Monday, March 22, 2010

Calling All Fans of Sea Legs Girl

As regular readers of Sea Legs Girl's blog, you are aware that in the past year she has given up junk mileage in favour of a structured training program set out by SR. The plan, by her own admission, has paid off huge and she is setting personal bests (PBs) all over the place - she recently set TWO PBs in one race! On May 23rd she will run the Copenhagen Marathon on a flat, fast, snow-free course without a baby jogger and without (hopefully) having run a million miles, or done a marathon swim the week before, she even promises to have her shoelaces tied. How fast can she run? I invite you take part in the SLG Marathon Prediction Contest. Legal, Italian performance enhancing drugs to be awarded to the winner (mmmmm pocket coffee).



The rules are as follows:

1. The winner is the contestant whose score is the smallest, the score is first determined by the absolute value of the difference between the contestant's guess and the time SLG runs e.g. if a contestant guesses 3:10:00 and SLG runs 3:09:30 that contestant's score is 30. Equally if SLG runs 3:10:30, that contestant's score is also 30. After the initial score is determined, some time bonuses and penalties are applied as described in the subsequent rules.

2. Each contestant may guess up to a maximum of five times where each subsequent guess replaces the last however every time a contestant changes a guess there is a 5 second penalty applied to their score e.g. if a contestant guesses 3:10:00 on their 5th guess and SLG runs 3:10:00, that contestant's score is 25.

3. To add an element of strategy, for every day IN ADVANCE of the marathon that a person guesses, they are given a 1 second bonus e.g. if someone guesses 20 days in advance of the marathon, 20 seconds will be subtracted from their score. So...one can wait until SLG has run her 50 km and her half marathon to gather more information but waiting has its disadvantage. Note that the time bonus is applied to the contestant's FINAL guess only.

4. Contestants may guess the same time.

5. In the event of a multiple winners, a maximum of three prizes will be awarded where precedence is given in order of the date of a contestant's first guess.

6. SLG & family MAY participate.

Post your guesses by commenting on this post.

Before submitting your guess you may want to review her last marathon, her progression, her recent feat of two PBs in one race, and a not-too-shabby recent long run.

9 comments:

  1. My mama will run in 3:21. Those are the three numbers I can say. Tre to en.

    From, The Lorax

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  2. Ah Lorax, little fellow... you're VERY cute but me thinks you must learn to count LOWER to win this contest. However you have inspired me to publish my prediction: 3:07:55.

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  3. What a fun contest, I'm going to say 3:18. Good luck SLG!

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  4. I just discovered your blog and have been reading Sea legs for a while now.
    I will give it a go....3:19

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  5. PPC, you gotta admit that MP's, BAB's and even the Lorax's guesses are a LITTLE closer to realistic. Though I am glad you believe in me :). I for one am waiting to guess until (if) I get my next period :). Ahhh, the benefits of being SLG (I gotta count even the small ones; the small benefits that is).

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  6. Mercier Calculator says your 1:03:05 15 km (I took off time for the shoelace incident) is worth a 3:10, I took off a bit more time b/c my impression is that your training right now is more suited to marathon than to 15 km. I admit 3:07:55 is a little fast. I will probably update my prediction after your 5 km and accept the 5 second penalty :)

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  7. Ok, I guess 3:16:24. That's a cool number, right? I might go down with this number closer we get to the actual race date.

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  8. I have to be in this too...

    My guess is 3:23:27. Plain guess, no thinking behind it.

    /malene

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