Esther Atkins and Peter Bromka recently wrote a piece on medium called “What is the US Olympic Trials Marathon.” I read through the article and immediately wanted to have them on the show to have a conversation with them about it.

Esther is a 3 time Olympic Trials Qualifier, she won the 2014 US Marathon Championships, placed 11th at the Olympic Trials Marathon in 2016 and has run 13 marathons under 2:40 with a personal best time of 2:33.

Peter is a 2:19 marathoner and has been super open about his journey to attempt an OTQ over these last couple of years.  He has come seconds from this goal several times and if you haven’t read his piece called “The Bubble of a Dream” GO DO IT right now!!

Both of these guests need an interview of their own on the show but for today we focused on the article and what it would look like if changes were made to the US Olympic Marathon Trials!

I hope you enjoy our conversation!! Side note – the second half of the conversation, my audio gets a bit staticky, but their audio stays fine so I hope it’s not too much of an annoyance!!

What we talked about:

4:35- Introduction to Esther Atkins

7:05- Introduction to Peter Bromka

11:40- Description of the article “What is the US Olympic Marathon Trials”

20:20- Discussion on the difference between men’s and women’s Olympic Marathon Trials standards

23:55- Thoughts on watching others qualify for the Olympic Trials and how it can inspire others and keep others in the sport

30:00- Their thoughts on what USATF is planning to do with the Olympic Trails

33:40- What a B Standard infers at the Olympic Trials

37:30- How making the standards harder could either motivate or deter people to try to run those qualifiers

42:15- If they would ever make the men’s standard slower and how that inspired Peter to write this article

46:20- If they tighten the standards, will it really affect the amount of spectators even when the elite side stays the same

52:00- Ben Rosario’s response to the article and how a better prize purse can be created for individuals

57:35- How to draw more fans into the sport

1:05:45- Final thoughts on the article since it has come out

1:12:30- How media outlets and running podcasts can help to grow the sport and give a voice to all runners

1:16:45- Peter’s written piece “The Bubble of the Dream”

Connect with Esther & Peter:

Esther on Instagram

Esther on Twitter

Peter on Instagram

Peter on Twitter

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The post Episode 289: Esther Atkins & Peter Bromka – What is the US Olympic Trials Marathon? appeared first on Lindsey Hein.