Cover photo by Clayton Evans for scrunners.com
DOWN THE ROAD Fantasy For The New Year By Cedric Jaggers
Dateline: Dec. 31, 2015, South Carolina. Something special happened in South Carolina in 2015, something so seemingly impossible as to be miraculous. South Carolina became the first state where every race in the State during 2015 was run on a USATF certified course. Not only that, but every single one of them submitted their complete results (meaning place, name, gender, age, hometown, state, and gun time of every finisher who crossed the finish line.) USATF officials were astonished and stated that South Carolina set an example which every state should aspire to for future years. “Runners deserve to know that their race was the full advertised length.” One official said “The only way a runner can be sure they ran a full length course is to run it on a USATF certified course as measured.”
South Carolina had many years in which most races did not even submit results. And many of those which posted results in 2014 and earlier had posted incomplete or partial results. The items which were most commonly left out were hometown and state, sometimes gender, and frequently the gun time (actual time runners crossed the finish line after the starting gun was fired as opposed to computer re-arranged chip time which bears only a sometime relation to the order in which runners crossed the line). The improvement was noticeable and remarkable.
Another interested party remarked on the fact that gun times were shown for every finisher in every race. “Some runners see results with only chip times and think that is their ‘actual time’. Unfortunately races that show only chip time give the runners no way to know what their actual finish place was in the race.”
Since a race actually starts when the race begins and not when the runner crosses the starting line, many younger runners are confused by ‘chip times’ thinking they are actual race times. But the actual time is from when the race starts and the runner reaches the finish line. A race is not a time trial.
USATF rule 245 defines race time and states: The official time shall be the time elapsed between the start of the watches or timing devices resulting from an appropriate start signal and when the athlete reaching the finish line (also called gun time). The actual time elapsed between when an athlete reaching the starting line and finish line (also called chip time) can be made known to the athlete, but will not be considered as official time.
Understanding of the rule brought some interesting comments. One runner said “I was surprised when I learned that races did not always show runners in the order they finished. I thought when I looked at results I could see the name of the person who finished right ahead of me and right behind me. But when races re-arranged finish order by chip time the person shown as finishing ahead of you could have been dozens of places behind you.” Another runner said “I don’t care about anything but my chip time. If I ran a faster time than another person in the race, it doesn’t matter if they crossed the finish line ahead of me. If I ran faster a faster chip time than the person who crossed the finish line first, I should get the first place award, even though the USATF rules say I should not.”
That every race submitted their results to USATF during 2015 was amplified by the submission of all the required paperwork for records to be recognized by USATF. Every race took the time and effort to do all the things necessary to be able to submit the necessary paperwork so that records run in their races could be recognized. This included having stopped time for the winning male and female, having random select times to ensure accuracy of results, and completing the Road Race Recognition Form.
One USATF official mentioned that people had frequently complained to them when they had run a record time at a race but the time was never recognized. In these cases the official pointed out that the results and needed paperwork were never submitted to USATF, thus cheating the runner out of the record and resulting recognition.
So what happened in 2015 was amazing. All the races in the state used certified courses. All the races submitted complete results. All the over 550 held races in the state submitted all needed USATF documentation in case records had been set in their races. All the races showed their results in gun time (actual finish time) order. Runners came to understand USATF rules and realized that races should use gun time and show chip time for runners’ information. Doing this brought an amazing amount of recognition to how large the sport of running has become. Most people in the state had no idea that an average of over 10 road races were held every weekend of the year. When the running boom began in the 70s, there were barely 10 road races held in the state per year. Since the results of all the races for 2015 had been submitted to USATF and posted so that everyone could access them, it raised the respect level for road races by a tremendous amount.
But this is a fantasy article. What happened in 2014 is most likely what will happen in 2015. Most races will not use certified full length courses. Most races will not create, much less submit complete results (i.e. with all needed information not just place, name and time) to USATF. Most races will not show results in gun time order with chip time shown for information. But we can dream can’t we? What an interesting fantasy. If only it could happen in South Carolina and every other state in the United States.
Cedric Jaggers was elected to the South Carolina Road Runners Club Hall of Fame in 1992. He is the author of Charleston’s Cooper River Bridge Run, A Complete History in Words and Photos.. He lives and runs in Rock Hill. He may be reached via e-mail at JaggersRun@comporium.net