Why is the parkrun decision wrong?

An un-athletic male is likely to be quicker than most athletically inclined females which is why millions of females are rightly pissed off about this.

Why is it that when we talk about trans it’s always about “ inclusion! Kindness! Listening!” and when we talk about women it’s always about “shut up no one cares”?

I'm not seeking to change anyone's opinion - just stating my own.

Personally I think the positive effect for a trans woman being able to compete in the category that fits her identity is more significant than the slight disappointment of other women possibly dropping down by a few places.

I'm not saying the trans woman is more important that other women just that the positive for her is greater than the negative for others.

As a woman, I would be happy to accept that my ranking might change. I accept that others might not. Obviously it is difficult to achieve a balance of everyone's needs.

Everyone (men, women and children) are being penalised by a few cheating men (I highly doubt any of them even suffer from gender dysphoria).

It is similar to when they have unisex toilets to get around the single sex toilet issue. Everyone is penalised.

It is another case of people losing their rights due to a small minority.

And perhaps it brings it home to the very vocal minority of men (woke-bros?) who say they support this nonsense. IRL I've yet to meet a man who supports this stuff.

Is one of the female records still held by the 'woman' who stabbed a UK Athletics race official?

But men aren't affected by that as their stats are still accurate (as any biological females in the male category won't adversely affect a man's position any more than the same number of additional males in their category would).

An athletic trans man is likely to be quicker than plenty of less athletically inclined men in the same age group, just not as fast as the fastest men.

I expect most people doing park run really aren’t that bothered.

I think the Trans community have missed an opportunity here. They could have had had an actual competition between themselves, across the country or indeed world. A real sporting competition with others that were the same sex and gender identity of themselves, where they would have to push to win.

In which case why not start letting adults compete in children's sports

Sure the children might stop winning and might slip down a few places but so what!

Still failing to see how anyone can get annoyed about this. Why does it matter who is ahead of you? Allowing trans women to participate in the category that fits their identity might mean you slip down a few places but so what!

Because I want to compare my performance to what I can realistically achieve, given my age and sex.

These factors make a difference to your time, which is why Parkrun have categories - if an 80 year old woman could expect to run the course at the same speed as a 20 year old man, they wouldn't need categories in the first place, but they have them because an 80 year old woman wants to know how her performance stacks up against other people of a similar age and sex, and not be aiming for the completely unobtainable time of the 20 year old male.

If age and sex make a difference to one's time, they should be recorded accurately. If they don't make any difference, then why even record these factors in the first place?

The more males who register as female in my age category, the more unrealistic and unobtainable the time I'm expecting to achieve for my age/sex category becomes.

Are you saying we should just have a list of times and no reference to gender? cos there's no reason to let the male TW pretend to be females more than any other man. Either they separate by sex or they don't. TW are and always will be male.

Allowing trans women to participate in the category that fits their identity might mean you slip down a few places but so what!

Bunbury points to the fact that several female Parkrun records are now held by TW. Seeing other women set and hold records can be inspirational and motivating for other girls and women. (I know this from my preferred sport. It encourages women to take up something that is overwhelmingly male dominated.)

They are meaningful for rankings like these.

https://www.thepowerof10.info/content/itemdisplay.aspx?itemid=1273

The point is that men don’t have to wonder if they were really 5th place compared to others of their sex, or if they were actually 3rd and just got beaten by a couple of men living in fantasy land. If timings and placings matter then they should matter for men and women equally and right now we’re being told that they shouldn’t matter for us.

For me, it's the fact that they are still recording things inaccurately for women, so the weekly times are still wrong for women, where an individual has placed relative to others in their sex/age category is still wrong for women, and so on.

But men aren't affected by that as their stats are still accurate (as any biological females in the male category won't adversely affect a man's position any more than the same number of additional males in their category would).

So by not publishing as many stats or the course records, they haven't actually resolved the issue that's adversely affecting women and only women - they've simply made it less visible.

Oh ok - I do understand it now. Still failing to see how anyone can get annoyed about this. Why does it matter who is ahead of you? Allowing trans women to participate in the category that fits their identity might mean you slip down a few places but so what!

The idea that they've removed the records to be "inclusive" is pure stinking bull anyway. They've done it to try and not confront the real issue which is the fact they encourage men to register as women if they have special feelings about wearing skorts. They can't police it, tgata bloody red herring, but the don't have to officially allow or encourage it.

I think if a woman in her late 80s marching herself round a parkrun in just under an hour isn't put off by other people's records being recorded and is in fact motivated by the timing and record keeping then I don't know who the fuck has a problem with them? Who is that fucking bitter, frankly.

If you're "put off" from running a parkrun by having to confront your own lack of speed on a fucking table on an Internet page then sure as hell don't turn up to try and do one, especially not on a lapped course. I run a decent time but I get lapped by the fast bastards and it's like I'm standing still. If your ego can't take the hit then group running of any sort isn't for you. Why does someone else being fast make it any less fun for anyone, you don't have to try and beat them.

They're not getting rid of the records, they're just not publishing them. So you'll still get an email saying your gender position, but you won't know who (how many men) was ahead of you.

If it is truly non-competitive then they wouldn't bother timing it.

It’s clear that people (and runners in particular) find it motivating to have their stats and to see how they “compete”. Women are also people (shock news to some!) . They also want to see how they “compete”, but against other women, not against men (because they are at a biological disadvantage). It’s really not that hard to grasp.

The whole
“men = real men” and
“women = other to real men, namely: men who don’t want to be men; men who don’t want to be men on race day; non binaries of either sex; biological women” is just so offensive. To me at least.

So the VW 85-89 at my local who was proper pleased with her course record and sure as hell doesn't own a fucking Garmin to self-time can just piss off with her competitive attitude then, eh? Because its for everyone and we should be inclusive?

There are plenty of other ways to compete if that’s your thing.

Not always locally. And Sportiv fees tend to be substantial and exclude people who can't afford them. Officially organised events tend to need the purchase of a race pass.

Surely the whole point is that park runs are for anyone and everyone so if getting rid of records allows it to be more inclusive that’s a good thing. As someone else rightly said, it’s not the Olympics. There are plenty of other ways to compete if that’s your thing.

This idea that you can't make a rule and ask men to have the decency and self respect to follow it voluntarily is part of the problem, I think. The bar for men is on the floor.

Don't join in then. 👋

You don't need to police it. Decent men won't register as women. For those that do and start setting course records then you can have a word with them. All that we are asking is for redress where someone has abused the system. Under your "you can't stop them so don't try" system there is no redress. It really is that simple.

320,000+ people ran a parkrun this weekend. How do you propose they stop anyone self ID-ing? I could probably get an amazing age grade if I identified as 90-100 but I’m only fooling myself.
What is the solution to a man claiming the women’s course record other than to not publish them by sex?
You could have men, women and open categories but you are still relying on everyone to correctly register their sex - there is no way to police it at a mass amateur event.

They should just let people time themselves and be done with making it a race. I thought it was meant to be running for fun.