Most Influential People & Events - #6 of 7

Back In November '06, Runner's World had an article on the forty most influential people and moments in running over the past forty years.

Over the next few posts you'll learn which seven people/moments that made the list are directly connected to the Boston Marathon. Only one more after today...

1970
First Boston Marathon with a Qualifying Time

Hoping to narrow the field, Boston Marathon organizers required all runners to have run a sub- four-hour marathon. It did nothing to diminish the numbers so the bar was raised to 3:30 and then adjusted again to reflect age and gender. To this day, Boston is the gold standard in marathons because of qualifying times. "Before qualifying times, there was nothing definitive to shoot for," says Dave McGillivray, Boston's race director.




Source: Runner World Nov 06