Keith Vine Handicap

What’s it all about:

A race qualifies for the Handicap League if at least SIX people running as Dorset Doddlers finish the race (the only exceptions are the main Doddler organised races – North Dorset Village Marathon, the Stur Half and the Stickler, as we want to encourage members to marshal rather than race). As a result of your first Keith Vine qualifying race, a handicap pace per mile representing your average pace over a flat 10km course is calculated. This handicap pace is used to predict the time you should expect to do in your next qualifying race. Once you have a handicap time it will carry forward from race to race being adjusted to reflect your current performance.

For each race, your handicap pace is used to calculate your predicted finishing time, with adjustments made to reflect different race distances and more challenging terrain. 10mile races are assumed to increase times by 3%, half marathons by 6%, and marathons by 18% etc. Hilly courses have an additional terrain adjustment applied to reflect the increased time needed. Once the results of a race are known, your actual and predicted times are compared. The race terrain factor is then adjusted so half the runners are listed as quicker, and half slower than predicted times. This offsets the impact of on the day weather and under foot conditions. Runners, men and women on one list, are ranked according to how far they were ahead of or behind their predicted times. The person who was furthest ahead is awarded 1 point; the next person gets 2 points and so on. After each race, your handicap pace is adjusted by moving it to a point half way between where it was and where your most recent result suggests it should be. If you run a very slow race (e.g. if running socially with others, or coming back from injury for instance) the increase in your handicap pace will be limited to 10 seconds.