Spring? Not yet...
Flowers are blooming in Boston but the temperatures don't feel like Spring
The weather report from the ground in Boston is that it is cold, windy, wet, and just not ideal.
We’re not climbing out of the 40s this week which can make it difficult to get out the door when so many of us are ready for Spring. But there are signs that it is coming. The biggest tell for me is always when I see daffodils around the Charles River. Like these!
And if you are a Red Sox fan? Well, tickets this time of year are usually comically cheap thanks to the unpredictable weather. Tonight’s game you can get bleacher seats for $7.
Okay, should we talk about running now? We really wanted to thank everyone who has downloaded the Tailwind App. It was such a fun project for us to build and we’ve been getting a lot of great feedback. Our plan is to evolve it into a tool that runners can use for other races (not just Boston) and also workout planning, etc. Weather can have such an impact on our results and we felt like there wasn’t a good tool out there to prepare you. If you’re training for Boston, we hope you’ll give it a try and share it with your friends.
Now let’s move on to our race day outlook from 12 days out. Yesterday, we looked at 3 different scenarios. Today, we’re taking a live look at what we’re expecting on Marathon Monday.
Tailwind Tracker
Will there be a tailwind? Yes, a strong one!
Temperature at Start: 44°F (9°C)
Temperature at Finish: 54°F (13°C)
Wind: W at 15 mph (24 km/h) — tailwind all the way
Precipitation Chance: 0%
Conditions: Cloudy
Humidity: 50%
Race Day Impact:
Similar years at Boston have yielded times that are on average 1-2 minutes faster than the average. A perfect day. If you’ve been following along with us, this has been the forecast over and over. Expect it to start to shift in the coming days. Based on history, there are two things that start to happen around this time in April.
The temps can start creeping up into the 60s.
Most of the winter the wind comes from the west but in the spring it starts to flip and come from the east.
We’re not saying either of these things will happen, but it would be smart to be prepared if they do!
1977: A Great day for Spectators
48 years ago, in the Bill Rodgers era, Jerome Drayton took down the American Record holder at the 81st running of the Boston Marathon. It was a warm day with highs in the 70s — a tough one for runners. The winning time that year was on the slower side — 2:14:46.
One thing about this era that is always crazy to me is that the field sizes were much smaller — around 3000 runners — but the crowd sizes were still massive! On this year, 900,000 spectators were out on what was a perfect day.
If you’ve never seen it, I’d highly recommend watching this video with Bill Rodgers on his build up to the 1977 race. On his way to the starting line, he talks about wanting to go the beach. It was a great beach day to be fair. He ended up dropping out.
He joked, “The Boston Marathon has been cancelled. Officials recommend we all go to the beach, have a light jog, and swim.”
The women’s champ, Miki Gorman remarked that she considered giving up many times. She went on to win the race that year in 2:48.
It’s funny on these warm days… I’ve watched 16 Boston Marathons at this point in my life, and I’ve yet to see a runner smiling in the later stages on warm days. It’s the type of weather where you really need to know how to manage the conditions, survive, and just focus on running your race, not setting a PB.