated actual age grades for marathon performances along with a runner’s position (percentile) within the distribution of all finish times for their age group. I updated that calculator in early … Read more
Feature image by David Lisnard on Wikimedia Commons – CC BY SA-4.0 When I started collecting and analyzing data on marathons a couple years ago, Paris was not on my radar at all. I mostly paid attention to American races, along with the international races that were part of the Majors. But Paris is a … Read more
When I was younger, I’ll admit that I was a fair weather runner. I often picked things up in the spring and tapered off in the late fall. This minimized my discomfort – and also severely limited my long term development as a runner. In the spring of 2020, I got back into running. I … Read more
Feature image from Governor Healy on Flickr. This week, the Boston Athletic Association released the entry list for the 2026 Boston Marathon. Athletes can log into Athletes’ Village to see their corral assignment, but that isn’t publicly available. The only information in the searchable entry list is a runner’s name, age, city, state, country of … Read more
Feature photo (c) Kevin Morris – Courtesy of Houston Marathon Last weekend was the 2026 Houston Marathon – a premier event that kicks off the new year in American marathoning. After a lull over the holidays, this usually marks the first large, fast event of the year – with a considerable numbers of BQs, a … Read more
For some reason, it can be hard to find solid information on the largest marathons in the United States. A few years back, I was looking for a list of the largest races in the country. What I ended up finding was a collection of listicles that mixed different methodologies for counting the field size … Read more
Feature photo by Steven Pisano on Flickr – CC BY 2.0 When I did a deep dive on the data from the 2025 New York City Marathon, I included a breakdown of where runners were from across the world and across the country. Just over 30% of runners are international. Of American runners, the biggest … Read more