IM Finish...has just finishing lost its prestige? (Page 2)

Finishing time is just a number and rarely tells the whole story. 

I have a friend who ran a 3:23 marathon to BQ and then ran a 4:15 (or something close to that) at Boston this year.  Unless you know that this year's Boston Marathon experienced 88F temps, you wouldn't fully appreciate the extra hour that he spent on the course. 

IMCdA was the race of a lifetime and there is a significant story behind my 13:38 finish time.  It's in my RR. 

We live in a somewhat insular world on these forums.  For those of us on here, or other boards, training for 10+ hours a week isn't extraordinary at all.  Upping that training to 15+ hours/week is just seen as a component of training for a particular event.

But, go ask someone who is completing their first 5 or 10k about putting in those hours.  Those are the folks who think we have a screw loose. 

There will always be a bigger, badder, tougher event out there.  It's in our nature.  In fact, that is how the first Ironman race came about - take the toughest single events in the area, and see who could do them all the fastest.

I'm currently training for my first IM.  And, there is a chance I might be a little disappointed if I don't hit my time goal.  But, I will be excited IF I finish.  Because that will show me that I was able to put in the time, effort and dedication to complete it.

As for anyone who thinks it is the "new 10K", too bad.  Go live your life, and I will live mine.

Yes, with some possible exceptions.  I'm sure they'll be glad to share their stories here.

Meh.  I think it's ridiculous to call an IM the new 10K but to be honest, I don't care what other people think.  I haven't completed an IM yet but when I do - it will be for me.  I don't know anyone IRL who wouldn't be impressed by it but I'm not doing it for them.

I hate this continual effort to up the anti on everything and that is somehow diminishes what is, unquestionably, a huge accomplishment.  A lot of people could complete a 10K in the required time even if they had to walk the whole thing but I don't know a lot of people who could complete an IM within the time limit.

A guy with 2 prosthetic legs kicked my arse at IM WI 2007.  Uneffingreal.

But, it's not prestigious.

^^This.  It always depends on who you talk to.  If you spend your time in extreme endurance chat rooms, Ironman has been lower on the totem pole for half a decade.  If you talk to your next door neighbor, however, Ironman will always hold the prestige because, as the first response said, We're still talking about only .00007% of the population (not counting multiple finishers), and most people get giddy about a half marathon.

Unlike grade inflation making a 4.0 GPA year by year, nothing is making it easier to swim, bike and run 140.6 miles.  Even those nice bikes you have to actually pedal up the hills!!

To me finishing Ironman never had "prestige".

It's a personal thing. It resides inside you. It isn't to project outward. You go do it, it's cool, you own it, you use the lessons going forward. That's it.

I acknowledge the perspective of a different culture, the culture that does the race in some part because of how it may alter other peoples' perception of them. It is an accessory to bolster their life story. They wear it on the outside, sometimes literally in the form of tattoos and so forth.

That's fine also.

However, the drawback is high bars are meant to be raised. That is why there is a bar in the first place. It isn't static. Each person tries to clear a succesively higher one.

So, if the motive to complete Ironman is to acheive some conspicuous "ultimate", some lasting final word on how impervious you are to fatigue, how goal oriented you are, how tough you can be, how you can get through anything- if that is your motive, visit a children's leukemia wing.

Then the entire endeavor is reframed into the act of selfish vanity that it is, not that there is anything wrong or bad about that, it just isn't the final word of ultimate-ness in the human experience. It's a fun and generally healthy, intense hobby.

I'll say the same thing I always say.  Completing an IM while tough is not what draws my awe; what does is the grueling training, day in and day out; the 3-4 hour training sessions; the weekly training volume; the planning that goes into it; the amount of time and energy devoted for months and months.

If you look at as just the race itself, it's just one day, one finish line.  I look beyond and I think that anyone who commits that much of his/her time, energy, blood, sweat and tears over how ever many months inspires awe, as it should.  I don't know if prestige is the right word, but I have mad respect for those who do the training whether they make it to the line or not.

There are many things that take dedication, training end persistance to become good at/to accomplish it.

Those that do have a certain character that carries most likely through everything in their life.

All of those accomplishements deserve a certain amount of respect and are prestigous.

The difficulty is to normalize and compare them.

How does finishing an Ironman compare to a non-stop 15hour call-of-duty session?

What about a gold-medal in pistol shooting versus running the comrades?

We can't normalize and compare the achievements unless we tried ourselves and even then due to personal history we will find some challenges harder than others.

But I (personally) consider anything that involved ACTIVE participation of an individual an accomplishment.

All this beeing said it comes to the ususal items in live, that perception is in the eye of the beholder.

I know that I am excited about the thought toeing a Half-Ironman starting line in 2013.

For me that will a huge accomplishement, that no-one I know (other than this forum and through tri-friends) has accomplished.

THIS x a million! 

maybe triathlon needs a prestige system like CoD

This is why it took me a long time to get used to being accepted into the community. I still have angst over not belonging here. That, for me, will be a bigger milestone than any mileage number.

On the lighter side, this reminds me of the worldly wise advice of a certain oersized lasagna loving feline, who said "to feel skinnier, hang around with people who are fatter than you." I feel like shamu after leaving a race. If I needed the comparison of others to feel better, I would spend more time at the casino, or denny's. I tend to better in life when I seek to be around those who set examples I would prefer to aspire to.

Really, only 500,000 people have ever finished an Ironman?  Dude, that's how many people run marathons in the US on a yearly basis.  So I don't know about prestigious but if your number is right IM finishers are definitely a very exclusive group.  Wow...

I think it's only prestigous if you do more than one.  I'm thinking 4?  That's the coolness transition point. 

That's what's great about kids, is they think your cool if you can just talk like donald duck or burp the alphabet...

I'm with Acumenjay and Tom on this one.  Who cares what level of "prestige" an IM has?  I don't do triathlons for prestige.  The people I train with, and the people I race with are the only people I care to even discuss triathlons with anyway.  My goal is to crush their dreams, and I want them to know it.  Other than that, I couldn't care less if anyone else never even knew I raced triathlons.