Top 3% of all marathoners, yes. Most people who run marathons do not run them to race them, they run them to complete them. Thus, the average time at the LA Marathon or similar races is around 5:30. The top 3% of people actually training and racing hard would be much faster than 2:38.

Eh- he's a mediocre marathoner and he won a bunch of endurance races that few people enter. He's an elite spokesperson and book-seller, and I guess an elite ultra-marathoner, but not marathoner, at all. I'm really impressed with ultra-marathoners and I would love to do one some day, I just don't think the competition…

None of the major marathons will put you in their "elite" field with a 2:30, and he ran a 2:38. Chicago's "elite development" minimum is 2:30- their "elite" is probably below 2:20. Just because you're in the top 3% does not make you elite in the marathon.

2:38 puts him nowhere near the border of "elite"- he needs to cut 30 minutes to compete in a big marathon, or 20 minutes to qualify for the US Olympic trials. 2:38 isn't anywhere near elite. So yes, it is a fringe sport with low participation. I love trail running and I think the best ultra guys are incredible…

Anyone interested in this story or diet for athletics, check out Matt Fitzgerald's "Racing Weight", "New Rules for Marathon and Half-Marathon Nutrition", and "Diet Cults"

Don't forget Davis Square. Is that still there? College was a long time ago.

I think the word you wanted there was "moot", not "mute".

Having doctors as parents in no way means drug free- I'm suggesting that having a doctor for a dad makes it more likely that she'd avoid PEDs.

Being wealthy and famous does not mean they are immune to wrongdoing, and I didn't imply that. I think they have every reason not to allow their daughter to get into anything illegal, like doping. She's already the best in the world for her age and among the best in the world, period. She gets caught doping now, her…

That's....amazing. It's Spike Lee meets Once a Runner.

This cannot possibly be their real personas, right? Please?

Maybe seems fishy, but "Definitely"? I don't know about that. Kara hasn't said anything about leaving because of doping either- maybe she did. But come on- she was on the team from 2004-2011. Either they were doping and she went along with it for 7 years and quit for other reasons, or she ignored the fact that they…

I don't know what that has to do with my comment, but I don't think they really cared that he was doping- they made a shitload of money off of him regardless.

A) The Cain family does not need the money. Mary Cain was world-class before she joined the Oregon Project, and her dad is an anesthesiologist at Columbia in NYC. Money is not an issue for that family. She has fame, she has money- I don't think she or her parents are compromised by either of those things.

Xenon gas is now cheating, I think the IAAF or some governing body declared it illegal just this month.

Magness is a great source, but he's pretty tightlipped about the Oregon Project, just like everyone else who has ever been associated with it. I want to believe they are at that 49.99999 mark and not over the line, but I wouldn't be shocked if they went over it.

*you're* commentating on something you admittedly know nothing about?

This is the closest I've seen anyone from inside the NOP come to saying "they are doping"....

You should start by reading the comments that have already been made so you don't duplicate what everyone else has said. I was being sarcastic- no serious runners train barefoot or in barefoot-type shoes.

"determined that gluten can cause gastrointestinal distress in even normal people"