Wednesday, May 02, 2007

Bad News for American Runners

USA Track and Field has recently banned racers from wearing headphones at any of their sanctioned events.

Rule 144.3b, sure to dramatically decrease participation in American casual running events, reads as follows,

"The visible possession or use by athletes of video or audio cassette recorders or players, TV's, CD or DVD players, radio transmitters or receivers, mobile phones, computers, or any similar devices in the competition area shall not be permitted"
I've never run a marathon and it's definitely on my to-do list one day and at one point I entertained the idea of making the New York marathon my first - not any more.

I just can't imagine running for 4 hours, fighting a body that doesn't really want to be doing what it's doing, and not have the benefit of a playlist.

They state it's for safety reasons - I'd love to see the stats as to the injuries due to running with headphones on a course where there's no vehicular traffic.