Boston Marathon

The Boston Marathon is an annual marathon sporting event hosted by the city of Boston, Massachusetts on Patriot's Day, the third Monday of April. Begun in 1897 and inspired by the success of the first modern-day marathon competition in the 1896 Summer Olympics, it has become one of the oldest and most popular professional marathon races in the world. Professional runners from all over of the world compete in the Boston Marathon each year, braving the hilly New England terrain and unpredictable weather to take part in the race.

The event attracts an average of about 20,000 registered participants each year. In the 100^th running of the Boston Marathon in 1996, the number of participants reached 38,000. While there is a cash prize awarded to the winners of the marathon, most of the runners take part in the historical marathon just for the joy of participating in such a prestigious race. Indeed, the qualifying standard is high enough that many marathoners aspire to meet it, and doing so is considered an achievement in itself.

Race

The Boston Marathon is open to all runners, male and female, from any nation, but they must meet certain qualifying standards. To qualify, a runner must first complete a standard marathon course certified by USA Track and Field (or, if outside the U.S., a course certified by a foreign athletic authority equivalent to USATF) within a certain period of time before the date of the desired Boston Marathon (usually within approximately 18 months prior). Prospective runners in the peak age range of 18-34 must run a time of no more than 3:10:00 (3 hours and 10 minutes) if male (approximately 0:7:15 per mile), or 3:40:00 if female (approximately 0:8:24 seconds per mile); the qualifying time is adjusted upward as age increases.

The race begins at noon (wheelchair race begins at 11:45 AM, and the elite women at 11:31 AM) at the official starting point in Hopkinton, Massachusetts. The course runs through 26.2 miles (42.195 km) of winding roads, into the center of Boston, where the official finish line is located at Copley Square, just beyond the Boston Public Library.

The Boston Marathon is considered to be one of the more difficult marathon courses because of the infamous Newton, Massachusetts hills along Commonwealth Avenue, which culminate in Heartbreak Hill near Boston College. Only once has a world record time for marathon running been set in Boston, in 1947. The record time then was 2:25:39, by Yun Bok Suh of South Korea. In 1975, the women's world record was set in Boston at 2:42:24. Ironically, the course is now considered invalid for international records because the finish is substantially lower in elevation than the start.

The race's organizers keep a standard time clock for all entries, though official timekeeping ceases after the six hour mark.

Massachusetts residents are proud of the Marathon, and a yearly tradition among the towns lining the race course has emerged. The local residents gladly welcome the Marathon participants with open arms, and they do their best to provide a supportive, encouraging, friendly atmosphere for the race itself. Along the entire 42.195 km - 26.2 mile stretch of the race, thousands of fans and well-wishers line up along the sides of the race course to cheer the runners on, encourage them, and provide free water and snacks to any and all of the runners. The crowds are even more encouraging for the amateur runners and neophytes taking part in the Marathon for the first time.

Every year, the Boston Red Sox play a home game at Fenway Park, starting at 11:05 a.m. When the game ends, the crowd empties into Kenmore Square to cheer as the runners near the 25 mile (40 km) marker.

History

The Boston Marathon was originally a local event, but its fame and status has attracted runners from all over the world. In recent years, critics of America's professional sports leagues have pointed to the dominance of foreign-born atheletes in the event (especially runners from Kenya) to back their arguments that American professional running is lagging behind the rest of the world in terms of producing quality atheletes.

For most of its history, the Boston Marathon was a free event, and the only prize awarded for winning the race was a wreath woven from olive branches. However, corporate-sponsored cash prizes began to be awarded in the 1980s, when professional athletes began to refuse to run the race without cash awards. The first cash prize for winning the marathon was awarded in 1986.

Women were not allowed to enter the Boston Marathon until 1972. In 1966, Roberta Gibb was the first woman to inofficially run the Boston Marathon. In 1967, Katherine Switzer, who had registered as "K Switzer", was the first woman to run with a race number. She finished although Boston Marathon officials tried to forcibly remove her from the race.

Rosie Ruiz scandal

Scandal came to the Boston Marathon in 1980 when amateur runner Rosie Ruiz came from out of nowhere to win the women's race. Marathon officials became suspicious when it was found Ruiz didn't appear in race videotapes until near the end of the race. A subsequent investigation concluded (though Ruiz never admitted to cheating) that Ruiz had skipped most of the race and blended into the crowd about one mile from the finish line, where she then ran to her apparent victory. Ruiz was officially disqualified, and the winner was proclaimed to be Canadian Jacqueline Gareau.