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Re:Ultra marathon runner earns awards for both first place w... by buzzdenver on Tuesday August 20, 2019 @11:48AM (#20748297)
You're putting words in my mouth. Let's say elite men are top 5 overall at UTMB; that's why I asked you to give me odds for women making it there.

But please prove me wrong by answering my question directly. Which race had an elite field of men that she beat. Not just one runner, because by that definition I have beaten sub 2:05 marathoners who DNF-ed.

Re:Ultra marathon runner earns awards for both first place w... by throwaway_law on Tuesday August 20, 2019 @12:09PM (#20748569)
What am I a Vegas odds maker?

Again I can't prove a elite field of men in the races she won, because I don't know you definition. Only you know your definition of elite ultra runners, so why don't you look at the fields instead of having me guess?

I can tell you plenty of the runners are ranked in the top 10% for their group (age/sex) overall, but something tells me that being a top 10% ultra runner in your group doesn't qualify one as Elite under your definition.

Re:Ultra marathon runner earns awards for both first place w... by buzzdenver on Tuesday August 20, 2019 @01:11PM (#20749353)
You have a much more generous definition of elite. To me elite is somebody who has a chance to win in any race regardless of who else shows up to compete. By that definition Courtney is an elite woman, but I do not believe that she would have a chance to win UTMB overall, or Moab 240 if all the best men showed up.
Re:Ultra marathon runner earns awards for both first place w... by throwaway_law on Wednesday August 21, 2019 @09:27AM (#20756917)
>To me elite is somebody who has a chance to win in any race regardless of who else shows up to compete.

Yes, my definition is more generous. But it also comes from the industry itself, in my experience marathons/races generally will have "Elite runner" applications/registrations. Like regular registrations/corrals the Elite Runner registrations are time based, and generally waive %'s of the race fee based on prior qualified race times. These are elite runner's in my mind, but in no way do most of them stand a chance of winning any given race on any given day.

And yes sort of by default I would place the top 10 finishers in a 238 mile race like Moab in the Elite category, they all appear to be top 20% of their group in overall Ultra rankings, so they are not the best for sure and its fine we disagree on their status of elite. I certainly wouldn't (and not saying you are, but others are) diminishing Courtney's accomplishments by saying she won niche races against untrained runners...I think its fair to say untrained runners don't run 50/100/238 mile races.

Re:Ultra marathon runner earns awards for both first place w... by buzzdenver on Wednesday August 21, 2019 @02:15PM (#20759857)
There is no elite field in ultras, only in big road races. Look at the PR-s for the elite guys here: https://www.baa.org/john-hancock-announces-2019-boston-marat... . The slowest one has a 2:13 which is below women's world record and 6 minutes faster than any of the elite women.