Boston Marathon 2013 Average Finish Times by Age Group

The race was ended by explosions with 4:09 on the finish clocks, though this timing is likely elapsed time for the 3rd wave runners, which began their race 40 minutes after the elites crossed the starting line. Between the elite start and 4:09 at the finish line, this is what happened:
  • Entrants: Nearly 27,000 runners were officially entered (approximately 22,000 qualified and 5,000 ran for charities)
  • Starters: Of those entrants, 87%, or 23,336 chose to compete; 13% Did Not Start (DNS)
  • Finishers: 17,580, or 75% of starters, completed the race before the terrorist attack shut the race down.
  • Almost Finishers:  4,496 had reached 24.8 miles, but were not allowed to continue
  • Average Finish Time*: 3 hours, 29 minutes (* for the 17,580 finishers)
  • Projected Average Finish Time: We expect the race would have averaged 3:45 if all runners finished
  • Average Finish Time of Boston 2010, before Qualifying times were reduced by 5 minutes: 3:50
  • Effective improvement in field of runners in 2013: 5 minutes faster
Direct analytic comparisons with other Boston Marathon results are, at first glance, naturally impossible, because Boston 2013 was unfinished, final results never to be completely tallied. And we do make adjustments below to accomodate a fair comparison. Bust first, the basics: actual comparisons between 2010, 2012, and 2013.



Adjustments And Comparative Results

However, we did want to know how results of the 17,580 Boston 2013 finishers compared with other years, so we modified the datasets, to allow for a truly comparable set of comparisons. The adjustment: compare results for only the first 17,580 finishers in the 2010 (conditions most like 2013) and 2012 (the outlier, due to unprecedented heat). So here it is, the adjusted direct comparisons.








For more, visit our complete Boston Marathon Coverage or see www.RunTri.com.