Racism At The London Marathon.

[webbo3]

https://news.sky.com/story/how-the-london-marathon-is-seeking-to-change-the-face-of-running-by-attracting-more-diverse-participation-12863815

Maybe black people don't want to take part, and all of the top athletes were black.

[naomi24]

Ridiculous. It’s open to all.

[Bazile]

Who is alleging racism ?

[webbo3]

There's this, without actually saying racism its what they are implying.
Currently the race, which will have more than 45,000 runners at this year's incarnation, has less than 2% representation of black athletes.

[Rosetta]

Are not many of the elite athletes from Kenya, Ethiopia etc?

[webbo3]

Exactly^

[roopower]

Perhaps they mean the other runners but the ballot is open to all.

[retrocop]

You can lead a horse to water etc etc. Just as the doomed attempts to recruit more firemen and police officers. Obviously lessons have not been learnt.

[brainiac]

//Are not many of the elite athletes from Kenya, Ethiopia etc?//

They are indeed. There are currently 55 Kenyan athletes serving doping bans, including Wilson Kipsang, the winner of the London marathon in 2012 and 2014, and Daniel Wanjiru the London winner in 2017.

[douglas9401]

Just more of the same. Why can't 'they' leave people alone?

If black folk want to run, they'll run.

[Old_Geezer]

Is that the Met police motto ?

[douglas9401]

No, OG, I believe theirs is 'If you can't beat them, what's the point in truncheons?'

[bazwillrun]

^

brilliant, three of the best posts ive ever seen on here...ag ag ag

[ichkeria]

They aren’t saying it’s racist.

We had the same moan about something else I forget what

[Rosetta]

The winners of both the mens' and womens' races are both black. Just saying!!

[mushroom25]

// They aren’t saying it’s racist. //

indeed not, but they are suggesting that attitudes to running are. when people see a black man running, their first thought (allegedly) is "fleeing criminal".

[ichkeria]

Are they??

I think not.
They are just wondering why more black people don’t enter

[Raidergal2022]

Perhaps ethnic minorities don’t have the same community spirit as those ancestry is from the UK (ie white population).

If they don’t feel strong connections to England they might be less likely to run for charities etc .. which is a main motivator for many in the marathon

[jourdain2]

An athletics coach was sacked for saying this 40 years ago, but it is true and I hope we have advanced enough to not screech 'racist' when someone points out that races differ physically.

There are of course different physical types of people, black and white.
I think the commentator was thinking of Afro-Caribbean black people.
These are almost supreme in shorter, sprint races because they physically have a greater percentage of what is called 'red twitch' muscle fibre than white races. Their bodies are also a different shape, with powerful gluteus maximus muscles - they are built for speed, not for endurance running.

Other black ethnicities have the inherent physical requirements for long-distance.

There are, of course, always exceptions to every generalisation.

[dave50]

Yawn