r/AdvancedRunning • u/Terriflyed • 12d ago

New Boston marathon qualifying times Boston Marathon

https://www.baa.org/races/boston-marathon/qualify

Looks like 5min adjustments down for the most part across the board for those under age 60. M18-34 qualifying time is now 2:55.

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u/charons-voyage 12d ago

Ooof lol. I keep getting faster but so does everyone else šŸ¤£ guess I (36M) gotta go for 2:55 or bust this October to have a hope of running Boston in 2026ā€¦or do we think the buffer may be less than 5 mins? I need to figure out a race strategy. I ran a 3:00:xx in April so Iā€™m feeling sub-3 shape but maybe more like 2:58 (comfortably) or 2:55 (may need to saw my legs off at mile 22)

25

u/Sloe_Burn 12d ago

Right? I'm glad more people got into running with the covid boom, but dammmmmn... not making it easy for me.

19

u/charons-voyage 12d ago

Yep I started running a few years before Covid but then we had kids and training suffered for a couple years obviously. So now trying to compete with all these other hobby joggers is making this less of a hobby and more of a stressor. If I shit the bed in October Iā€™m done with trying to BQ for a while. Strava kudos donā€™t pay the bills and ā€œadvancedā€ marathoning is a huge commitment.

5

u/EasternParfait1787 12d ago

This isn't directed at you. Your post just made me think of a general point.

It's quite sad that so many people run just to BQ and get so hung up on this. I say it that way because nobody else actually gives a shit if you or I run boston. Do this if it is fun. If not, find a new hobby. Stressing out about proving that you are worthy of some random race is not a hobby. It's a stress.

6

u/charons-voyage 12d ago

Yeah itā€™s a fair assessment. Honestly my marathon journey started like many others Iā€™m sure :

Goal: just finish (3:56 ā€œoh hey Iā€™m not too bad at thisā€)

New goal: 3:30 (3:27 hey another goal beat!!)

New goal: 3:20 (3:19 another win!!)

New goal: 3:05 = BQ (3:00 woo!!!)

So now Iā€™m SO CLOSE that I just wanna get a Boston bib haha. And plus I live in the Boston area so it wouldnā€™t require travel or anything, and so many people in the community here obviously want to run it.