When is a PB a PB?

Slogger Jogger

Philosophical questions perhaps :rolleyes:

• Does it have to be in a race?
• If its done in training, does that count?
• Can you count numerous PBs as being broken in the one race (if you're lucky enough to run a very fast 10K for instance, and go through 5K, 5 mile fast? Or should you need to do dedicated 5k race etc for it to 'count'?

I've no real opinion myself, but I've run a faster 10K in training than in a race, but I still count the race time as my PB

bazman

My opinion:
Does it have to be in a race? YES
If its done in training, does that count? NO
Can you count numerous PBs as being broken in the one race (if you're lucky enough to run a very fast 10K for instance, and go through 5K, 5 mile fast? NO

Mainly because you need independent verification : )

I have broke my 5k time as part of a 10k recently, but can I count on my Garmin or indeed the 5k marker?

That said there are some dodgy races out there where folk seem to get remarkable PBs - presume AAI approval includes distance verification?

shels4ever

bazman wrote: »

My opinion:

Can you count numerous PBs as being broken in the one race (if you're lucky enough to run a very fast 10K for instance, and go through 5K, 5 mile fast? Or should you need to do dedicated 5k race etc for it to 'count'? NO

Mainly because you need independent verification : )

Tell that to Ray Flynn

Maybe if there is official time at the split.

RJC

On a slight aside I don't have any desires on PBs. For me it about the result in relation to the effort (both in the race and in the year). So if I have had a light few months then a result that is better than I hoped in a race is a result I consider to be a PB. (a kind of age adjustment but based on training effort and condition).

Daithi BC

If I take the 10 fastest km splits off my Garmin from the Wexford half marathon and add them together, it's faster than my 10k PB. Does this count?

asimonov

Daithi BC wrote: »

If I take the 10 fastest km splits off my Garmin from the Wexford half marathon and add them together, it's faster than my 10k PB. Does this count?

I did a sub 3 on mcmillan last night :-)

Slogger Jogger

Sounds like a pick n mix PB Daithi

jlang

Daithi BC wrote: »

If I take the 10 fastest km splits off my Garmin from the Wexford half marathon and add them together, it's faster than my 10k PB. Does this count?

No, but if they were consecutive kilometres you might have some claim (can't do hill repeats and only count the downhills either!). I don't call a PB unless it's a race of the appropriate distance but it is nice to register a fast intermediate split that would beat an obsolete PB.

Daithi BC

jlang wrote: »

No, but if they were consecutive kilometres you might have some claim (can't do hill repeats and only count the downhills either!)

Anyone who ran Wexford will understand that one of the 10 splits was the 9th km, which was about an 80m drop in altitude!

robinph

I'd like to be able to count the two halves of last years Dublin Marathon towards my half PB* seeing as they had timing mats for it. Also that would mean that I broke the PB twice on the same day even if it was only by a minute and a bit the second time round.

*I'm sure I have done a faster half before actually, but it was over 15 years ago so I'm not counting that anymore even if I could remember the time now.

Hard Worker

bazman wrote: »

My opinion:
Does it have to be in a race? YES
If its done in training, does that count? NO
Can you count numerous PBs as being broken in the one race (if you're lucky enough to run a very fast 10K for instance, and go through 5K, 5 mile fast? NO

Mainly because you need independent verification : )

I have broke my 5k time as part of a 10k recently, but can I count on my Garmin or indeed the 5k marker?

That said there are some dodgy races out there where folk seem to get remarkable PBs - presume AAI approval includes distance verification?

I have the opposite opinion to you.
My 4 mile, 5 mile and 10K pb's were all done in the same race. I've no problem with that as I verified it with the course measurer. There have been world bests of 20K set during half marathons ( verified timing at the 20K point ).
Also, I set up a 3000 metre time trial last year for two of the women I coach. Just the two of them in the trial and they both ran pb's. I did the timing myself.

rovers_runner

PB is a PB only when you are running one set distance in a particular race.
Counting of 5k, 10k etc. time in a half or full marathon are not recognised by elites for record purposes so that says it all really.

aburke

rovers_runner wrote: »

PB is a PB only when you are running one set distance in a particular race.
Counting of 5k, 10k etc. time in a half or full marathon are not recognised by elites for record purposes so that says it all really.

Agreed.
On a properly certified course, only the distance from start to finish is official. Km marker, Mile markers etc are for your convinience, and are not necessarily certified.

dna_leri

Hard Worker wrote: »

I have the opposite opinion to you.
My 4 mile, 5 mile and 10K pb's were all done in the same race. I've no problem with that as I verified it with the course measurer. There have been world bests of 20K set during half marathons ( verified timing at the 20K point ).
Also, I set up a 3000 metre time trial last year for two of the women I coach. Just the two of them in the trial and they both ran pb's. I did the timing myself.

THe measurement distance might be verified but what about vertical drop - the first half of a race might be all downhill so you really should not count this as a PB unless you know the altitude is the same. Likewise a race that starts on the top of a hill and finishes at the bottom is a bit suspect for PB purposes and would not count for an official time.

MCOS

Folks

PB = PERSONAL best

Individual to every single person, individual benchmark, individual sense of accomplishment.

Unless it happens to be a WR, CR, NR, AR, A standard, B standard blah blah... it matters not to the rest of the world, only the Person to whom it belongs...

My 2c on the topic

thirtyfoot

bazman wrote: »

Can you count numerous PBs as being broken in the one race (if you're lucky enough to run a very fast 10K for instance, and go through 5K, 5 mile fast? NO

I think officially they do. Example is Fagan has taken the 20km record of Andy Ronan which he set on the way to his half marathon record and I think Roisin McGettigan set a 1500 PB when beating Sonia's indoor mile this season.

However 400 runners will regularly beat 200 PBs in a 400 race but these won't count.

Peterx

MCOS has it right, it's a Personal Best.

I know that my pb's for 5k, 5m and 10k all arrived in 2 tough laps of Navan's 10k, complete with knacker kids kicking footballs at the pack and a lesson in race tactics from Niall Coppinger.

If I was going for National Best (ha ha) then maybe the argument about only the certified race distance would be relevant but the topic says PB.

TFBubendorfer

Am I trapped in a time loop or are we merely repeating a discussion from a few weeks ago?

Hard Worker

rovers_runner wrote: »

PB is a PB only when you are running one set distance in a particular race.
Counting of 5k, 10k etc. time in a half or full marathon are not recognised by elites for record purposes so that says it all really.

That's not the case. World bests have been set for 20K during half marathons and 30K during full marathons.
As correctly pointed out by MCOS, we are talking about personal bests, not world bests, national records etc.
I have no problem recognising pb's during races or time trials, subject to terms and conditions of course, some of which have been pointed out.

Sosa

You cannot claim PB's in the middle of other races ....its just not right.
Therefore i have no mile,5k or marathon PB...
Just wait until you run the said distance on its own...whats the hurry ?

donothoponpop

Sosa wrote: »

You cannot claim PB's in the middle of other races ....its just not right.
Therefore i have no mile,5k or marathon PB...
Just wait until you run the said distance on its own...whats the hurry ?

My two cents- the hurry is that it's a personal best, as in the fastest 5k, 10 miler, half marathon, whatever you've run, and there's a lot of them to get, and they all matter! If I ran a sub 40 min 10k on the way to a (say) 65 min 10 miler, I'd be pretty happy in describing myself as a sub-40 10-k'er. Sure, there's a caveat, in that I'll have to say my fastest 10k came during a 10 mile race, but unless I'm going for a national record or better, that caveat shouldn't take away from my proven ability, ie. I've just run 10k faster than 40 minutes!?

Secondly, this is really a debate over minutae of measurements, what difference does it matter that a time/distance came during specific race conditions? Was Alan Wells the Fastest Man In The World when he won his races in Moscow 1980, during the American Olympic boycott? Do you run a better time during a slow race, or when pushed hard by a training partner? Will the OP happily wear the "King of the Mountains" crown tomorrow, knowing his sophistry has distacted the running masses, turned Rathfarnham teammate against teammate, and even possibly sent the great John Lenihan into a moral dilemma: "does God intervene during Croagh Patrick PB's, and if so, did I say my prayers last night?":eek:

Slogger Jogger

I picked up a copy of Frank Greally's Running Commentary book on the way to Connaught today. A good running read.
I quote him from page 70 where he says 'Flynn's national mile record of 3:49:77 :eek: , set in Oslo in July 1982, remains untouched as does the 1,500-metre mark of 3:33:05 he posted en route'
I suppose its a factor of the official timings on an event and whether they have timings at various splits. No such splits on the top of Croagh Patrick I'm afraid... a challenge which awaits you dononhoponpop... some day.:)

TheRoadRunner

Good thread. For me I only count a personal best when raced at the specified distance.

My 10k PB is pretty poor but I have ran a faster 10k than my current PB en route to a 10 mile PB (and have actually gone quicker in training :eek:) but I don't count this. If I'm asked my 10k PB I always state the above though

RealistSpy

In addition if you can't prove it then you don't have it!

Hard Worker

TheRoadRunner wrote: »

Good thread. For me I only count a personal best when raced at the specified distance.

My 10k PB is pretty poor but I have ran a faster 10k than my current PB en route to a 10 mile PB (and have actually gone quicker in training :eek:) but I don't count this. If I'm asked my 10k PB I always state the above though

If you did a time trial - 25 laps of the track - with your coach timing you, and you run your fastest 10K time, would you not count it as a pb because it's not in a race?
If you run a 5 mile race and your own stopwatch gives you a pb, but the "official" time doesn't, which do you take?
I know that in both cases, I would count them as PERSONAL bests.

TheRoadRunner

Hey Hard Worker

Great running today I don't know how you got the legs turning over so efficiently after a marathon

Hard Worker wrote: »

If you did a time trial - 25 laps of the track - with your coach timing you, and you run your fastest 10K time, would you not count it as a pb because it's not in a race?

No I wouldn't count it as a PB but if somebody asked me my PB I'd say it is blah but I have run a minute quicker in a time trial. May be ridiculous but for me a race PB needs to be run in a race. Maybe I need to start race PBs and overall PB

Hard Worker wrote: »

If you run a 5 mile race and your own stopwatch gives you a pb, but the "official" time doesn't, which do you take?
I know that in both cases, I would count them as PERSONAL bests.

I like you would take my watch time.

Cheers

robinph

TheRoadRunner wrote: »

I like you would take my watch time.

What about if the "official chip" time is 10 seconds quicker than your watch time?