Dublin Marathon 2019 tickets selling fast

M.m.m.

El CabaIIo wrote: »

Nataliya Lehonkova ran 2:28 last year and won by over 6 minutes. You really believe KBC bank, the global bank is sponsoring this race? It's KBC Ireland, the subsidiary version that is. They can't compare to NN, the Dutch global insurance group sponsoring Rotterdam or German car maker BMW sponsoring Berlin or American Bank Bank of America sponsoring Chicago. All the main Global parent for their buisness with revenue streams range from 20-500 times the size of KBC Ireland.



Tadesse Tola ran this year who is a very well known former 2:04 guy. Dereje Debele won it in 2015 who was a 2:07 guy.

I think you guys are losing perspective on how hugely expensive it is to bring 2:05-2:09 guys to the race. Fukouka marathon was on 2 weeks ago(probably one of the most historic marathons in the world). 2 guys broke 2:09

The Abu Dhabi marathon was on last weekend and had supposedly daft appearance fees and 100 grand for the winner plus another 100 grand for anyone who finished faster than 2:04 had 4 guys under 2:09 and that course ended up being short. Emmanuel Mutai(4th fastest all time) who is the definition of a receding star was running that and still got a huge payday just for his name to end up detached before halfway and finish in 2:12.

The Berlin marathon turned down Kenneisa Bekele this year because he was asking for a huge appearance fee and hadn't run a good marathon in 2 years. Huge stars of the past are living on name and still demanding huge paydays just to run.

2:05 won London in 2017, 2:05 won Chicago this year, 2:05 won Tokyo this year, 2:06 came second in Berlin this year, 2:07 won Fukoka this year. 2:06 won Paris this Year. All ridiculously flat courses. There seems to be an idea around now that 2:03-2:07 guys grow on trees these days but that is not true, The guys that run in that range are all doing the Marathon majors with 100's of thousands and even millions of Euro on the line.


Now then look at it at the perspective of the Dublin marathon and say I want 2:05 to 2:09 winning it. Realistically you need a 2:03 guy to be able to run 2:05 in Dublin and a 2:07 guy to be able to run under 2:09 on that course. A 2:03 guy is probably going to demand a near six digit appearance fee, he's going to want a huge 1st place prize to cover the losses he would have from missing out on a London or Berlin and throw away his place in the 500 grand marathon major competition.

2:07 guys won't be much cheaper because they are legimate threats for podiums and wins at major marathons. To pay for one of them, you discard lets say 10 of the other Africans. You then have to assure that he's not just going to go out at 2:15 pace and sprint for the win so you have to incentivise him to run fast by adding huge time bonuses, make sure he has some ccompetition and it's not just a solo time trial where he wins by 6-10 minutes and you now have doubled the cost the cost as he will pick up time bonuses to and will need a large prize pool to cover the podium places. What if the second guy has a bad day or got injured in the build up, you better make sure you have another 2:03-2:07 guy on hand that's what and at that point, you are competing with the likes of Berlin and Chicago for top talent as well as having to recruit and pay for lesser talent to add to the depth of the race.

You end up with hundreds of thousands of euro in investment into the elite field and if you haven't got a huge history like many of the marathons mentioned earlier or a propanda fueled Saudi prince throwing money at it, finding a sponsor willing to cover those costs is not going to be easy.

I would love to see those guys and times been run in Dublin but the reality is a lot more complicated than it's been made out to be here.

I don't think anyone is disputing you there, its a gradual process improving anything.

They probably could research it further and up the calibre somewhat.


I'm not sure the Saudi example is realistic really, they're just jumping on the bandwagon now that 2 hours is in sight and want to be the ones who get there first.



No other country could compete with that and its really just an outlier.

zico10

average_runner wrote: »

If its a club team, obviously the best get into the team Any remaining spaces go via lottery in the club like it does for London.

I know you mentioned club teams in your first post on this topic, but I must say I'm not picking up the same sense of concern from all other in the thread. You'll have to tell me how London works, because I don't know. Does every single club affiliated to British Athletics get to send a team? And if this were the case in Dublin, would the team from Ballygobackwards AC be more entitled to their entires than the second strongest team Clonliffe Harriers, etc. could put together? Or are slots given out according to number of members? If that were the case, could every club in Ireland be guaranteed 3 slots for their fastest men and 3 slots for their fastest women? I might be able to see some merit in reserving spots for club teams, but there's bound to be some element of unfairness in it. And what I'm picking up from this thread is that most club runners, by mere virtue of being in a club, think they should be given more time to decide whether they want to race DCM, than the average Joe Soap on the street.

What sort of system would you propose for Dublin? Unless they were to go down the road of GFA qualifying times, I don't see how it can be any fairer than the current system.

If you don't have club runners, you won't have a marathon after awhile.

With all 20,000 entries sold 11 months in advance, I'd say DCM could count on being able to ride this out for a quite a while yet.

RayCun

For London marathon, as well as the lottery and GFA, there are a certain number of places per club ( I think one per hundred members) and Uk championship entries (2.45 for men).

RayCun

Of course the other thing about London is that these are measures to get you a place and avoid the lottery. You still have to register very early even if you have a fast time. While Dublin guarantees you a place, if you register early enough.

It will be interesting to see what happens with the refunds, how many people there will be who don't get a place, and how many club runners among them.

ThePiedPiper

I probably didn’t make my point very well earlier, but the figures in reply to the post were very interesting. And I suppose, in truth, I do think there should be a small bit of special treatment for your average club member. As a good few people mentioned, clubs are expected to be involved with volunteering at DCM, and the marathon should be regarded as a proper race, as opposed to a mass participation fun run.

Selling out in December shows that DCM are doing a lot of things right, unquestionably. However, it’s s not a perfect situation. Selling out so far in advance is bound to result in thousands of no shows. Surely there’d be some opportunities for offering a couple of thousand places to people next August who qualified by means of other championship races or times.

skyblue46

ThePiedPiper wrote: »

I probably didn’t make my point very well earlier, but the figures in reply to the post were very interesting. And I suppose, in truth, I do think there should be a small bit of special treatment for your average club member. As a good few people mentioned, clubs are expected to be involved with volunteering at DCM, and the marathon should be regarded as a proper race, as opposed to a mass participation fun run.

Selling out in December shows that DCM are doing a lot of things right, unquestionably. However, it’s s not a perfect situation. Selling out so far in advance is bound to result in thousands of no shows. Surely there’d be some opportunities for offering a couple of thousand places to people next August who qualified by means of other championship races or times.

It seems that the decision has been made to sell the refunded no shows. It is always possible some will be allocated to clubs.

I'll be interested to see if there is a change in the profile of the participants. Will it become more like a long distance mini marathon (pardon the contradiction) with vastly increased numbers of fancy dressers and run/walkers?

average_runner

I am not running dublin and didnt plan to run it. But i do think the marathon was caught by surprise, going by their current form they will learn from this and make the correct changes next year if they think its right

average_runner

skyblue46 wrote: »

It seems that the decision has been made to sell the refunded no shows. It is always possible some will be allocated to clubs.

I'll be interested to see if there is a change in the profile of the participants. Will it become more like a long distance mini marathon (pardon the contradiction) with vastly increased numbers of fancy dressers and run/walkers?

Alot of people could sign up for a different marathon and hence the demand for sales could be less

ThePiedPiper

I’d imagine the average profile of most posters here is a 30-50 year old with various work and family commitments, who runs 1-4 marathons per year. There’ll be times when training is going well and a 3-4 month plan can be put in place to target a set goal.

Running a major marathon, or for the real elite, qualifying and competing in a world or Olympic marathon will be important enough for most to set aside a year of preparation, at least. Dublin doesn’t fall into that bracket really. The spectator who has been inspired to set a year long goal to get fit and run a marathon is one who’ll be happy to enter early. The marathon is, at the time of entry, their Everest. Even entering is a major achievement.

My point is that your average 2:45-4:00 grizzly veteran, who is as likely to turn up in Clonakilty as Chicago, London or Longford, doesn’t want to or feel forced into entering a race 11 months in advance. If this continues, the cost will continue to drift upwards and the times downwards, ala New York. Average finishing times on the wrong side of 4:30 and extortionate pricing for the admittedly great experience of running in huge crowds. Maybe that’s what a lot of people want for DCM, personally I don’t and will, as previous posters suggested, continue to enter other marathons at home and abroad.

Testosterscone

skyblue46 wrote: »

It seems that the decision has been made to sell the refunded no shows. It is always possible some will be allocated to clubs.

I'll be interested to see if there is a change in the profile of the participants. Will it become more like a long distance mini marathon (pardon the contradiction) with vastly increased numbers of fancy dressers and run/walkers?

In an ideal world it will mean that people have a greater block of training under there belt (as opposed to the 18 week coach to marathon approach) which should lead to less pulling out through injury

Sadly though we don’t live in an ideal world and imagine the clammer is to keep up with the joneses followed by a few fallow months before panic sets in

robinph

RayCun wrote: »

For London marathon, as well as the lottery and GFA, there are a certain number of places per club ( I think one per hundred members) and Uk championship entries (2.45 for men).

I haven't see the exact number for 2019, but based on the number of places my club got this year I think it is now more like 1 place per 200+ members. Our membership hasn't changed drastically, but the number of places has gone from 6 to 2 since I've been a member.

The championship places (sub 2:45 male and 3:15 female) are the only runners who can count for the club championship. Any GFA don't count regardless of their finish position, I don't even think the likes of Farah was counted for his club Newham.

Testosterscone

robinph wrote: »

I haven't see the exact number for 2019, but based on the number of places my club got this year I think it is now more like 1 place per 200+ members. Our membership hasn't changed drastically, but the number of places has gone from 6 to 2 since I've been a member.

The championship places (sub 2:45 male and 3:15 female) are the only runners who can count for the club championship. Any GFA don't count regardless of their finish position, I don't even think the likes of Farah was counted for his club Newham.

Think this was reduced again from next year IIRC to increase charity spots (as they are much more lucrative, another factor people don’t take into account when comparing to Dublin, this charity sports are sold to charities at about £700/800 which supplements costs to no end)

Sacksian

I think it would be much more detrimental to AAI than DCM if the link between the two was severed, particularly for masters club runners. The majority of club runners in DCM are masters and if club competition was done the way London is, with a reasonable senior qualifying time, they would probably require a separate masters marathon as most would not achieve a senior QT:

Senior Women - 97
F35 Women - 168
F40 Women - 275
F45 Women - 193

Senior Men - 208
M35 Men - 351
M40 Men - 402
M45 Men - 353

Having said that, I think DCM's prize structure reflects their values and priorities and, given that DCM is (literally) embedded within the Irish club structure, I would be very surprised if they weren't cognisant of the value of a healthy club competition within DCM to Irish athletics/athletes (generally). Perhaps 2 senior and 2 masters teams per club could be set aside? Based on the totals above, I don't think you'd need any more than 2,000 for the club runners.

dublin runner

Sacksian wrote: »

I think it would be much more detrimental to AAI than DCM if the link between the two was severed, particularly for masters club runners. The majority of club runners in DCM are masters and if club competition was done the way London is, with a reasonable senior qualifying time, they would probably require a separate masters marathon as most would not achieve a senior QT:

Senior Women - 97
F35 Women - 168
F40 Women - 275
F45 Women - 193

Senior Men - 208
M35 Men - 351
M40 Men - 402
M45 Men - 353

Having said that, I think DCM's prize structure reflects their values and priorities and, given that DCM is (literally) embedded within the Irish club structure, I would be very surprised if they weren't cognisant of the value of a healthy club competition within DCM to Irish athletics/athletes (generally). Perhaps 2 senior and 2 masters teams per club could be set aside? Based on the totals above, I don't think you'd need any more than 2,000 for the club runners.

On this.

The best way to promote fast CLUB running is to introduce a qualifying system for entry, with closing in the months before, not 10 months previous like we have seen.

The current system of handing out <cough> 'elite' entries to men running mid 2.40s (a very good time but hardly elite) just isn't fair. A more transparent QT System to ensure promotion of faster club running is a method to counteract signing up 10 months in advance (something I personally would never do). A first come, first served method, strictly limited.

That addition would further enhance a great event.

TRR_the_turd

dublin runner wrote: »

On this.

The current system of handing out <cough> 'elite' entries to men running mid 2.40s (a very good time but hardly elite) just isn't fair.
.

Just another point of note. Elite QT was sub 2.35 last year.

El CabaIIo

TRR_the_turd wrote: »

Just another point of note. Elite QT was sub 2.35 last year.

Does that get you a free bib? I always thought that just a sub-elite number and access to better facilities.

TRR_the_turd

El CabaIIo wrote: »

Does that get you a free bib? I always thought that just a sub-elite number and access to better facilities.

Yes sub elite but not free entry. Of course I’m open to correction as I’m not in the know as some of the oracles above.

RayCun

Elite bib lets you warm-up out front, I don't know what the cut-off is for free entry.

You also get an elite bib for being a national medal winner the previous year, including masters winners.

(and they give out a few elite bibs at random too it seems )

Zipppy

So I missed out on this.. what's best alternative marathon to go for ?

djemba djemba

Zipppy wrote: »

So I missed out on this.. what's best alternative marathon to go for ?

Frankfurt is on the same day as Dublin or cologne a few weeks before. Both are flat and well organized.

sideshowbob321

Zipppy wrote:

So I missed out on this.. what's best alternative marathon to go for ?

Amsterdam is on the week before too

OOnegative

Zipppy wrote: »

So I missed out on this.. what's best alternative marathon to go for ?

Eindhoven is two weeks before DCM, very very flat & fast.

zico10

Frankfurt didn't sell out this year and it was possible to enter up until the week of the race. As it's the very same day as Dublin, you could train with Frankfurt in mind without registering for it, and wait to see if you can get a transfer for Dublin.

squinn2912

Might take a look at one of those options myself. Fuming I've missed out on Dublin. I don't know why on earth I left it. Hardly much hope that there'll be additional places released?

RayCun

squinn2912 wrote: »

Might take a look at one of those options myself. Fuming I've missed out on Dublin. I don't know why on earth I left it. Hardly much hope that there'll be additional places released?

They have said on Facebook that they will be allowing refunds this year, so those places will go back on sale. No details of refunds or resales available yet

sideswipe

dublin runner wrote: »

A fair question.

Like any consumer or service item, it is very fair to ask how your money/entry fee is spent.

Unfortunately, there are three types of races in Ireland, hence the ambiguity:
1) Commercial Race (for profit)
2) Charity Race or Club Race (volunteer based)
3) Commercial Race masquerading as Charity Race

Type 3) causes the hostility.

It is always a fair request to ask 'how is my money spent'. I get asked that very question and always welcome it.

I think DCM do a largely good job but some races fall victim to Type 3.

Little wonder there's hostility- There was a 5k/10k in wicklow today, the numbers were poor, now the organiser is trying to flog t-shirts and medals for a virtual version of the races and claiming if he doesn't and I quote 'it's a bill on crumlin children hospital'. Disgraceful carry on!

kerrylad1

squinn2912 wrote: »

Might take a look at one of those options myself. Fuming I've missed out on Dublin. I don't know why on earth I left it. Hardly much hope that there'll be additional places released?

You were probably too busy partying untill 6am,every night,like you did after your 2:54,to realise it was selling out.Like urself,I am not on facebook,only for boards,I would have missed out.

squinn2912

kerrylad1 wrote: »

You were probably too busy partying untill 6am,every night,like you did after your 2:54,to realise it was selling out.Like urself,I am not on facebook,only for boards,I would have missed out.

Haha don’t want to get the wrong reputation I’m not fit to party like that! It’s my own fault. I think I can improve the 2:54 next year just a question of getting in!

Testosterscone

sideswipe wrote: »

Little wonder there's hostility- There was a 5k/10k in wicklow today, the numbers were poor, now the organiser is trying to flog t-shirts and medals for a virtual version of the races and claiming if he doesn't and I quote 'it's a bill on crumlin children hospital'. Disgraceful carry on!

Haha why am I not surprised

Testosterscone wrote: »

Came across a prime example of this today.

Specifically say that funds raised go to charity and to be fair last year they did donate 5,500 however there are a number of things they fail to mention

- this figure includes money raised from free entry with 50e sponsor (as well as any extra raised beyond the 50e threshold)

- doesnt include extra revenue from tshirt and virtual run option effectively means you get a medal in the post for not showing up. Funnily enough this medal is provided by a virtual run company run by the race organiser (which is not a charity organisation to the best of my knowledge.

Despite the good PR around the novelty cheque donation the maths on this really don't stack up in favour of the organisers.

kerrylad1

squinn2912 wrote: »

Haha don’t want to get the wrong reputation I’m not fit to party like that! It’s my own fault. I think I can improve the 2:54 next year just a question of getting in!

Some good alternative Marathon's for October 2019 posted above.Flights,hotel,and entry to Manchester marathon next April,Came in at more or less the price I paid for the hotel alone,for Dublin marathon,a few weeks ago.