2016 Grandmas Marathon Analysis

Interesting fact, the marathon was named after Grandmas Restaurant who sponsored it (when apparently no one else would) when it was a inaugural event with only 150 participants in 1977. I always wondered where it got its name because it is definitely unique! Read more over on Wikipedia and the Duluth Tribune has a great article on it's history, if you're curious!

It seems like 2016 late spring is the year of heat for the East Coast and Midwest because this race wasn't spared. Race start was 75F! That's pretty rough. I would imagine by the time most people were finishing it was over 80F easily. These conditions make it very hard to perform well and that is evidenced in the results.

AG Group	2015 Qualifiers	2015 AG Total	Percentage	2016 Qualifiers	2016 AG Total	Percentage
F18-34	219	1291	16.96%	103	1564	6.59%
F35-39	78	412	18.93%	43	681	6.31%
F40-44	67	322	20.81%	28	564	4.96%
F45-49	46	230	20.00%	32	384	8.33%
F50-54	52	206	25.24%	28	281	9.96%
F55-59	30	97	30.93%	20	159	12.58%
F60-64	10	46	21.74%	9	70	12.86%
F65-69	1	16	6.25%	2	20	10.00%
F70-74	0	3	0.00%	1	7	14.29%
F75-79	1	2	50.00%	0	1	0.00%
F80+	0	0	0.00%	0	0	0.00%
M18-34	256	1343	19.06%	116	1368	8.48%
M35-39	68	486	13.99%	35	533	6.57%
M40-44	69	418	16.51%	32	502	6.37%
M45-49	74	359	20.61%	28	413	6.78%
M50-54	64	348	18.39%	30	364	8.24%
M55-59	40	233	17.17%	30	307	9.77%
M60-64	35	153	22.88%	14	164	8.54%
M65-69	17	64	26.56%	10	75	13.33%
M70-74	6	15	40.00%	3	21	14.29%
M75-79	0	4	0.00%	0	3	0.00%
M80+	1	2	50.00%	0	2	0.00%
Totals	1134	6050	18.74%	564	7483	7.54%

This is about the worst year over year I've seen for BQs. In fact it is the worst. There are about 50% fewer qualifiers. Boston was second worst behind that at around 30% fewer qualifiers.

Margin	2015	Percentage	2016	Percentage
<1 minute	67	5.91%	25	4.43%
1-2 minutes	62	5.47%	24	4.26%
2-3 minutes	64	5.64%	37	6.56%
3-4 minutes	59	5.20%	23	4.08%
4-5 minutes	46	4.06%	28	4.96%
5-10 minutes	213	18.78%	115	20.39%
10-20 minutes	298	26.28%	138	24.47%
20> minutes	325	28.66%	174	30.85%
Totals	1134		564

2015 Squeaker Pack: 26.28%
2016 Squeaker Pack: 24.29%

Interestingly, the Squeaker Pack is smaller which makes me wonder if the only runners that were able to BQ in the heat were the fastest runners who usually have 10+ minute margins.

Well, it goes without saying the cutoff prediction is not going up.

Here are the totals:

AG Group	2016 Qualifiers	20156 AG Total	Percentage	2017 Qualifiers	2017 AG Total	Percentage
F18-34	5074	40624	12.49%	4254	39474	10.78%
F35-39	2307	16171	14.27%	2078	16405	12.67%
F40-44	2302	15418	14.93%	1961	15165	12.93%
F45-49	2325	11186	20.78%	2048	11664	17.56%
F50-54	1461	7388	19.78%	1373	7867	17.45%
F55-59	770	3711	20.75%	664	3777	17.58%
F60-64	335	1532	21.87%	342	1652	20.70%
F65-69	95	480	19.79%	110	530	20.75%
F70-74	21	136	15.44%	20	160	12.50%
F75-79	4	28	14.29%	1	22	4.55%
F80+	1	4	25.00%	4	10	40.00%
M18-34	4601	36562	12.58%	3653	34706	10.53%
M35-39	2280	19209	11.87%	1896	18602	10.19%
M40-44	2598	20888	12.44%	2157	19768	10.91%
M45-49	3137	17647	17.78%	2600	17665	14.72%
M50-54	2422	13980	17.32%	2012	13971	14.40%
M55-59	1597	8511	18.76%	1405	8888	15.81%
M60-64	966	4532	21.32%	910	4669	19.49%
M65-69	434	1888	22.99%	404	2000	20.20%
M70-74	135	630	21.43%	105	632	16.61%
M75-79	25	167	14.97%	30	181	16.57%
M80+	6	38	15.79%	10	43	23.26%
Totals	32896	220730	14.90%	28037	217851	12.87%

That is 13.64% fewer qualifiers which is up 13.5% after Ottawa.

Margin	2016	Percentage	2017	Percentage
<1 minute	1819	5.53%	1578	5.63%
1-2 minutes	1792	5.45%	1580	5.64%
2-3 minutes	1804	5.48%	1507	5.38%
3-4 minutes	1647	5.01%	1399	4.99%
4-5 minutes	1550	4.71%	1292	4.61%
5-10 minutes	6899	20.97%	5984	21.34%
10-20 minutes	9262	28.16%	7812	27.86%
20> minutes	8123	24.69%	6885	24.56%
Totals	32896		28037

The Squeaker Pack is slightly bigger in the 2017 qualification year - 26.24% vs 26.18%.

On to the cutoff calculation!

The number of runners achieving better than 147 seconds of margin for the races in the 2016 qualification year in the 20 races analyzed is 28405.

As you can see, I don't even have to run a query on the database. There are nearly 400 more qualifiers over 147 than we have total qualifiers.

The predicted cutoff is back to 0.